Some of the easiest to care for, hardiest plants for most climates include: marigolds, blueberry bushes, tomatoes, strawberries, sunflowers, corn, pansies, mint (be careful, mint will spread like crazy and you’ll literally never be able to rein it back in), and wildflowers like California poppies (these are fun because you can also collect the seed pods for planting again next year!).

Some thoughts:

• Children love to water plants. So either you need plants that can tolerate a lot of water or you need a garden with a really good drainage system (or both).
• Drought resistant plants are also good because if your child *forgets* to water (or you forget, because let’s face it, parenthood is rough) the plant, it’ll survive.
• Pick something that grows well in your climate. Ask at the nursery when you’re purchasing.
• Strawberries and tomatoes are great fruit plants because they’re generally pretty hardy, yield pretty fruit that’s fun to watch grow, and can also be very successfully container gardened.
• Something that’s plentiful and easy to replant is great too. We change out pansies like crazy in the kids’ raised bed, and they’re bright and colorful and can tolerate full sun.
• Wildflowers are great for kids’ gardens too because they are generally much more resilient than some of the other types of flowers you can get. They can also generally be planted thick and close, meaning they’re dramatic and full of color and don’t require careful spacing.
• Roses are pretty easy. They just need to be watered and occasionally maybe (depending on how you feel about chemicals) sprayed for aphids or leaf fungus. My kids love to help deadhead the roses (cut off the spent blooms) so much that I often have to hide the pruning clippers to avoid too-enthusiastic clipping.
• Flowers like Shasta daisies are often a good choice too, because they’re a nice hardy neat bush and can be picked for fun.

Generally, be ready for trial and error. Some amount of dying plants are to be expected. What’s easy for my kiddos may not be easy for yours, and every dead plant is a lesson learned overall.