Who doesn’t have small junk fossils that they don’t know what to do with them? Fairy gardens for indoors or outdoors are a wonderful way to utilize these small fossils. A plus is if you have kids or grandkids that can join you in this playful, creative dreamscape.
This is the largest and most complex fairy garden I have created yet. It is below zero and snowing today, so this is a wonderful little project! Below I will do a show and tell how I created this one – it was fun and cost me nothing!
Note the reflection in the “pond”.
Here is another one that I just created. This is a glass conservatory that I had picked up years ago at a rummage sale for $5 and it has been repurposed multiple times and is currently a fairy conservatory.
The Mechanics
I started with a scrap piece of 3/4 inch plywood (It is just what I had lying around.) that I could fit the mirror onto. I found the mirror at a rummage sale this summer for 50 cents. The mirror is actually blue colored but has very scratched up silvering. The “tree” was at the same rummage sale for, I think, $2.50. I used 100% silicone, interior/exterior caulk to glue them to the board.
Note the indoor/outdoor astroturf-type carpet. I had picked up a large piece of that years ago at a rummage sale and use it in the garden. I have just started using it on fairy gardens and like it. Driftwood pieces. Scissors, and in the back is a piece of Great Stuff foam that I had run out of the can to use it up or lose it. I will be using that for lift and adhere it with the silicone caulk.
Sand in the bowl and samples of astroturf I had gotten when I was looking to buy some and then found the carpet at a rummage sale.
So here we are about halfway through. I wanted you to see how I’m creating the beaches – silicone spread out with my finger tips (Dip your fingers in a bowl of warm water first and it won’t stick to them.) with sand sprinkled onto it and pressed in. The Great Stuff foam was used for the lift with the carpet over it, again glued on with silicone. The rocks and fairy are glued on with silicone. FYI, hot glue does not work on rocks.
Here is a closeup of the beach complete. Note brachiopod on left, then a cephalopod n the big rock, another ceph that stands up like a bird bath on the right, and a Maclurites on the top. The carpet has some real worn spots, so I just rubbed some silicone on them and sprinkled some sand there.
The first two rocks on the left are worn hash plates of bryozoans, the triangular shape in the middle is a worn horn coral, then another bryozoan rock to the right and on the far right a quartzite drusy rock – sparkly creek rock. 😀
Note that I was cutting various astroturf samples to create a fairly natural look of reeds and tall grasses. Again, everything adhered with silicone caulk.
To the far left is a single piece of branching bryozoan and a single brachiopod, then a worn brach hash plate and a piece of receptaculitid, ending with driftwood.
And to the right of the fairy is a Hormatoma. To the left her that doesn’t show in this pic is a brach in matrix.
Driftwood adhered with silicone. FYI, when you stop and if you don’t use the whole tube, just slip a nail in the end to keep it useable for next time.
Did you see the little bird in the tree? That actually came with it.
Is it done? Oh, I don’t know. Seems like I could do more with the tree, but it will have to wait until I get to Michael’s or Hobby Lobby.
This is very changeable. I can just pry anything off with a knife if I want and scrape the excess silicone off and start over. It is indoor/outdoor. It can be added too or subtracted from.
A fun afternoon pastime for young and old.
Especially in the winter or on a rainy day.
