‘FAMILY MAKES GARDENING BETTER’
THE POPULAR PRESENTER INTRODUCES US TO HER FAMILY
Melissa King’s love affair for gardening started in her family’s backyard in Warrandyte, north-east of Melbourne, when she was just a little girl.
“Mum and Dad gave me this big patch of ground up the back near the chook pen,” she tells New Idea.
“I would have all these garden beds and I created this little wonderland ... I had rose gardens and my own pond.”
Now married to husband Alex and a devoted mum, it’s no surprise the Better Homes and Gardens star is passing her passion onto her young sons Noah and Marlon.
“In this day and age of screens everywhere, I’m big on trying to get the kids outdoors. Gardening is a really great way to engage them to get them outside,” she explains.
Though, Melissa adds that her boys are especially big fans of growing anything they can eat.
“We grew potatoes and harvesting them was so hilarious because the kids were just saying, ‘There’s another one! And another one! And another one!’ They were so excited by that,” she says.
Another gardening project that was a big hit at home was when Melissa grew “pizza pots” full of tasty herbs and vegies.
“[You] grow the ingredients you would put on a pizza and when they’re ripe and ready you harvest them and have a pizza party,” she says.
But when it comes to entertaining children in the garden, Melissa says the opportunities are endless.
“You can create a maze out of daffodils or there’s fun flowers like snapdragons that you can pinch to make the dragon roar that kids love,” she says.
As much as she loves digging around in the dirt, there is one job the horticulturist is over.
“It’s my dream to one day garden without having to pick up tonnes of gum leaves,” Melissa says with a laugh.
“We live in a leafy area and I’m constantly cleaning gum leaves out of garden beds and it drives me nuts! I will say for me, that’s not gardening. That’s a chore.”
Since joining the cast of Better Homes and Gardens in 2020, Melissa says she’s lucky to now have two tribes that share her passions.
“Everyone talks about [BH&G] as being like a family and it really is,” she says. “Everyone’s really friendly and was so welcoming when I started.”
Asked to pick a favourite colleague, Melissa finds the task impossible, finding wonderful things to say about the whole line-up. It’s much easier though for her to pinpoint what she loves most abot working on the longrunning
‘I’m big on trying to get the kids
outdoors’
program.
“The variety,” Melissa explains. “One day I’m standing in the middle of a lavender field, the next day, I’m at a beautiful event, then I’m sitting in front of my computer writing. Life just doesn’t get better.”