The First-Time Gardener: Growing Vegetables: All the know-how and encouragement you need to grow - and fall in love with! - your brand new food garden

You’re excited to plant your first vegetable garden—but where to start? In The First-Time Gardener: Growing Vegetables, you’ll find the answers you’re looking for.

*Winner of the GardenComm 2022 Media Awards Silver Award of Achievement in the Photography/Book General Readership Category*

Homesteader Jessica Sowards, the warm and energetic host of YouTube’s Roots and Refuge Farm, is the perfect teacher for new gardeners, offering not just know-how but inspiration and time-management tips for success.

Before you sink your hands into the soil, she’ll answer all those questions rolling around inside your head:
 

• Where do I put my new garden?
• How do I prepare the soil?
• What vegetables should I plant?
• Is it better to start new plants from seed or should I buy transplants?
• What about watering, feeding, and taking care of my garden?
• What do I do if bugs show up?

There are no stupid questions here. Everyone has to start somewhere, after all. Not only will you learn how to prepare, plant, and tend your first vegetable garden, you’ll also learn:
 

• How to design an eco-friendly layout
• How to grow with the seasons
• How to maximize your harvest, even if you only grow in a small space

Jessica wants your first food-growing experience to be a positive one, and she’s prepared to go the distance to make sure tending the earth becomes your new favorite hobby.

A single growing season is all it takes to fall in love with growing your own healthy, organic, nutrient-dense food. With Jessica as your guide, you’ll soon discover all the satisfactions, challenges, and great joys of growing your own food garden.

This book is part of The First-Time Gardener’s Guides series from Cool Springs Press, which also includes The First-Time Gardener: Growing Plants and Flowers and The First-Time Gardener: Raised Bed Gardening. Each book in The First-Time Gardener’s Guides series is aimed at beginner gardeners and offers clear, fact-based information that’s presented in a friendly and accessible way, including step-by-step instructions and full-color illustrations throughout.

Jessica Sowards is a homesteader and gardener who shares her journey through social media. She and her husband, Jeremiah, are raising their six children on a small hobby farm. They share their lives on their YouTube channel, Roots and Refuge Farm. She offers the insights they have gathered along the way in her books, The First-time Gardener: Growing Vegetables (March 2021) and The First-Time Homesteader (September 2022). Jessica is passionate about gardening, growing food, and equipping others to do the same.