International Fairy Day- June 24

FAIRY GARDENS    
Two years ago, my horticulturally gifted sister-in-law, inspired my daughters to do something fun and creative.  They started their first Fairy Gardens.  My daughter, Maddie's first garden was created in an old bird bath and my other daughter, Carolyn's garden was started in a plant saucer.   That lasted a while, but the fairies quickly outgrew that area.  This year the girls decided to combine their gardens into one big garden on the side of our patio. 

A fairy garden can be hidden among your current garden, or in individual containers.  Our neighbors started a garden this year.  They created a bed for their garden.  They found lots of fun accessories from www.hearthsong.com.  These are perfect for the young fairy gardener.  You can even order fairies.

If you would like to try your hand at creating a fairy garden, here are some fun, inexpensive ways to do that.  I recently taught a class where 11 girls created their own garden.  This is perfect for a summer birthday party, and took about 1 1/2 hours to complete.

First.....Start with a saucer or container for your garden. 

Second.....Figure out what kind of plants you want to include in your garden.  We purchased some Irish Moss, and dug up some ground cover from our yard.  You can use flowers, alyssum and they even sell miniature trees especially for fairy gardens. 

Third.....Figure out what you want to include in your garden.  We created these fun little houses out of mini bird houses from Michaels.  The houses are only $1.  We used our jig saw and cut the hole to be a doorway and sanded the edges.  It took about 10 minutes to do 11 houses.   We used acrylic paint to piant them, and even embellished the roof by hot gluing stones on them.

Fourth....We created some fun wishing wells.  Gather twigs and sticks, some bark, a small glass jar like a baby food jar, two rubber bands, and a glue gun.  Wrap the rubber bands around the jar tucking twigs and sticks under the bands.  Place two taller sticks directly across from each other to hold the bark roof.  Hot glue the bark to the taller sticks for the roof.  You can fill the jar with blue stones or allow it to naturally fill with water.

Fifth....Gather some fun decorations.  We used natural rock, big and small, and blue glass stones from the Dollar Tree.  The blue stones make great water, creeks and ponds.  We found these fun miniature clay pots and butterflies at Michael's.

 

Last....decorate to your heart's content. 

Many garden supply stores sell fun benches, bridges, arbors, chandeliers, and more.  We even used old tea cups and small terra cotta pots for little houses.  Whatever creative thing you and your kids come up with, is sure to be a hit with the fairies that will visit your garden.