How I spent my first day of fall

Making terrariums!

I've had this idea rattling around in my head for a while now, but never managed to execute on it. One reason is probably that I've had trouble sourcing an interesting variety of small, slow growing, moisture loving, low to medium light thriving plants through my local merchants. In fact, when I'd tell people at the garden store what I was aiming for I was often greeted with mild confusion or a dismissive, "I don't think we really have anything like that." Come on, folks. You can do better.

But yesterday I left the house determined to procure the supplies I needed. It took visits to a number of different stores (including the aquarium section of a pet store for some activated charcoal) but by late afternoon my mission was accomplished.

Now that I'm able to stand back and admire my handiwork, I think they're pretty darn cool. They're certainly classin' up the dining room table at the moment. I love the idea of having a nearly self-sufficient miniature garden inside my house. By nearly self-sufficient, I mean with proper setup and drainage you hardly have to water your plants since they're enclosed in a glass jar and retain moisture nicely.

In case you're interested, here's a list of my supplies:

• Inexpensive terrarium, glass jar and vase, from JoAnn, Old Time Pottery and the cabinet under my sink, respectively (Good candidates for containers can probably be found at thrift stores too.)
  
• Small rock chips, spaghnum moss, potting soil and coarse sand, all from the garden store
• Jar of activated charcoal from pet shop
• Rocks, shells and assorted decorative doo-dads

Here are the plants I got:

• Variegated Ivy
• Fittonia (Nerve Plant)
• Creeping Fig
• African Violet
• Selaginella (Club Moss)
  
• A purple and green leafed plant I can't remember the name of.
• Rabbit's Foot Fern (Didn't end up using it yet.)
• Maidenhair Fern (Didn't use this one yet either. Love these all by themselves, so I may just pot this moisture lover and put it in the bathroom.

There are some online retailers selling more exotic options like Jewel Orchids. Depending on how these plantings do I might be willing to experiment a bit more in the future. Also, there are a number of terrarium building how-to's out there on the interweb, but here's a website and a series of videos I found rather helpful:

http://www.thegardenhelper.com/terrarium.html
http://www.monkeysee.com/play/11233-how-to-build-a-terrarium

I may head back over to JoAnn next week, 40% off coupon in hand, and get an apothecary jar like this one:


So...heads up, friends and family! If I manage to keep these two alive (supposedly this is not too difficult if you've done your homework), you could very well receive your very own terrarium this holiday season.