Make Your Very Own Fairy Garden!

The winter holidays are here and what better way to spend time with your kids than by creating a winter wonderland for their fairy friends.

There are a number of different ideas to make your little garden that use various bases and feature different architecture.

STEP 1 First of all, you will need a base. Commonly used are existing garden beds, large soil-filled pots or old wash tubs, the base of a pot-plant, a garden box, or between the roots of a big tree.

STEP 2 Design the plantation and structural elements of the garden. Is it rocky? Is it green? Is it a woodland or is it floral? Does it have moss? Is there a house for the fairies to stay when they visit? Let your child's imagination run wild here and you may even like to get them to embrace their creativity and produce a drawing for reference.

STEP 3 Now that you have a plan, you need to curate the structural elements of the garden. These can be made or bought. You can find lots of cute porcelain and plastic pieces at $2 shops but if you'd prefer to keep on the creative, budget route, here are a few ideas:

• Use a pine cone as a house. Help your child paint on a door and some windows onto the exterior.
• Make a house structure out of sticks and twine ” just like in the Three Little Pigs!
• Paddle Pop sticks and glue make a great resource for crafts. Seal the final structure with some varnish and it should last the weather.
• Old jars can be painted up and connected to build a fairy fortress or buried in the soil to provide a pond or well for their pixie pals.
• Decorate the sprites' space with some solar fairy lights or purchase some glow in the dark stones to build a path to the front door.

The options are endless so this project won't just stretch your child's imagination!

STEP 4 A fairy garden isn't complete without the garden! Decide on the flora you want to include. Small plants and succulents are a great idea for this project, or perhaps you want to make your fairy garden practical by planting herbs!

STEP 5 Assembly. Lay out all the facets of the fairy garden so you can methodically fit them into the base. Now you can play, arrange and rearrange to your heart's content until you decide on the final landscape.