About Me
Bonnie Blodgett is a writer, gardener, and do-it-yourselfer who lives in the land of short summers and long winters, Minnesota, and likes to keep busy. Winter gardening revolves around four main activities: planning trips to warm (green) places, tending houseplants and seedlings (under fluorescent tubes in the basement), and getting ready for spring. The latter activity has produced some of Bonnie’s most ingenious home and garden projects. Only in the depths of winter, deprived of adequate warmth and sunlight, would a person think it was a good idea to cover an ugly garage roof with cedar underlayment (instead of pricy hand-sawn shakes).
Bonnie came late to gardening and garden writing. She started out as a traveling troubadour. Why she traveled back home to Minnesota is a good question, but here she is. She launched a gardening publication after many years working as a magazine editor and freelance writer because it combined her two passions, writing and gardening. Trial and error has been her mantra ever since. Learn as you go.
For fifteen years The Garden Letter — which by some miracle won a Garden Writers Association award for excellence in its first year — has chronicled Bonnie's climb from ignorant weekend hobbyist to full-fledged amateur gardener. Her garden has been on tours and in magazines other than her own. Her garden writing has been published in Garden Design, Fine Gardening, and Better Homes and Gardens. She is the gardening expert for Midwest Home and writes a weekly gardening column in the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Her books include Midwest Top Ten (Sunset Books), an illustrated guide to great plants; Jewel of Como, a history of a horticultural landmark; and Remembering Smell: A Memoir of Losing —and Discovering—the Primal Sense (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, June 2010).
Remembering Smell took four years to research and write. Though a serious brain book with little direct relevance to gardening, it is her proudest achievement to date. Bonnie is currently dividing her time between book promoting, garden writing, and hosting Blundering Gardener TV. Check out the growing library of BGTV videos and learn more about Bonnie's new book elsewhere on this website.
