How to Plant a Garden, by Aidan Cooper

Last week while I was at work, Brandon and the kids had a "daddy day" and planted a garden. I know this little garden is quite the envy of my cousins Noah and Heidi, and they have just been waiting for some how-to instructions from our crew. With only a little bribing by his mommy with the promise of miniature frozen pancakes, my Aidan Cooper wanted to give you his perspective, and teach all of you a lesson on how to build a garden:

I went to the store with Daddy to buy the garden stuff and they had all the stuff to make a garden grow. They had wood. That's all we gotted. And big nails and big screws. The nails are a hundred feet tall and they don't even fit in the garage and Daddy can carry the nails that are a hundred feet tall because Daddy is the strongest kid.

First, I put a little lines on the sides, then we put all the dirt in it, then Daddy got even more than me and he made all those lines in the dirt. Then he pushed all lines down in the garden when I was by the garden where the dirt was.

I only got to measure the wood and draw on it, I didn't get to cut on the wood. Daddy cut a little bit of it with his big crazy saw and he cut some of it with his saw. After Daddy cut the wood, then we made the garden and Daddy made the lines then he put the dirt in it and I took all the green stuff out of it. That's all I did. Me and Dane and Daddy put the plants in, and I got to put in the huge one.

The big tree that was there for so long and was so big and it became too far and crushed my whole house and we went to Uncle Tom and Aunt Carol and Jonathan's house. But now that's where the garden is. Where the big tree was.

I planted corn seeds and I don't know watermelon, cucumber, corn. My name is Aidan. That's all for today. See ya! I don't know which one is the watermelon. I think the first ones is corns and zucchinis. Watermelons are next. I don't like zucchinis. I want to draw! (This is how most conversations with Aidan go. Please pray for his teachers at school.)

We took a picture with Harper, Daddy took off her shirt because her shirt was too dirty when she ate-ed dinner. Then we swang and swang and swang. (Sidenote: I was mildly traumatized to come home and see about 40 pictures of my sweet little girl running around outside topless. And lets not even talk about the spears my boys are holding.)

Do not touch the garden, that's all for today. The garden needs all kinds of seeds, it needs sunshine and water. We put water on it with the hose so it can grow.

I hope we have all learned priceless lessons about garden-planting today. This is invaluable information from people who successfully grew 4 okras last year, only to learn that none of us are big okra fans.

Keep this in mind, because there's a slim chance that I might be trying to unload zucchini on you if a few months.