It's February (wasn't it just New Year's Day, goodness how time flies!) and time for another Fairy Garden Class. This month's theme is, of course, Valentine's Day. These cherubs were found in my house and I thought they'd make a good addition to this month's container garden.
 |
| Alyssum, purchased at Home Depot. This 6 pack was under $3.00 |
 |
| Violas, purchased at Home Depot. This 6 pack was also under $3.00 |
 |
| Primrose, purchased at Home Depot. This flower was $1.50 |
This metal container is relatively new. I received it during the Christmas break full of candy and it is a beautiful, deep red that I felt would be perfect for this theme. The cherubs and alyssum are a bright white and the viola I used was a soft yellow which helped to make sure that the primrose would be the star of this garden.
Because this will be a short-lived themed garden, I didn't feel the need to put drainage holes in this container. I don't plan to leave these plants in here for more than two months, and I made sure to keep the Primrose in it's original pot to prevent it's roots from reaching the bottom and risking root rot. If you ever plan to plant in a metal container, you'll need to drill in drainage holes yourself. If you are like me and feel you might want to repurpose the metal container for non-plant things in the future, make sure to re-home your plants within a month or two and not to over water.
As always, place a good amount of small stones at the bottom of your container. This will help with drainage and is especially important if your container does not have drainage holes. Again, this is only meant to be a short-term home for these plants; any long-term container for plants need drainage holes at the base. These rocks will also prevent the soil from retaining all of the water and causing root rot. Since I kept the primrose in it's pot, I placed a layer of soil over the rocks, placed the primrose in the center and poured the remainder of the soil around that. This also will make extraction easier when I'm ready to move the flower to a more permanent location.
After placing all the flowers where I want them, it's now time to add decor. Here I have the cherubs to fit the theme as well as an 'iron' gate and pebbles for ground cover (purchased at Dollar Tree for $1.00). The pebbles would keep the container bright and cover up the dark soil. I then added the accenting gate and cherubs only to find that the cherubs were blocking the view of my planned main feature! I had to rethink this garden. It was obvious that I had to abandon my plan to have the cherubs and primrose in the same garden. I decided to use a different container and a taller plant so that it wouldn't be blocked by the cherubs. Since I recently brought ferns into my garden, I decided to use that, especially because I know ferns are a tall plant.
Yes, this is much better. The cherubs do not block the fern and this now looks like a quaint little park scene where two cherubs flirt on a park bench with a tall tree behind them. It was unfortunate that I didn't get to use the primrose with the cherubs, however, I'll find another use for them next week. If you have any photos of a container garden that didn't go according to plan, email them to me and a story about what happened and I may share it on the blog.
PLEASE COME VISIT MY FAIRY PAGE
No comments:
Post a Comment