Thank you for joining us for episode 420 of Live Happy Now.

This is National Garden Week, so it's a great time to talk about what plants and planting can do for you.

I'm your host, Paula Phelps, and this week I'm talking with Jolene Davis, a master gardener and owner of wine cottage gardens near Nashville.

Jolene has discovered the amazing power of gardening as a tool for social connection,

exercise, helping others, and mental well-being. She's here today to talk about all those benefits

and more. So let's have a listen. Jolene, thank you so much for joining me on Live Happy Now.

Well, thanks for having me. This is an exciting conversation to have because I met you over a year ago

and you have just this amazing place right outside of Nashville. It's called Wine Cottage Gardens.

So let's kick it off. It's National Garden Week.

Let's kick it off by you explaining what Wine Cottage Gardens is. Okay. It all started with a she shed,

but how common is that? So I wanted to create a wine shed. So we call it the wine cottage. And then we started to build raised beds. And it just

went off from there. So now we are vegetable farmers and a little bit of flower farming and also

beekeeping. It's pretty amazing. It's like it's a magical place and it's extensive and just absolutely beautiful.

When did you first start it and how long did it take for it to get to what it is now?

We are going into our fourth growing season and we had done row gardening. I would say about 13 years now and that was my husband's thing. I don't like row gardening. I have say about 13 years now. And that was my husband's thing. I don't like

row gardening. I have no control over the weather. I don't like to till. So I took it over and it's

been four years now. That is so very cool. And you have accomplished a lot with it. I know people

use it just as a place to come and really kind of

absorb the energy and reset themselves. But you've also used it as a tool for giving back. And

during the pandemic, I think it was five families. You said you were able to keep fed with the work

that you were doing. So how did that come about where you started saying, okay, we want to do this

as a way to give back to others? And then how did you find about where you started saying, okay, we want to do this as a way to

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