How to Keep Up With Your Garden When Life is Crazy Busy with These Steps to Simplify Your Gardening Chores

Between kids' activities, work deadlines, endless laundry, and trying to get a halfway decent dinner on the table, it can feel intimidating to also keep a garden alive. But if you’ve dreamed of feeding your family fresh food straight from the backyard, I promise—it is possible and SO worth it! You don’t need to be outside for hours every day, and you don’t need to feel guilty if life gets hectic. You just need a few strategies to keep your garden thriving without adding stress to your already full plate.

Here’s how to keep up with your garden even when life is crazy busy with steps to simplify your gardening chores.

1. Start Small and Stay Focused

When time is limited, less really is more. Instead of trying to grow everything, pick a handful of crops your family loves and will actually eat. Think tomatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, or herbs. You’ll save yourself the overwhelm and still enjoy plenty of fresh produce.

Reflect on this: What does my family eat every week? Start there!

2. Set Yourself Up For Success from The Beginning

If you’re just getting started in gardening (or need to revise your plan for next year), here’s three things I would do to make garden life easier:

• Garden in raised beds or containers and fill them with high quality, weed free soil - this keeps your garden neat and manageable PLUS raised beds and containers help enormously when it comes to keeping weeds out of your space

• Plant seeds densely in blocks rather than rows - less space between plants allows for less weeds and also shades the ground as the plants grow, aiding in moisture retention during the dog days of summer. 

• Automate your water - I will scream it from the rooftops…get an automated timer and install a drip or soaker irrigation in your garden! This is an economically friendly, easy to install way to do so much less maintenance in your garden. It gives you the freedom to ignore your garden when you need to. 

3. Create a “Garden Rhythm”

You don’t need hours in the garden every day… although your soul may need it. Instead, build a quick rhythm that fits your lifestyle. If you could garden for just 15-30 minutes every WEEK after the initial planting season, could you make that happen? I bet you can!

• 5 minutes per day: hand water (if needed) and do a quick check.

  
  

  Although by now I hope you’ve installed your automatic watering system (here’s a “how-to” guide if you haven’t yet), you should still check on soil moisture and adjust accordingly. The soil should be moist but never swampy and dry out ever so slightly before night. This prevents rot. But while a drip or soaker system does wonders for the roots of plants, the surface moisture can burn off during the hottest days so the surface of your garden soil may need a little hand watering love every so often, especially when you still have young, delicate plants that haven’t grown big enough leaves to shade the ground yet.

• 10 minutes every few days: weed or trim the spots that bug you most.

  
  

  Weeds are notoriously a gardener's nemesis but can I let you in on a little secret? They’re really not so bad. While you certainly don’t want to allow weeds to run rampant and go to seed all over your beautiful garden, its okay to let some baby weeds pop up into plants that are easy to pluck, taking the whole root with it. Just pull the weeds you notice as you hand water or as you take your daily stroll around your garden to see how things are growing (I know you do it too).

• Once a week: harvest and tidy.

Don’t wait for the massive chore of harvesting everything at once. Plan your garden so that different produce becomes ready at different times and harvest veggies that are ready to eat or can finish ripening off the plant, like “blushing” tomatoes. Check your garden for what you can harvest and plan it into your family’s meals in the next week. Don’t try to hold off to get an entire bushel of carrots or 50 pounds of tomatoes at once unless you’ve slotted time for processing, canning, and freezing. 

After you harvest, take a short amount of time to tidy the garden. Use your harvest scissors or shears to cut away dead leaves and deadhead (pinch off) old flowers. Tie up vines that have strayed or stake plants that are untamed. Out with the old to make room for the new! You don't have to conquer it all in one day but make a weekly task to tackle an area of your garden so its fresh and rejuvenated.

This rhythm turns gardening from one big overwhelming task into little pockets of joy you can manage.

4. Use Mulch Like It’s Your Best Friend

Mulch is hands-down the busiest gardener’s secret weapon. A thick layer of straw  or wood chips keeps weeds down and holds in moisture, meaning less watering and weeding for you. Lay it down once and thank yourself later. It’s best to lay mulch once the soil temperatures are warm and young plants have sprouted. Put about 2-3 inches down and the layer will act as a weed barrier all summer as well as an insulator as cooler temperatures set in during the fall. 

5. Plant Smart (Low Maintenance Wins)

Choose plants that don’t need constant babysitting. Leafy greens, beans, zucchini, and herbs are forgiving and keep producing with little attention. Skip the divas (like peppers, cabbage, and melons) if this season of life feels too hectic. 

5. Give Yourself Permission to Let “Good Enough” Be Enough

Your garden doesn’t have to look like the picture-perfect Pinterest board. A few weeds? Totally fine. Crooked rows? Doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you’re nourishing your family with fresh, healthy food that you grew yourself. 

Bonus: Make Meals Simple With What You Have

Keep a short list of “garden-to-table meals” your family loves—like roasted veggie sheet pans, pasta with fresh herbs, or cucumber salad. That way when you harvest, you don’t waste time wondering how to use it.

Final Encouragement

Your garden is meant to support your life, not add stress to it. It’s important to remember your “why.” Your garden doesn’t have to win any beauty contests to achieve its purpose of getting you and your family outdoors, producing healthy food right in your backyard, and replacing store bought with farm fresh. Don’t lose sight of that when things get hectic! Gardens are much more resilient than we give them credit for. With the right mindset and a few smart shortcuts, you’ll find that keeping up with your backyard garden—even during life’s busiest seasons—is absolutely possible. And when you sit down to a meal made with your own fresh-picked produce, you’ll know every little effort was worth it.

Want to make garden life easier? Grab my free 15 Minute Garden Chores Guide!