I like gardening in all my households, and have been trying to get as many plants up to Perfect quality as I can.
Though I play multiple families, so what I've been doing is gardening up as much as I can while playing a family, moving on to the next, and having that family head back over to the previous one to gather up what they had, and continue improving the crops with their own family.
I wish that crops would grow even if the Lots weren't loaded at the time that plants all advance in their growth stages (which I guess is at set points during the day/night?), because then I could just make a community greenhouse lot somewhere. But as it stands now, unless they're at the lot when plants are supposed to grow/produce fruits, they'll just freeze at their current stage.