Making a Terrarium

I was reading this series of posts by Nesting Place about plants and using them in your home. Those of you who worked with me while I was in the business setting know I love to have plants around. In my house though, I've always had difficulty; however, I put it all aside to see if I could breathe new life into our home with plants. Besides, lil man likes to take care of things and play with dirt, so why not teach him how to care for plants, right????

One of the things that Nester presented was a terrarium. I fell in LOVE! I've seen them and know a fantastic teacher who has 2 in her room. I've thought about emulating them for the past 5 years and moreso recently this fall when I decided my school fish aquarium needed to go. I was sick of caring for it. I decided I would start small so I headed over to the thrift store for a glass bowl. I found one, but it was too small for what I wanted. I got another at Marc's for $1.99.

Next, I had to find plants for the terrarium and the other supplies. I finally had everything and was ready to go!

Step 1: Wash out the bowl (just a preference I have) and make sure to dry it well. Gather supplies (charcoal, potting soil, rocks, filter/cloth, plants, figurines).

Step 2: Put river pebbles in the bottom.

Step 3: Add a coffee filter, piece of cloth or newspaper to the top. It prevents the charcoal and soil from mixing with the rocks which would defeat the purpose of the rocks for drainage purposes. I didn't know this until the kind lady at Donzell's told me. She was amazing and had made a beautiful fairy garden and bunch of awesome terrariums.

Step 4: add charcoal

Step 5 add potting soil (I already had this from previous projects).

Step 6 add plants and figurines.

Before figurines.... don't mind the guy on the cover of the newspaper.... I just didn't feel like working on the floor and chose to put paper down instead.

Side view... I'm thinking we'll add some sand or something mulch too... It's a work in progress.

From the top. I must say, I chose my 2 favorite dinos for this!

This process didn't take long to make once I had everything. It took longer to pick out the plants I wanted than anything else! I chose to put dinosaurs in the terrarium because lil man is loving dinosaurs right now. I figured it would give him something to enjoy and we can take them out to change the theme later.

I'm joining up at Nesting Place for a plant linky party. Stop on over and check out the other terrariums people have made!