Gardening on Cloud 9 » Tabletop Garden

Tabletop Garden – Doraemon Bonsai

Sandy — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 05:33:41 +0000

This is my tabletop garden – Doraemon Bonsai. Yes, it doesn’t look like anything close to those elegant oriental potted trees that we usually call as bonsai. But since bonsai is the art of recreating the beautiful scenery we find in nature in pots and trays, I really do think that this is a bonsai, for it is reliving a scene in the nature (of Doraemon’s world)

You can visit Happy Bonsai for more about bonsai and this tabletop garden – Doraemon Bonsai.

Tabletop Garden – A Shot of Succulent Please!

Sandy — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 02:37:57 +0000

Don’t these little shots of succulents look cute? We can either put a few of them together on a tabletop or scatter them around in the house, either way, will add a slice of nature and some refreshing colors to our homes and offices.

Actually my idea of making this set of four succulent gardens all started with a succulent that I bought in CitySuper 1.5 years ago . As time passed by, the white little rocks in the container began to turn greenish and look dirty (as shown in the photo on the right). So, I decided to give its home a renovation. And since I had a few other small succulents with me, why not give them a colorful new home too!

Besides the danger of getting people confused, especially the already-drunk ones, these succulents can make cool decorations for party venue as well

How to Make Tabletop Garden – Black N Matching

Sandy — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 16:08:39 +0000

Tabletop garden – Black N Matching is not only an easy-to-make tabletop garden, but it is also a garden that is easy to maintain, making it a great gift for any of your self-claimed blackthumb friends.

Here, let me show you how to make this tabletop garden.

In this tabletop garden, I used mini Fittonia, dwarf Neanthe Bella Palm, and Chinese Evergreen. All of these plants can grow well in partial shade, as well as indoor.

Because this is my Mother’s Day present for my mom, I handmade a heart-shaped S and put it in the garden. It is not only my initial, but also my mom’s (Susana), as well as my brother’s (Stephen). If you don’t have a particular design that you want to put in your garden like I did, you can consider using cookie cutters, which make good decorations in your tabletop gardens.

Here are some tabletop gardens that I have used cookie cutters:
Tabletop Garden – After Jurassic
Tabletop Garden – My Star
Tabletop Garden – Double the Love

Chopstick is a common gardening tool for Chinese. I like using a chopstick when I am potting my plants. And in Japanese Garden, Gururaj shares how he uses his pair of chopsticks in his garden. I bet many Japanese gardeners use chopsticks when they are in their gardens as well.

Besides chopstick, my pointed-tip tweezers is another gardening tool that I have found very helpful. In fact, since the objects in my tabletop gardens are very small, for greater precision, I prefer my tweezers over a pair of chopsticks when I am working on my tabletop gardens.

I made this tabletop garden on May 9, a day before Mother’s Day. It looked fine, with only a small part of the “S” being covered by the mini Fittonia. However, on Mother’s Day, which was just a day later, I found the plants had covered almost the whole “S”. This was due to the nature that plants – the tendency of reaching towards the light source.

I got reminded again that, unlike oil painting or sculpture, the matters involving in a tabletop garden is organic and will change along with time and its surrounding environment. And yes, that’s the fun part too!

Tabletop Garden – Kitty Snacks

Sandy — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 22:52:55 +0000

After experimenting with growing wheatgrass for about two weeks, I had a pretty good idea of how to grow the grass well in a container, and was more or less ready to make a cat grass tabletop garden as a birthday present for my cat loving friend. And because I wanted the cat grass in the container to be ready for the cats to snack on by the time I gave this garden to my friend, I needed to make this tabletop garden a week in advance.

These photos are taken on the 5th day after I planted the seeds. And since my friend, Janet, is planning to buy a house in the next few months, I added a tiny house in the garden as a little decor. When I gave this catgrass tabletop garden to my friend on the 8th day, the grass was around 6-7 inches tall, just about right for harvesting

Cat Grass Day 21 – Mold Problem Solved

Sandy — Fri, 29 May 2009 16:46:12 +0000

Apparently, moving my bowl of catgrass out to the balcony is the right decision to make. After a week of time, the mold near the root of the wheatgrass has more or less gone! Despite of the improved air circulation, the damp and rainy weather in the past week had made me wondered whether the high humidity would worsen the mold problem. Hence, I had not watered the grass since Day 14. And when I checked the wheatgrass again a week later, I was very happy to find that the mold was gone. Even though it has been humid and rainy in these few days, the strong gusts of wind have provided very good air circulation

Tabletop Garden – Double the Love v2

Sandy — Mon, 25 May 2009 16:34:55 +0000

This is the second Tabletop Garden – Double the Love that I have made, and it is now in Randon Art Workshop. While people can buy this tabletop garden in the workshop, to me, it is more for promotional purpose than for sales. Hopefully, the city dwellers, especially the younger generation, can find more fun with the green! Gardening doesn’t have to be anything too serious. Making a tabletop garden is fun, and it’s nothing too complicated. While a tabletop garden introduces more green into our homes and workplaces, it also makes a special and unique gift for our family and friends

Tabletop Garden – Black N Matching

Sandy — Thu, 14 May 2009 00:47:24 +0000

This tabletop container garden is my gift to my mom for Mother’s Day this year. When I was designing this garden, I wanted it to be an easy-to-maintain garden that requires little time and attention from my busy mom. I wanted the garden to be something cool and fun, while the plants in the garden must be hardy enough to survive on little attention. I don’t want to get my mom discouraged because she thinks she kills the plants in the garden after a few weeks.

So, this is what I have made for my mom – a tabletop container garden with different low-maintenance indoor plants that have attractive foliage and colors.

I can’t say black is a very popular color for Mother’s Day, and as well, it surely is not my mom’s favorite color (I rarely see my mom wearing anything in black). However, this didn’t cross my mind but only until this morning when I was looking at the photos of the container garden and about to write a post on it. It actually bothered me quite a bit that I called my mom and offered a remake of the garden for her with another container. But surprisingly, she told me she loves it. She said that she especially likes the color of the container for it matches perfectly with her black furniture.

What a relief! I am so happy that I called!

How to Make Container Garden – Money Bowl

Sandy — Fri, 08 May 2009 01:57:03 +0000

We know that good drainage is the key to healthy plants, but the containers that we find most attractive are often the ones without drainage holes. So, to broaden my choices of containers, I decided to go ahead and try to drill drainage holes in the containers by myself.

Because this was my first time drilling drainage holes, I chose a wooden Japanese bowl as my container for I knew that it would be much easier to drill holes on wood than on glass. And as expected, this was so easy.

Drill the Holes

In order to hang my container garden, besides the drainage holes, I have also made three evenly spaced holes around the rim of the container. Make sure the holes are large enough to accommodate the size of the rope that will be used to hang the garden.

Pilea peperomioides is one of those plants that grow well in water (check out this post – Suitable Plants for Crystal Soil and Hydroculture for a list of other plants that grow well in water). So, if you are growing the plants in water, you don’t need to make any drainage hole.

Pot the Pilea Peperomioides

I put a piece of landscape fabric at the bottom of the bowl to keep the soil from washing through the drainage holes. Then I repotted the pilea peperomioides into its new container. For better adaptation, I always keep some of the soil that is around the roots of the plant when I repot my plants.

Hang with Ropes & S Hooks

I simply tied a rope at each of the three holes and tied all three ropes together at the top. Then, with the S-hook that I made by using plier and some wire I found at home, I hanged my container garden – Money Bowl on the window guard of my room. And if you don’t want to make your own S-hook, you can find them available in different sizes in most hardware stores.

Container Garden – Money Bowl

Sandy — Wed, 06 May 2009 10:11:48 +0000

This plant that has some very round green leafs mounted in the center on a long stem is called Pilea Peperomioides. It is a plant native to the Yunnan province in the South of China. And due to its origin and the resemblance between its leafs and coins, this plant is also known as the Chinese money plant.

Since I have already drilled some holes on the bottom of this wooden Japanese bowl, I had no choice but planted my Chinese money plant in soil. But like pathos and lucky bamboo, Chinese money plant is a hydroculture plant that is very suitable to be planted in water without soil or any other growing medium.

You can check this post for a list of plants that are suitable to grow in the water.

As mentioned earlier, roots that are grown in water (called water roots) are more brittle than soil-grown roots. Hence, growing houseplants in water isn’t exactly for those serious gardeners who take their plants to exhibitions or competitions.

But for the rest of us who haven’t yet tried hydroculture, I would recommend you to give this fun and easy way of growing plants a try. And it can be very educational too! With a transparent container, kids can observe the development of the roots as the plant grows.

Check out this post if you want to learn how to make container garden – Money Bowl.

And you can go to this post to learn how to pot plants in hydroculture.

Tabletop Garden – In the Outer Space v2

Sandy — Sat, 02 May 2009 01:46:29 +0000

To match the name of this tabletop garden – In the Outer Space better, I have taken away the moss and covered the pots and soil with black stones instead.

Which one do you like more?

Tabletop Garden – In the Outer Space v1