For my birthday, Nerissa made me a Terrarium Kit with all the parts needed to make a terrarium: rocks, charcoal, soil, decorations and a glass vessel. It’s an awesome gift because I’ve been wanting to make one of these for a while now. You can find lots of instructions on Google and many how-to videos on YouTube. The only tip that I’d add is that an oversized pair of chopsticks works really well for placing objects neatly where hands can’t reach. I put the arrangement below together in half an hour, racing against time as the sun set. For a first attempt, I like it. It’s pretty rewarding to design your own miniature eco-system. I can see why it turns into an obsession for some people.

Glass beer or soda bottles can be used as vases for tall slender cuttings. The weightiness of the bottle keeps it upright and steady. The tapered neck and small mouth gathers the stems snuggly together while keeping the arrangement neatly in place. Look for bottles with a nice shape and labels that are easily scrubbed off. To dress it up, drape some pins over the neck. To get extra sparkle, you can loosely fill the bottle with clear glass marbles. This tends to make water changes and rearrangements a bit fussy, though. So, in this case, we didn’t bother. All that was needed for a finishing touch was Pee Wee Herman.

Finding imaginative vessels to display our garden clippings is always a joy. We found these vintage-looking glass bottles at Ruby Dog’s Art House, near Kingsway and Fraser. They were in a section with test tubes and petri-dishes, so I assume the little bottles are for pills or medicine. In any case, they were a steal at 35¢ a piece. The only catch is that vessels this small, even when filled with water, are really light. They’ll topple over if the clippings they hold aren’t as light as a feather. Pictured from left to right are: (1) a sprig of mint, (2) buds from an unknown shrub, (3) bamboo leaves, (4) chive flower, (5) berries from an unknown shrub. Thanks in advance, if you can ID numbers 2 and 5 for us.

Spring is here and the flowers are starting to bloom. However, none of our flowers right now are big enough for a regular size vase. So, I created a mini-centerpiece using a spare spice jar as a vessel. The flowers are crocuses which were the first to sprout up in the backyard. Our rosemary bush stays vibrant all year long and I added a sprig for color & contrast. The cut crocuses opened wide shortly after hitting the water but the delicate, paper-thin petals are starting to expire after only a few days. No worries. We have lots and they’re all free for the picking.

Peter gathered all the green chilies we had growing out in the garden and I was surprised to see almost a full bowl of chilies! There was no way the two of us could use that many chilies so we decided to share some and give them away as presents. We gathered bunches of peppers together and created custom packets for each. We experimented with simple paper/tape techniques, different ways to tie thread and finished it off with an ink-jet sticker label.

(Updated: Jan. 30, 2010 with new photos.)