From the heaviest duty to the very most minimal, Labor Day weekend can be whatever you want in the garden.

I happened to hit two extremes of gardening this last week and thought I'd share them as inspiration for your maximum, or dainty, or somewhere in between projects.

Chipper day madness:

Living in a high fire danger neighborhood, we have a wonderful service called chipper day. To encourage residents to clear out excess vegetation, you can put as many branches as you want out in the street, and the chipper comes to pick them up for free!

😍😍😍😍

This year I took full advantage. Check out this pile, a large part of which came from the oak tree directly above:

It gets better tho. That is just the *front* of the pile. See?

That was some no joke gardening!

Most of it made possible by this pole pruner. (<-- Not an affiliate link.)

On the extreme other end of the spectrum is this:

I just tied a little pink bow on this flower to mark it for seed saving. That's it for now. Tying the bow.

These are this year's zinnias that originally came from seed I bought from Floret a couple years ago. I've been saving seed from the colors I like best to see what happens.

(If you're interested in their seeds, the Floret Originals seed pre-order starts next week. <-- *not* an affiliate link)

Their seeds are very expensive, as befits the tremendous work that goes into breeding, and I was happy to support them. Not every year though! Since purchasing, I've been saving my own, and plan to continue doing so. Maybe next year I'll add another variety to my mix . . .

This particular flower with the bow has the perfect blend of salmon undertones and zingy pink at the base of the petals, along with a particularly good form. Just what I like in a zinnia!

Instead of picking the very best ones for bouquets, I mark them to leave them to go to seed. These will be the seed for next year's flowers.

To keep diversity in the batch, I'll also save seed from a few random ones too, just to see what crosses happen by accident too.

[The ones I started with, btw, are Dawn Creek Peach and Precious Metals.]

They mix especially well with bachelor button Black Magic and cosmos Rubenza. I've been making bouquets like this all summer:

All three are easy, unfussy flowers to grow from seed. It's so much less expensive than nursery starts, but for me, the real benefit is that you can get more interesting colors!

Honestly if the choice is between the bright red, yellow, and fuchsia of nursery-start zinnias and not growing them at all, I'd probably not grow them most years. (No shade on those colors - I actually quite like them - they're just not the ones I gravitate towards for everyday bouquets, and they don't really harmonize with the perennials that are already in the garden.)

As I link here in this newsletter to $100 pole pruners and $18 seed packets, I see how this starts to feel a little like one of those reviews where some beautiful, thin magazine editor in New York gushes that the $250 t-shirt is totally worth the money.

But we have to ask the question, "compared to what?"

Paying a tree pruner to cut and haul that much material would cost upwards of $2,000. We once got a quote for $5,500 to prune a similar sized tree!

So, when the choice is $100 for a tool, $2,000 + for a service, or leaving the tree full of dead material creating a fire hazard, it feels a lot different than a $250 t-shirt.

Ditto with the expensive seeds. If you buy lots of them every year, ok, it adds up. But even then, it's cheaper than nursery starts. It becomes waaaaay cheaper if you save seed from year to year.

I've been thinking a lot about money and gardening over the summer, especially the conflict between those who grow veg to save money, and those who say it's impossible to cost-effectively grow food at home. I've been working on something to share with you. Stay tuned for it next week.

And speaking of next week (and saving money!) our big end of summer sale starts next Thursday! (Add it to your calendar here so you don't miss it)​

Happy Labor Day Weekend,

Anne

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When you’re ready, here are some more ways I can help you grow a thriving garden from seed:

1. Plan your seed-starting schedule with our ​free printable planner.​

2. Download the free ​Orta Seed Starting Handbook with all the basics you need to succeed with seeds.​

3. Take the guesswork out of watering with Orta Self-Watering Pots. (Find discounted factory seconds here!)

4. Join the Orta Seed Club to have 5 hand-picked, unusual & high-yielding varieties delivered to you every season.

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