Fostering Blooms
Fostering Blooms
Podcast Description
Two friends, one passion for gardening. Welcome to Fostering Blooms — where the beauty of the garden is designed for life. Join Shannon Foster-Boline and Caitlyn Blum, two friends and neighbors, as they cultivate stunning gardens and bring the richness of nature into their homes. From growing lush English-style borders to designing pastoral homesteads, they’ll guide you through every bloom, bounty, and blunder along the way.
Alongside garden projects, they’ll dive into garden design, cooking with homegrown vegetables, and creating floral arrangements with the flowers they grow. It’s not just about cultivating beautiful spaces — it’s about using the garden to nourish the home, table, and soul. Don't miss our recurring "Garden Ready" series — monthly episodes packed with essential tasks to keep your garden thriving through every season. Whether it’s pruning in winter or harvesting in fall, you'll know exactly what to focus on each month.
With a love for flowers, vegetables, and self-sufficiency, Shannon and Cait share heartwarming stories, practical tips, and creative inspiration for turning garden dreams into reality. Whether you're planting your first seed, growing a garden to sustain your family, or crafting floral designs that bring nature indoors, Fostering Blooms will leave you inspired to grow more than just plants — but a home, a community, and a life connected to nature.
Tune in for gardening advice, seasonal inspiration, and a whole lot of heart from two women with dirty hands and big dreams.
Podcast Insights
Content Themes
The show revolves around gardening, design, and using homegrown produce, with specific episodes focusing on monthly gardening tasks like seeding and harvesting, personal stories about favorite plants, and thematic discussions such as lazy gardening tips and annual reflections on successes and challenges.
Two friends, one passion for gardening. Welcome to Fostering Blooms — where the beauty of the garden is designed for life. Join Shannon Foster-Boline and Caitlyn Blum, two friends and neighbors, as they cultivate stunning gardens and bring the richness of nature into their homes. From growing lush English-style borders to designing pastoral homesteads, they’ll guide you through every bloom, bounty, and blunder along the way.
Alongside garden projects, they’ll dive into garden design, cooking with homegrown vegetables, and creating floral arrangements with the flowers they grow. It’s not just about cultivating beautiful spaces — it’s about using the garden to nourish the home, table, and soul. Don’t miss our recurring “Garden Ready” series — monthly episodes packed with essential tasks to keep your garden thriving through every season. Whether it’s pruning in winter or harvesting in fall, you’ll know exactly what to focus on each month.
With a love for flowers, vegetables, and self-sufficiency, Shannon and Cait share heartwarming stories, practical tips, and creative inspiration for turning garden dreams into reality. Whether you’re planting your first seed, growing a garden to sustain your family, or crafting floral designs that bring nature indoors, Fostering Blooms will leave you inspired to grow more than just plants — but a home, a community, and a life connected to nature.
Tune in for gardening advice, seasonal inspiration, and a whole lot of heart from two women with dirty hands and big dreams.
Welcome to Fostering Blooms — the podcast where two gardening-obsessed friends, Shannon Foster-Boline and Caitlyn Blum, dig into the joys (and challenges!) of growing a beautiful life from the ground up.
In this episode, we’re talking about all the real-life tasks we’re doing in May to get our gardens set up for a season of lush blooms and abundant harvests. That means trench-planting tomatoes, laying down limestone screenings, dealing with the first big pest wave (hello, flea beetles 
), and making time for drip irrigation before the summer heat rolls in.
We also share what we’ve learned about no-dig bed prep (hint: painter’s paper > butcher paper), what we’re doing differently with squash, beans, and cucumbers, and why it’s time to net, stake, and trellis everything now—so future you isn’t wrestling floppy dahlias in 90° heat.
Whether you’re scaling up like Shannon or squeezing plants into every inch like Caitlyn, this episode will give you a dose of motivation, some laughs, and a practical checklist for getting it done this May.
Topics we cover:
Trench-planting tomatoes in raised beds
Why we love cattle panel trellises for climbing crops
Flea beetle panic mode + organic pest control options
Landscape fabric vs. screenings vs. mulch: what actually worked
Beans, squash, cucumbers, eggplant, and dahlia planting timelines
Irrigation systems: drip line tips, timers, and rain barrel prep
What to stake and net now (and why it’s better than doing it later)
Planting annuals, potted roses, hydrangeas, and perennials in late spring
If you’re gardening in Zone 7B (or anywhere that’s heating up fast), this episode will help you stay one step ahead—and remind you that you’re never really “behind.”
Let’s go get dirty. Let’s go grow, baby! 
Love what you hear? Follow Fostering Blooms on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. Leave a rating or review to help other garden lovers find us. And share this episode with a friend who’s out there planting tomato trees and fighting beetles, too.
Follow us on Instagram [@fosteringblooms] for garden inspo, behind-the-scenes chaos, and planty joy.
Disclaimer
This podcast’s information is provided for general reference and was obtained from publicly accessible sources. The Podcast Collaborative neither produces nor verifies the content, accuracy, or suitability of this podcast. Views and opinions belong solely to the podcast creators and guests.
For a complete disclaimer, please see our Full Disclaimer on the archive page. The Podcast Collaborative bears no responsibility for the podcast’s themes, language, or overall content. Listener discretion is advised. Read our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy for more details.