My parents gardened extensively, both decoratively and for fruits and vegetables, but I never had the time or money. I’m happy to find that I could find success gardening — conveniently and inexpensively — with very little prior knowledge. Gardening on a Shoestring is a well-conceived and very well thought-through book offering a multitude of ways to garden without spending a lot of money. Many of the ideas are based around upcycling — recycling junk to create gardening spaces and containers for one or more plants.

Gardening in boxes created from old pallets is one idea we’re looking into, and we gathered our old decorative tin containers from around the house to cover our dining nook’s window sill with a lovely and useful herb garden. I’m delighted to discover the secrets about how to deal with short-lived supermarket basil and now we ended up with several long-living plants instead. There are many, many great tips that anyone could/would actually do, including lists of easy to grow plants that require little maintenance. I’m sure this will help our family with our own gardening efforts for years to come.