Plant a Fairy Garden

This has been a different kind of spring this year.  Right when we should be watering and nurturing a vegetable garden, we are getting very late freezes and trimming damaged rose and geranium leaves.  It has not stopped the random 80 degree days from fooling us into the need to be in the garden.  One day we don warm jackets and brave the bitter cold winds and the next we are in short sleeves wondering if today is a gardening day. I fear our forced late spring gardens will not be able to produce before the Texas summer heat hits.  It gets pretty hot and dry here.  I gravitated to the flower beds and created a weed barrier between the rose bushes and mums using newspaper and pine needles.  First I removed the weeds that had come up.  I placed sheets of newspaper around and between the larger plants, making to sure to over lap  in a shingling manner.  

       

After covering all the dirt areas with two-three layers of newspaper (no color printed pages) I raked up pine needles from the tree in the yard and put a thick layer of 3-5” on top of the paper. 

The faux stone face came from a garden center. I posed it against a large river rock.

A few fusty yard & garden utensils.

                 
I re situated the decorative stones and rustic relics and watered the bed thoroughly.  The newspaper allows the water to soak through but prevents most weeds from germinating and coming up. The roses have leaves all over and some buds ready to burst open.  Because of the unusual late freezes, I had to trim back some damaged leaves and buds.

Frost bitten in May!

             
While the little grands were here yesterday we decided to cheat the unpredictable cold by putting together a fairy garden pot.   I located a beautiful robin’s egg blue pot in the the garage and filled it with potting soil.  We cut some sheet moss from the craft store to fit the top and took a cutting from a hardy succulent to plant there.  The grands gathered little pebbles from the drive to make a fairy path.  A larger stone looked like a perfect place for a little gnome salvaged from the bottom of a garden pot of “things” to rest and look things over.  The whole project took less than an hour, which is good for the younger grands short attention spans.  It sits in a raised bed between some rose bushes right along the sidewalk to the front door.  I’m hoping to rip open some of the flower seed packets I purchased several weeks ago and spread the seedlings soon.  Surely, the cold will stop invading our normal balmy spring since I prefer to skip indoor seeding and go straight to scattering them on warm moist soil. 

P.S.  That weird little metal rod next to the fairy pot…Little Girl grand thought the fairies might need it to swing up to the pot!
You can see our first fairy garden that has a Toad House here.
Here is the leprechaun garden.

I love your comments.  It’s nice to know I’m not totally talking to myself in black and white with pictures!
I link up at these parties…
Made in a Day
Wildly Original
Fairy Garden Contest @ The Magic Onion