Good morning! I hope you had a fun weekend. I don't know about you, but with spring fast approaching (I can't wait!), I've been inspired to bring a little greenery into my apartment in the form of plants, but as a notorious plant-killer, I didn't really know where to start! Basically I wanted something simple and low-maintenance to help develop my green thumb. My friend Anne recently created a really cool tabletop terrarium (tutorial here), which is something I've seen on lots of blogs lately. In case you don't know, a terrarium is a container designed to hold small plants in controlled conditions (they can be open or closed). In an effort to learn more, my husband and I attended a tabletop terrarium demo at a nearby West Elm store over the weekend. Local florist John LaRoche showed us how to arrange cacti and succulents in glass terrariums, and we left armed with the necessities (this small open-face terrarium, two succulents, one cactus, a bag of river rocks and terrarium soil mix, which retains moisture and resists mold). (You can find more information on West Elm's indoor garden page.)
Once home, I attempted to follow the directions from the demo: Place a layer of rocks on the bottom of the container, followed by the soil (so the water can drain through the soil); remove plants from their containers and use sharp scissors to trim their soil-packed roots to the height you want for your bowl; arrange your plants in the soil and add more to cover, packing it down as you go; then follow with another layer of rocks or pebbles. I even practiced the helpful hints, which included wearing gloves (a must for working with a sharp cactus!), using an old makeup brush (or paintbrush) to wipe the soil off the plants for a clean look (since you don't pour water directly on the plants, any errant pieces of soil will just stay there forever!), and using wooden chopsticks to position the rocks in hard-to-reach places, like around the base of the cactus. Then you simply water your plants gently every few weeks! This was a fun weekend project, and if my plants actually stay alive, I would love to make another one, this time in a closed fish-bowl container!
Once home, I attempted to follow the directions from the demo: Place a layer of rocks on the bottom of the container, followed by the soil (so the water can drain through the soil); remove plants from their containers and use sharp scissors to trim their soil-packed roots to the height you want for your bowl; arrange your plants in the soil and add more to cover, packing it down as you go; then follow with another layer of rocks or pebbles. I even practiced the helpful hints, which included wearing gloves (a must for working with a sharp cactus!), using an old makeup brush (or paintbrush) to wipe the soil off the plants for a clean look (since you don't pour water directly on the plants, any errant pieces of soil will just stay there forever!), and using wooden chopsticks to position the rocks in hard-to-reach places, like around the base of the cactus. Then you simply water your plants gently every few weeks! This was a fun weekend project, and if my plants actually stay alive, I would love to make another one, this time in a closed fish-bowl container!
