If the thought of starting a garden makes you sweat a little…same!

It may look like I’ve got it all figured out, but I’ve killed more plants than most people ever will in their lifetime, and my early ‘gardens’ were chaotic and choked with weeds. But somehow, here I am: a full-blown flower farmer with a huge pollinator-friendly garden, homegrown veggies, and flowers that won’t quit.

And I started from scratch! No fancy degree, no perfect soil. Just a lot of curiosity, a deep love of growing things, and a stubborn refusal to give up.

So if you’re feeling overwhelmed, know this: you don’t need to do it all perfectly. You just need to start. You will make mistakes and that’s okay!! All great gardeners kill lots of plants before they figure things out.

*What started as a weedy patch of unused grass is now a paradise for me & the wildlife!*

Everyone’s got their thing, right? For some, it’s sourdough. For others, it’s hiking, knitting, or keeping a houseplant alive for more than two weeks.

My thing is gardening. And not in a cutesy, hanging basket on the front porch kind of way. It’s more of an all-consuming obsession, a lifelong passion that cannot be stopped.

Nowadays everyone seems to want to dip their toes into gardening, but I was doing it way before it was cool. Photographic evidence below of me as a 14 year old in my sunflower patch with my little brother and sister ;)

It’s 17 years later and I hope that 14 year old Hayden would be proud of the gardens I’ve created. And no, I don’t have any formal horticultural training. My classroom was my Grandma’s multi-acre magical garden, my lessons were Monty Don’s Gardeners World reruns on BBC, and my experience came through killing lots (and lots) of plants.

*My grandma’s garden today. Still one of my favorite places on earth!*

Starting a Garden Doesn’t Have to Be Complicated

You don’t need fancy tools or perfect land. You don’t need to know what ‘hardening off’ means (yet). All you need is a little guidance, a place to plant, and the willingness to try.

To help, I’ve put together a free guide for beginners to spare you from listening to me talk your ear off about gardening next time you ask me me for garden advice ;)

Here it is, The Backyard Garden Starter Kit – simple steps, favorite tools, and plant lists to help you grow a low-stress, high-reward garden.

Join my email list to grab the free guide and get more down-to-earth gardening tips straight to your inbox. Whether you’ve got a backyard, a balcony, or just a dream, you can absolutely grow something beautiful.

Starting from the Ground Up

In the fall of 2023, I got divorced and gave up the suburban garden I had put so many years into. I moved back to my mom’s 5 acre property in the small rural town I grew up in and got to work on a brand new garden. It was overwhelming to start from scratch - there were no existing trees or shrubs or anything, it was a completely blank slate.

*August 2023, right before I moved into the little house.*

I decided to have a guy come out and till up the entire area I wanted to transform into a garden. This definitely isn’t a necessary step and it’s not even feasible in most gardens where there’s already existing landscaping.

But since this was just a weedy, compacted patch of holes and old tree stumps, I took the extra time to till the soil to level everything, loosen up the compacted ground, and break up the weeds.

*November 2023, after the area was tilled and leveled. A truly blank slate.*

*A year after moving in - the veggie garden in August 2024. The garden is surrounded by hazelnut orchards and pasture.*

Where I Got All the Plants

To fill a space this large, I needed a lot of plants. I couldn’t just run to the nursery and pick up a few pots, I needed hundreds of plants to transform the space into the jungle I envisioned.

*June 2025 - the grasses are looking so lush*

There was no way I could afford to go out and spend thousands of dollars on plants all at once. I brought a ton of plants with me from my old garden that I had been growing for years, plus dug up plants from my grandma’s garden, attended plant swaps, started plants from seed, and hunted Facebook Marketplace.

I hustled, but it meant I spent very little on plants!! Here’s some places to find free plants:

Plant Swaps

Check out your local area for clubs or groups that host plant swaps. I am part of a gardening group that meets once or twice a year to swap plants and I often go home with a car full of goodies. Try searching for Facebook groups, garden clubs, or plant sale events. It means you have to put yourself out there and actually connect with people IRL, but trust me, it’s worth it to make new gardening friends!

Gifts

Once people start recognizing you’re in need of plants, you’d be surprised at how many people start offering you starts from their gardens!! Coworkers, neighbors, friends of friends have all invited me to their gardens to dig up extras. Put it out in the world that you’re looking for freebies and so many people will be happy for you to come to their garden and do the hard work of digging up and dividing plants.

Propagation

Although it takes some practice, you can propagate tons of plants cheaply by starting seeds or taking cuttings. My first suburban garden looked bare the first year, but that was because I had tons of little babies growing behind the scenes waiting to go out in the garden. It can take a year or so to grow perennials from seeds but it saves you hundreds of dollars not buying full grown plants from the store.

Planning the Design

I wish I could tell you that I drew out my plan beautifully and mapped every plant and cross-referenced my spreadsheets to plan the perfect garden.

*This garden gets full, hot sun for most of the day. I chose plants that can withstand hot, dry conditions.*

In reality, I had a loose idea and a sketch on my iPad that included a few main components: a gravel area with a fire pit, a long gravel path going through the garden, plenty of room for pollinator-friendly perennials, and an area to grow vegetables.

There’s a lot to consider when designing gardens. What colors look good paired together? What varieties of plants do well in my conditions?

An easy way to design a garden that looks cohesive is to pick a couple components and go from there. I really love the color purple and am obsessed with grasses, so those two components guided my decisions from there.

What kinds of plants have purple flowers? What kinds of plants look good with grasses?

Where My Garden Style Inspiration Came From

When I first started a backyard garden nearly 10 years ago, I was obsessed with having a romantic cottage garden overflowing with roses and flowers. I still absolutely love that style, but it can be a little more high maintenance to keep all the flowers looking good and frankly, my tastes have changed.

There’s all sorts of styles when it comes to gardening and I’m really fond of the wild, prairie look that includes lots of tall grasses and long-stemmed flowers. In the garden world, this is often called ‘Naturalistic Gardening’ and is heavily inspired by the gardener Piet Oudolf. (I’ll share more resources on design below)

The benefits of this style of gardening is that it relies heavily on plants that are often drought-resistant, hardy to varying temperatures, and are beloved by the birds and bees. It is intended to mimic nature, not be defined by clean lines and tightly clipped edges.

I love to mix native Oregon plants in with varieties from all over the world, but what ties the plants together is their ability to withstand hot, dry summers and our wet winter. The Willamette Valley has more of a mediterranean climate, so if you’re looking for hardy plants for these conditions, use this to help guide your decisions.

You’ll also see words like ‘drought tolerant’ and ‘winter hardy’.

List of Plants I used in my Garden

Here’s an incomplete list of plants that look great in my garden. As a general rule, I chose to create a garden that is mostly lush foliage and then added in some flowering plants so the color pops against the green.

Purple & blue flowered plants:

Spring Bloomers:

Allium
Verbena bonariensis
Tulips
Salvia
Clematis
Foxglove
Iris

Summer Bloomers:

Verbena bonariensis
Nepeta
Agastache
Germander (Teucrium chamaedrys)
Echinops ritro
Echinacea

How I Decided Which Plants Went Where

My favorite part of gardening is dreaming up plant combinations with balanced color, textures, and forms. When I made decisions about which plants went where, I considered what they would look like in each season.

Prepping the Ground & Planting

I follow a series of steps with every new garden I start to ensure the weeds stay under control and I set my garden up for success.

The most important thing to remember is that any exposed ground will be filled with weeds if you don’t prevent them from growing. We live in a plant paradise, if there’s room, weeds will pop up and take over.

So first I kill the weeds as best I can depending on the site conditions. My favorite method is to lay tarps on the ground and leave them for several month so the plants and weed seeds underneath get baked by the sun and killed.

If I can’t tarp (like there’s too many existing trees or landscaping, or you can’t stand ugly tarps for months), then I will do my best to kill weeds ahead of time. In the past, I have rented a sod cutter to remove lawn, which is a ton of work but it’s way faster than waiting for a tarp to kill things. I have also tilled the ground to break up weeds, but this method still requires that you cover the ground quickly before weeds sprout again. More examples below.

*This field was tilled with a tractor to break up the compacted ground, rip out weeds, and even the holes in the ground.*

After removing weeds, I lay cardboard on the bare ground. Cardboard breaks down relatively quickly but blocks sunlight to prevent weed seeds from germinating. Then I’ll cover the cardboard with a natural mulch, such as woodchips (I get them for free from ChipDrop).

Once the area is mulched, I’ll push away mulch with my hands to cut through the cardboard, dig a hole, and plant into the ground. I’ll push the woodchips snugly around the plant to make sure there’s no exposed dirt.

In my case, this took months. It’s really labor intensive and I’m working with a HUGE space and doing all the work myself. For a much smaller garden, the cardboard/mulch/planting method could be done in a weekend.

Next Steps - Maintaining the Garden

The garden was officially all planted by the Summer of 2024 so all I had to do was keep it watered well and enjoy it!! The layers of cardboard and woodchips meant that weeding was minimal. I set up a sprinkler on a timer to water every few days through the heat of the summer, but in 2025 I water it once a week or every other week.

I know this seems like a lot, and it is, but I’m working on a huge, crazy scale. Your backyard garden will be MUCH easier to tackle, I promise!!

I summed all this up in a handy little guide that you can download for free when you join my email list, The Backyard Garden Starter Kit – simple steps, favorite tools, and plant lists to help you grow a low-stress, high-reward garden.

I’ll continue sharing more on blog to help you start your own garden successfully so leave a comment or send me an email with ideas you want me to cover next!! More on veggie gardening, flower gardening, or pollinator gardening?! Let me know!

How I Started my Garden from Scratch (and How You Can Too)