Many avid gardeners will tell you that their life-long love of plants and nature took root in their parents' or grandparents' gardens. When you share your love of gardening with children, you are planting the seeds of a lifelong passion. You can nurture that budding interest by keeping the focus on fun. So take a break from the mowing and weeding for a little while and spend some time down in the dirt with your kids. Here are some activities you'll both enjoy.

Ages 2-3: Kids this age love mucking with soil – just digging a hole and filling it with water is an adventure. While it's too early for them to handle plants, kids at this age are enthralled by worms, bugs and butterflies. Think about installing a toad house. Show them what plant roots look like by pulling a few weeds. Let them help with a pint-sized watering can. Just be sure you're always on the spot: toddlers can easily go too far "helping," pulling out every annual that you've just planted.

Ages 4-5: For kids in this age group, gardens make great playgrounds. Encourage secret hide-a-ways, such as forts made from giant sunflowers, or a teepee enclosed with climbing pole beans. Let them pick some flowers and dismember them - try bleeding hearts, snapdragons and daises. Give them their own kid-sized tools and a spot to dig and water. Show how plants start from sprouted seeds. Help them sow some large seeds in pots - radishes and marigolds, for example - so they can experience the birth of a plant close up.

Ages 6-7: Kids this age are ready for their own small 4x4-foot patch where they can grow annual flowers and veggies. Let them choose the plants, but encourage choices that are easy and fast-growing. Give them wooden plant tags and pencils to make plant labels. Another fun project: building a scarecrow. Remember that "doing" is the important part, so relax your standards: crooked rows and a few weeds are ok; so is mixing and matching with abandon. As bees, butterflies and insects visit the plants, show kids that these too belong in the garden. Insects pollinate flowers and are food for birds and other animals; even pests are interesting to watch and learn from.

Ages 8-10: Kids' involvement in the garden can be more sophisticated now. They can pore over garden catalogues or visit the nursery with you to make their own choices. Try a family project like planting a pizza garden. Kids at this age can even enter their flowers and veggies into the local fairs or community events. You can also ask them to help with garden chores like weeding and fertilizing, but be sure to join in - many hands make light work. If you're doing an outdoor project, like building a patio or an arbor, you may even be able to press your kids' friends into service.

Ages 11-12 and beyond: Kids this age may be budding chefs who like to cook with home-grown produce, or they may be emerging naturalists or florists. Good projects for this age are theme gardens. Gardens are the perfect living laboratory for school projects on nature and ecology. By donating extra vegetables from the garden to the local food bank, you introduce kids to the satisfaction of helping others and you encourage a habit of community involvement. Kids who learn to appreciate plants and cared-for landscapes from a young age will mature into teens that are respectful of people, trees and properties in the community. Some kids even start their own summer garden businesses, mowing neighborhood lawns, selling homegrown flowers, or taking care of flowerbeds.