Gardening

I've been yearning for a garden for months now. I waste so much time online looking up plants, learning about low desert gardening, finding neat little ways to do things. I love DIY solutions. I really don't see the point in buying something I can make. I save money, learn a new skill, and it's so much more satisfying! I also hate to throw something away that could have another use. So today I came across some very neat things right up my alley. Anyone's alley really. They are simple ways to make your own pots for the garden. No special tools or skills required!

The first are newspaper pots. You can purchase a wooden form to make these...



or use items you already have, a glass, soda can, or soda bottle with the top cut off and black & white newspaper. If you want a bigger pot, just use a bigger vessel to wrap your paper around. Here is a video from eHow with directions. She creates a pot in 3 minutes! This is so easy you can do it in front of the TV. She suggests taking the newspaper off when you plant the pot since the newspaper may not decompose fast enough, most people leave it on tho. I think it depends on your gardening conditions, and how many layers of newspaper you have in your pot. If you do leave the newspaper on, make sure it is completely buried so that it doesn't wick moisture away from the seedling.

How to Create Seed-Starting Pots From Newspapers -- powered by eHow.com

There are lots of different ways to make your pots, some are more complicated than others.

The other idea I came across is using 2 liter soda bottles as mini green houses. Again very easy, and all you need is the bottle, scissors or knife, soil and seeds.



You can find instructions for this at MrBrownThumb's garden blog. Here is an idea for turning the bottle on it's side.

Update on cat

I'm late on this, but just in case someone is actually reading this, I should let you know what happened. A few days after that post, our beautiful Ebe disappeared. She likes to go outside (supervised of course), but doesn't wander off. That day was beautiful and my daughter and I were on the back porch. Ebe came out with us. I saw her cross in front of the back door while I was inside for a minute. When I went back out, she was gone. I looked all over for her with no luck. Even if she escaped the back yard, she would probably have just laid in the sun on the driveway. Like I said, she isn't a wanderer. My hubby and I think she wandered off to die. We will miss her terribly. She was a great cat, full of personality, loving, and until this illness, never sick a day in her life.