Garden Goal Setting for the New Year – Ep. 281
Just Grow Something | Evidence-Based Home GardeningDecember 23, 2025x
281
00:25:5423.72 MB

Garden Goal Setting for the New Year – Ep. 281

We’ve reached the end of another gardening year. Maybe your garden was spectacular. Maybe it was just so-so. Maybe it was an absolute disaster in certain beds and you’re still a little salty about the squash vine borers.

However it went, this is a powerful moment in the gardening calendar.

Today we’re going to slow down and talk about taking time to reflect on the past season, reset your expectations, and reimagine what you want from your garden next year.

Extension programs and planning guides consistently recommend end-of-season evaluation, note-taking, and mapping as key pieces of long-term garden success. Research on goal-setting shows that specific, challenging, and meaningful goals help people follow through and actually change their behavior.

So, in this final episode of the year, we’re going to weave those two ideas together:

1. Why the end of the year is the best time to reflect on your garden

2. What goal-setting research can teach us about making better garden goals

3. Turning reflection into 3–5 clear, realistic goals for next year

4. A healthier mindset for handling “failures” and unexpected seasons

By the end, you’ll have a framework to close the book on this year’s garden and open a new one with intention.

Let’s dig in.

References and Resources:

Iowa State University Extension – Yard and Garden. “Garden Journaling.”: https://yardandgarden.extension.iastate.edu/how-to/garden-journaling

Locke, E. A., & Latham, G. P. “Building a Practically Useful Theory of Goal Setting and Task Motivation.” American Psychologist, 2002: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12237980/

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00:00:00
Hello my gardening friends and welcome back to the Just Grow

00:00:02
Something podcast. We have reached the end of

00:00:06
another gardening year. Maybe your garden was

00:00:08
spectacular. Maybe it was fine and maybe it

00:00:12
was an absolute disaster and you are still a little salty about

00:00:15
those squash vine bores. However it went, this can be a

00:00:19
powerful moment in our gardening calendar.

00:00:21
Today we are going to slow down and we are going to talk about

00:00:24
what we can think of as sort of an offseason superpower, taking

00:00:29
the time to reflect on the past season, reset your expectations

00:00:34
and reimagine what you want from your garden for next year.

00:00:38
This isn't just feel good journaling because you know

00:00:40
that's not something I'm extension programs and planning.

00:00:43
The guides consistently recommend end of season

00:00:46
evaluation and note taking and mapping as key pieces of long

00:00:51
term garden success. And research on goal setting

00:00:55
shows that specific, challenging, and meaningful

00:00:58
goals will help people follow through and actually change

00:01:02
their behavior. So today, on Just Grow

00:01:04
Something, we are going to weave those two ideas together.

00:01:08
We'll cover why the end of the year is the best time to reflect

00:01:11
on your garden, what goal setting research can teach us

00:01:15
about making better garden goals, turning reflection into 3

00:01:19
to 5 clear realistic goals for next year, and a healthier

00:01:23
mindset for handling failures and unexpected seasons.

00:01:27
By the end, you will have a framework to close the book on

00:01:30
this year's garden and open a new one with intention.

00:01:34
Let's dig in. Hey, I'm Karen and what started

00:01:37
as a small backyard garden 20 years ago turned into a lifelong

00:01:40
passion for growing food. Now as a market farmer and

00:01:43
horticulturist, I want to help you do the same.

00:01:46
On this podcast, I am your friend in the garden teaching

00:01:49
evidence based techniques to help you grow your favorites and

00:01:52
build confidence in your own garden space.

00:01:55
So grab your garden journal and a cup of coffee and get ready to

00:01:57
just grow something. So I know I harp on the garden

00:02:04
journal a lot and I have been very clear about the fact that I

00:02:08
am not a journaler in the traditional sense.

00:02:11
But why does reflection of some sort matter in the garden?

00:02:16
I think as gardeners we are really good at asking what

00:02:19
should I plant or when should I plant this right?

00:02:22
And we are less likely to pause and ask what actually happened

00:02:26
and what do I want to be different in the garden next

00:02:30
year? So an end of season review,

00:02:33
whether that's making notes on varieties or taking notes about

00:02:37
your layout or your pest issues. And thinking about your timing

00:02:41
can actually help us to plan better for next year because our

00:02:46
memory is terrible for details like which of those tomato

00:02:51
varieties cracked the least, or which bed had the worst flea

00:02:55
beetle problem, or when did I actually get the first ripe

00:02:58
pepper right? If we have written records and

00:03:02
we kind of take some deliberate reflection, we can turn our

00:03:06
garden into more of like a long term experiment instead of just

00:03:10
this random series of seasons that just happened by, well,

00:03:14
happenstance, right? On the personal side, there are

00:03:19
extension and gardening therapy resources that point out that

00:03:24
true journaling can also reduce stress and help you notice what

00:03:29
brought you joy and deepen your sense of connection with your

00:03:34
garden and with the seasons. So reflection is both practical

00:03:39
and emotional. The practical side, which is the

00:03:42
side that I'm really good at is, you know, going to help us with

00:03:45
better planning and give us fewer repeated mistakes.

00:03:49
The emotional side might be recognizing the wins that we had

00:03:53
in the garden, learning from our frustrations and sort of closing

00:03:57
the gardening year with a sense of completion instead of just

00:04:02
random guilt about the number of weeds that we let grow in the

00:04:05
garden or whatever, right? This doesn't have to be

00:04:08
complicated. We can keep it very simple and

00:04:10
very structured and we can start with just doing like a year end

00:04:14
review, right? If we look at focusing on what

00:04:19
we did and what happened and what we want to change, that's a

00:04:26
really good start. So think about first what worked

00:04:30
well, let's start with the wins, right?

00:04:32
This isn't just like, you know, feel good things making us feel

00:04:36
good about what we did. It's actual data.

00:04:37
And you know, I'm very data-driven.

00:04:39
So, you know, ask yourself which crops performed best, whether

00:04:42
that was through yield or flavor or reliability, whatever your

00:04:47
gauge is for performance, which variety stood out as favorites,

00:04:51
which beds or containers seemed especially productive?

00:04:56
What new thing did you try that you would like to repeat?

00:05:00
Was it a new interplanting? Was it a new type of mulch?

00:05:04
A new trellis style? What whatever it was that worked

00:05:07
well for you that you would like to do again.

00:05:10
You know, noting your favorite varieties for flavor or disease

00:05:13
resistance or performance right after the season ends, while

00:05:17
your memories are still fresh is going to be a lot more

00:05:19
effective. So write these things down.

00:05:22
These are our list of things that we're going to keep doing,

00:05:25
right? And then we can reflect on what

00:05:27
didn't work and why. List out those frustrations, but

00:05:32
without beating yourself up over it, OK.

00:05:34
There is nothing, you know, moral about any of this.

00:05:37
It's just what happened, right? So which crops may be

00:05:40
underperformed or completely failed?

00:05:44
Did you have repeated pest or disease issues in certain beds?

00:05:48
Were there crops that never made it into the ground because the

00:05:51
timing got away from you? I had a few of those.

00:05:54
Did anything feel like it was just too much work for the

00:05:59
payoff that you got, or maybe it took up too much room for what

00:06:03
you got out of it? A key piece of information to

00:06:07
add here is the possible reason for these things, even if you're

00:06:11
not 100% sure that that's the reason.

00:06:13
So, you know, if, you know, the tomatoes didn't do well because

00:06:16
you got late blight and, you know, maybe you recognize that

00:06:21
there was just not enough airflow in that corner of the

00:06:23
garden, right? Or your carrots, the little

00:06:27
Divas that they are, had really poor germination.

00:06:30
And you realize, thinking back on it while the soil had crusted

00:06:33
over. So you know, that maybe they

00:06:35
weren't getting enough moisture or they weren't retaining that

00:06:38
moisture. They weren't protected, right?

00:06:40
The peas didn't do well. Well, maybe, you know, you think

00:06:43
about the timing and Oh yeah, those probably got planted too

00:06:46
late and we hit a heat wave just as they were starting to ready.

00:06:50
So this type of journaling can guide us to emphasize, you know,

00:06:56
the patterns that we see, identify the patterns that we

00:06:59
see, where things went wrong and which conditions were present so

00:07:03
that we can adjust those things for next season.

00:07:07
And if you can write down things like how your layout and your

00:07:10
rotation work. So even if even if you didn't do

00:07:13
like a formal crop plan or map, you can still reflect on the

00:07:17
placement of the things that were in your garden.

00:07:20
Did certain beds get too much shade or, you know, or not

00:07:24
enough shade? Did the tall crops shade out the

00:07:27
shorter ones where you had them positioned?

00:07:29
Did the pests or the diseases keep showing up in the same

00:07:32
locations? Right.

00:07:33
If you can and you don't already have one, you can sketch out a

00:07:37
quick map of this year's garden and you can label the location

00:07:41
of your major crops so that you can maybe work on a rotation for

00:07:45
next year. And then, you know, how did the

00:07:48
garden fit into your life? Like this is the part that we

00:07:53
often skip. OK, Did you enjoy being in the

00:07:57
garden or did it feel like just a chore most of the season and

00:08:01
you didn't really want to get out there?

00:08:04
And if you forced yourself to get out there, did you enjoy it

00:08:07
while you were in there or, you know, once you were finally

00:08:10
done, were there parts of the garden that were easy to care

00:08:14
for? Or were there some that just

00:08:17
constantly nagged at you and you just felt like you couldn't do

00:08:20
enough in that spot? Were your gardening time

00:08:24
expectations realistic given your work and your family and

00:08:30
your other commitments? This matters because the garden

00:08:34
should be enjoyable. Even if your main goal for your

00:08:37
garden is to provide for your family in some way, you

00:08:41
shouldn't feel, you know, beholden to what is going on on

00:08:45
there. Your your goals for next year

00:08:47
should fit your actual life, not some fantasy schedule of you

00:08:52
know, hey, I can do it all right.

00:08:54
So this is something to reflect on.

00:08:57
And then once you've, you know, reflected a little bit, the next

00:09:01
step is to capture what happened this year in some form that you

00:09:07
can revisit when it's time to start planning.

00:09:09
So, you know, the the classic garden journal is just a

00:09:12
notebook or a binder, or it can just be a digital document of

00:09:17
some sort, right? I mean, it could be, you know,

00:09:20
an Excel spreadsheet if that's what you want to use.

00:09:22
But you should record what you planted, where you planted it,

00:09:26
when you planted it, the different varieties that you

00:09:30
planted and the sources of where you got those seeds, which you

00:09:33
know, if you've got a seed inventory that you that you've

00:09:36
built, then you may already have that information in there.

00:09:39
We should be annotating the weather and any extreme events.

00:09:43
Like there was a year out here where we flooded 3 times in one

00:09:47
season. That was an extreme event, not

00:09:50
something that happens every year, but it was something I

00:09:52
noted that year, right? Tests and diseases, you know,

00:09:55
and how you handled them, your harvest dates and, you know,

00:09:59
roughly what your yields are. I have a notebook if I can find

00:10:02
it. Yeah, it's right here.

00:10:04
You know, I've got a little notebook that I keep right where

00:10:07
I kind of clean and prep our vegetables when I bring them in.

00:10:10
And as I'm bringing them in, I'm weighing out what it was, you

00:10:15
know, how many pounds of tomatoes I got that day, how

00:10:17
many quarts of hot Peppers I got that day.

00:10:19
Now, do you have to be that specific?

00:10:21
No. But having a rough idea is going

00:10:23
to help you to plan for next year, you know, and then any

00:10:26
other thoughts and I ideas or you know, oh gosh, next year I

00:10:30
should do XY and Z when it comes up, write it down or type it in

00:10:34
or whatever. You know, this can be a really,

00:10:37
really powerful tool for just becoming a better gardener

00:10:41
because we can learn from our mistakes and we can remember

00:10:44
what worked. Another thing that's very

00:10:47
valuable is like maps or diagrams, right?

00:10:51
So at a minimum, if you can sketch out your garden beds or

00:10:55
your main containers that you're using and what major crop

00:10:58
families grew where this is going to help you with crop

00:11:02
rotation. Now, of course, they're, you

00:11:04
know, the guidelines basically say that we should have, you

00:11:07
know, a three to four bed sort of system where the different

00:11:10
crops move each year. And using a map or a diagram is

00:11:15
going to be helpful in this because you won't have to rely

00:11:17
on memory. Like where did I have the

00:11:18
tomatoes two years ago? I know where I had them this

00:11:21
year, but where were they the year before it?

00:11:23
It keeps you from rotating them into the the wrong bed.

00:11:26
Right now, if you're like me and you do a lot of intercropping,

00:11:32
it may not be as necessary every year to rotate unless you are

00:11:37
experiencing diseases and pests specific to those major crop

00:11:40
families. But having a record of what has

00:11:43
been planted where in which season is going to help you with

00:11:47
your planning for sure. And then finally, you know,

00:11:51
photos or and you know, digital notes of some sort, like even if

00:11:56
you don't write down what was going on, if you take pictures

00:12:00
throughout the season, you can see how the beds filled in over

00:12:04
the season. You can remember when certain

00:12:07
perennials, you know, popped up out of the ground or started

00:12:10
blooming. You can compare the timing of

00:12:13
these things across the years if you keep these photos from year

00:12:17
to year. So you can basically create a

00:12:19
simple photo album on your phone, label it with the

00:12:22
gardening year and you have an automatic record of what has

00:12:25
happened. If you take photos along the

00:12:28
way, you know those photos are time stamped in the meta

00:12:31
description. You could even short, you know,

00:12:32
add little captions to it like, you know, first ripe tomato July

00:12:36
25th or you know, powdery mildew showed up this week in the

00:12:38
garden, whatever it is. So whether you're a paper person

00:12:43
or a digital person or somewhere in between, the key basically is

00:12:46
just consistency. Capture enough to be useful

00:12:49
without over complicating it So now that we've looked back,

00:12:54
let's talk about looking forward with some intention and what

00:12:59
goal setting science can teach us as gardeners.

00:13:03
So psychologist Edwin Locke and Gary Latham have spent decades

00:13:07
studying how goals affect performance.

00:13:11
So their research, which is often called goal setting

00:13:14
theory, shows that specific and challenging goals lead to much

00:13:20
better outcomes than just they egg do your best intentions

00:13:25
across a lot of different tasks. And they have identified a few

00:13:29
key principles of effective goals.

00:13:31
And I think that we can borrow some of these and put them into

00:13:36
our garden planning. The first one would be clarity,

00:13:39
right? Goals should be specific and

00:13:42
unambiguous. So a goal of harvest 30 pints of

00:13:47
green beans is much clearer than I just want to grow more green

00:13:51
beans next year. OK, very specific.

00:13:54
The second one would be challenge.

00:13:55
Goals should be challenging but realistic.

00:13:59
So if the goal is too easy, then it's not going to be very

00:14:02
motivating. If it's too hard and almost

00:14:04
unattainable, well then it's going to be discouraging.

00:14:07
So we have to kind of find a happy medium somewhere.

00:14:09
The third would be commitment. You're more likely to follow

00:14:12
through on goals that you care about and believe that you can

00:14:16
achieve. The 4th would be feedback.

00:14:19
You need some way to track progress and adjust, which is

00:14:22
where your journal and your notes come in, right?

00:14:25
And then the 5th is task complexity.

00:14:27
The more complex the goal, the more it helps to break it into

00:14:31
sub goals and steps. Now, we're not going to turn the

00:14:35
garden into like a corporate performance review, but we can

00:14:38
borrow what works from these kind of key principles, right?

00:14:43
So instead of just saying I want a better garden, we can be very

00:14:46
specific and say I want to harvest salad greens from my own

00:14:50
garden at least three times a week from, you know, April

00:14:54
through June. That's a realistic goal

00:14:57
depending on where you live and depending on the size of your

00:15:00
garden. And you can plan around that

00:15:04
very specific goal. You know, instead of saying, oh

00:15:07
I really should rotate my crops, No, you say I will set up a

00:15:11
simple 4 bed family rotation and I will stick to it for the next

00:15:15
three years. I mean, these are goals that you

00:15:17
can plan around and measure, right?

00:15:21
So now let's connect the dots between that garden reflection

00:15:25
and those very specific goals that we have set.

00:15:28
Most gardeners are going to benefit from choosing 3 to 5

00:15:32
main goals for the upcoming year rather than just a huge list

00:15:37
because this keeps things focused and achievable.

00:15:41
So you know, let's there's some categories that you might choose

00:15:45
from and, and we'll give you some evidence that goes along

00:15:48
with it. So the first one might be like

00:15:50
harvest and yield goals. So if your main frustration was,

00:15:54
you know, you didn't produce enough food or you produced too

00:15:57
much of one thing, then you might set specific goals that

00:16:01
will say, you know, harvest enough paste tomatoes to make

00:16:05
and freeze 12 quarts of sauce. This gives you a way to plan

00:16:11
because you can figure out, well if I need 12 quarts of sauce,

00:16:13
then I know how many pounds of paste tomatoes goes into each

00:16:17
one of those quarts and you back that out and you go, well now

00:16:20
OK, I know how many pounds on average a paste tomato plant

00:16:25
will produce. Boom.

00:16:27
Now you know how many tomato plants you need, right?

00:16:30
So another one might be grow a continuous supply of lettuce

00:16:32
from mid spring to early summer by succession sewing every two

00:16:37
weeks. This gives you a very clear path

00:16:41
in your plan. OK, so think in terms of how

00:16:44
you'll use the harvest and set your planning of your plantings

00:16:49
accordingly. The second goal sort of category

00:16:53
might be your soil health and crop rotation.

00:16:56
So if you struggled with diseases or nutrient issues or

00:17:00
your soil just sort of seems, I don't know, tired, like I don't

00:17:05
know how to describe that. But if it just doesn't seem like

00:17:07
your soil is very vibrant anymore, then you might need to

00:17:10
implement some crop rotation or a very specific set of goals in

00:17:15
terms of like amending your soil.

00:17:17
So you know we talked about that, you know that goal to

00:17:20
implement A4 bed crop rotation system and sticking to it,

00:17:24
right? Another goal might be adding one

00:17:27
to two inches of finished compost to each bed at the end

00:17:31
of the year or in each bed before planting the spring

00:17:34
crops. Whatever it is, rotation and

00:17:37
organic matter additions are simple things that we can do for

00:17:42
improving, you know, with resilience and reducing the pest

00:17:44
and disease pressure over time in our gardens.

00:17:47
And so this is a very valuable goal that you could set for

00:17:49
yourself. But it has to be specific,

00:17:51
right? The third category might be

00:17:54
disease and pest management. If you have certain problems

00:17:57
that keep recurring, then you might set a goal to choose at

00:18:01
least two tomato varieties that have documented resistance to

00:18:05
the disease that I have been battling and avoid planting

00:18:10
tomatoes in the same bed as last year.

00:18:12
If you need help with that, go Back to this day episode that we

00:18:15
did on the seed catalogs and we talked about you know how to

00:18:20
look for disease resistant varieties, right?

00:18:23
Another goal might be use row cover on the brassicas from the

00:18:27
time they go on the ground until they are established to reduce

00:18:31
the Caterpillar damage. OK, Again, we're being very

00:18:34
specific. These goals combine like the

00:18:37
variety choice with cultural practices.

00:18:41
And so that is how we work through pest management, OK, and

00:18:45
disease management. That's what we're going to

00:18:47
emphasize. Your next goal might be on time

00:18:52
and organization. So if you felt overwhelmed in

00:18:55
the garden, there was too much going on, then maybe your goal

00:18:58
would be to reduce the planting area by 1 bed and focus on

00:19:03
maintaining the remaining beds really, really well.

00:19:06
Or you might put the garden journal as a goal.

00:19:09
You might say I will use a simple garden journal and a

00:19:13
monthly checklist to plan the main tasks each month.

00:19:18
You know, garden journaling and planning calendars are

00:19:20
repeatedly recommended as tools to help organize tasks and to

00:19:24
reduce stress and possible chaos in the garden.

00:19:28
And so if this is something that you have struggled with, this

00:19:30
might be one of your goal categories, right?

00:19:34
Lastly, it might be something as simple as learning and

00:19:36
experimentation. If you enjoy experimenting but

00:19:41
you know chaos starts to sneak in every time you try, then

00:19:45
maybe you just make a goal to only choose two new crops or

00:19:49
techniques to try next year and record the results in your

00:19:53
garden journal instead of doing the whole laundry list of things

00:19:56
that you try Willy nilly. OK, I may or may not be speaking

00:19:59
from experience here, you know, or you might just set a goal to

00:20:02
attend. At least one local gardening

00:20:06
class or extension workshop and apply one thing that you learn

00:20:11
into your garden. OK, so the key would be to like

00:20:13
limit the number of experiments so that they're fun and they're

00:20:16
informative and they don't lead to chaos and exhaustion.

00:20:20
Just pick a mix of those different categories that we

00:20:24
just talked about and, you know, just pick what aligns with what

00:20:29
you reflected on in the garden, I think is the best way to say

00:20:32
it. So, you know, pick one of those

00:20:33
categories or two of those categories and and make yourself

00:20:36
some goals that are based on what it was that you saw in the

00:20:39
garden. At the risk of sounding too woo

00:20:43
woo in all of this, I think we need to talk about mindset.

00:20:47
So you know, bad years, you know, I'm using air bunnies

00:20:52
here. Bad garden years can actually

00:20:54
end up being some of the most informative and ones that we

00:20:59
really do learn from, especially if we record what happened and

00:21:03
we adjust from it. Okay, so I think we need to put

00:21:08
a few reminders out as we set these goals, though number one

00:21:11
is we are not in control of the weather or the pests in most

00:21:15
instances, OK? So our goals should focus on

00:21:20
actions that we can take, not outcomes that we can't

00:21:24
guarantee. So, you know, for example, if

00:21:27
you struggled with, you know, not staying on a watering

00:21:31
schedule, then your goal could be install drip, drip irrigation

00:21:36
beef for the heat hits in July. Your goal would not be, I'm

00:21:41
never going to let anything get dried out because that doesn't,

00:21:43
that's not a positive goal, right?

00:21:45
And that's, that's not something that you can guarantee.

00:21:48
You need to, to focus on the action that you're going to take

00:21:51
to prevent that from happening. Not that you're just going to

00:21:53
prevent it from happening, right?

00:21:54
Or you could say I'm going to practice trap cropping for

00:21:57
squash bugs rather than, you know, I'm not going to let the

00:22:00
squash bugs wreak havoc this year, right?

00:22:03
Just that little mindset shift moves us from being reactive to

00:22:07
being proactive. And it also prevents any kind of

00:22:11
shame around something that didn't work out even when you

00:22:14
tried your best, right? So if you do get that drip

00:22:17
irrigation installed before the heat of the summer hits and

00:22:21
something ends up happening, it's not your fault.

00:22:25
Again, Air Bunny's here, OK? It it wasn't anything that you

00:22:28
did. You did what you could to be

00:22:29
proactive. You're not reacting to things.

00:22:32
OK. The second thing to remember, I

00:22:34
think is imperfection is absolutely normal.

00:22:38
Even really experienced gardeners like myself and

00:22:42
somebody who does this professionally, we experience

00:22:46
crop failures and pest outbreaks and diseases that hit.

00:22:50
OK. It's, it's one of those cases

00:22:53
of, you know, if this happens, try this next year, you will see

00:22:59
that advice all over the place and extension materials and, and

00:23:03
master gardener classes and, and you know, even the, the

00:23:06
scientific journals and stuff, which assumes that things will

00:23:11
go sideways sometimes. OK, I have manuals, I have

00:23:15
commercial, you know, references for commercial farmers that sit

00:23:20
on my shelf behind me and they are filled with things about

00:23:25
pest management and disease management and everything else.

00:23:27
OK, those resources are out there for a reason because it

00:23:32
happens. So it's OK for things to go

00:23:35
sideways in the garden, especially if you feel like you

00:23:37
have tried everything and it still just doesn't seem to work

00:23:40
out. All right.

00:23:42
And I think we need to recognize that reflection is not blame.

00:23:49
It's about information, OK? If you are looking back on your

00:23:53
garden season and you're like, my tomatoes struggle with

00:23:56
disease, OK, That's not a moral failure.

00:23:58
It's just a data point, all right?

00:23:59
And that just might lead you to decide to try some resistant

00:24:02
varieties or change up your spacing or do a different crop

00:24:06
rotation. OK.

00:24:08
There is, I guess, a mental health benefit of reflection.

00:24:16
It helps us to process disappointments.

00:24:20
It also helps us to notice what we did accomplish, what we were

00:24:24
successful in and sort of carry forward that like hope and

00:24:29
curiosity into the next season. So, you know, if you end up the

00:24:34
season on a note of, you know, I don't think that was a really

00:24:38
good season at all, but then you sit down and you can find those

00:24:42
one or two bright points in there, then that just kind of

00:24:46
helps propel us forward for the next season.

00:24:47
So think of it as a conversation with your future self.

00:24:50
Like, here's what we learned this year, and here's how we're

00:24:54
going to make next year just a little bit better.

00:25:00
Thank you, my gardening friend, for spending another gardening

00:25:04
year with me here on the podcast.

00:25:06
Whether your season was incredible or challenging or

00:25:10
somewhere in between, it all counts.

00:25:13
Every season teaches us something if we take the time to

00:25:17
listen. I know that I learned more than

00:25:19
my fair share of lessons in the garden this year.

00:25:22
I am looking forward to another year of learning and growing

00:25:26
together. I am going to take next week off

00:25:28
of the podcast to start digging into my garden planning and

00:25:32
preparing for the next season of the show.

00:25:35
I look forward to reconnecting with you in the new year and

00:25:39
charging full steam ahead into all things gardening.

00:25:44
Until next year, my gardening friends, keep on cultivating

00:25:47
that dream garden, and we'll talk again soon.