22 Sep 25 Lessons We’ve Learned Since Launching

Happy Autumn Equinox! It’s hard to believe that we launched just one equinox ago on the cusp of spring — and that the tulips and kumquats of March have been replaced by the blushing apple trees, pickling tips and dahlias on dahlias on dahlias of September. Here are some lessons we’ve learned in the six months since our little gardening gazette has gone live:

1. The garden blogging community is the warmest and most inquisitive, quirky, can-do community there is.

2. And they like to party.

3. For a day of deadheading, champagne (or a smoked porter) is your best accessory.

4. Nothing bestows a sense of place better than a sign that says, “YES, WE HAVE PRIVET” hanging in front of a nursery.

5. Surfers make excellent bonsai practitioners.

6. Love means snapping off a cutting from your “mama jade” succulent and giving it away to friends both willing and unwilling.

7. Never fight the urge to pick a Magnolia grandiflora and wear it on your head like a beret.

8. There’s no shame spiral like that brought on by a struggling tillandsia.

9. When you write a gardening blog, everyone will ask you if you know the identity of every plant on Earth.

10. Which is why @-tagging your hort expert friends is key. Or do as Tom Haverford does:

11. Plants make the best puns.

12. But those puns will not always come when summoned.

13. Californians can take home 10 pounds of beach seaweed for “personal use.” (We chose fertilizer tea, but it’s whatever floats your boat.)

14. Squishing aphids is therapeutic.

15. We still have another three months to make good on that This Is the Year We Start Composting resolution we made back in January.

16. Fake turf is the new black.

17. Wedges are not appropriate footwear for a farm visit.

18. No matter how late we are for work, we will stop to examine the bizarre cactus flower that bloomed overnight.

19. Office flowers shouldn’t be boring.

20. If you semi-ignore the wild orchid growing in your yard, it will grow like gangbusters.

21. Ferns, bromeliads, calathea >>> drab bamboo fencing.

22. After first learning the identity of a certain tree, you will suddenly start to see that tree everywhere.

23. Marriage is yard work.

24. Anyone can (and everyone should) plant a pollinator garden.

25. There are eight million Tree Stories in the naked city.