Make Your Garden a Welcoming Place With Garden Decor

If you think you like your garden now you'll like it even more when you make it your own. Beautiful flowering plants or even a vegetable garden can be made more beautiful with some small, beautifying elements. Garden décor is not just for those with large gardens or for the people next door. You can awaken your garden and make it a place that you and your family and friends love to be any time of the year!



Garden décor allows for you to infuse your own personality into your outdoor space. While you may have chosen all of the plants that are there, there is nothing truly unique about them. Pour yourself into your garden with décor that will beautify your space. You can start with simple items such as stepping stones or even just a bit of lighting. When you start you'll find that these simple elements really do bring the place alive.



If you like the stepping stones you may want to think about other lawn ornaments. There are lawn ornaments of every shape and size. You may want to look at small animals or even statuettes of flowers. These can be small additions that will allow you to move into lawn ornaments slowly. A little color or décor here and there can go a long way in any garden. You'll find that you can buy a whole host of lawn décor at your local garden supply center.



If you want to really add something spectacular to your garden you may want to consider garden art. Garden art comes in many shapes and sizes. You might just want to add a mosaic to your space. This is a beautiful way to add a bit of color to your garden without having it be overstated. If you are artistic you can create a mural on the walls of your garden. You can also hand paint stepping stones or fountains or even benches. This is another simple but effective way to add beauty and style to your garden without stepping outside your comfort zone. You may find that by adding simple elements to your garden that it actually becomes the most comfortable space in or around your home!



If you aren't sure what sort of artistic elements or décor you would like to add to your home, simply browse around the internet a bit and see what other people are doing. This can serve as inspiration. Wind chimes, paintings, mosaics, stepping stones, fountains, lawn stakes, statues, and pottery are all great ways to beautify your space and make it your own. You don't have to add any or all of these elements, and you don't have to do it all at one time. Enjoy decorating your outdoor space little by little; it'll be more enjoyable that way.

Caitlina Fuller is a freelance writer. If you like the stepping stones you may want to think about other lawn ornaments. There are lawn ornaments of every shape and size. If you want to really add something spectacular to your garden you may want to consider garden art. You might just want to add a mosaic to your space.

Starting A Water Garden With A Fountain

Even if you want a big water garden with a fountain, waterfall, stream, and a variety of fish and plants, make a starter garden first. A small-scale project offers experience you'll find helpful when tackling larger projects later.



A starter garden brings the beauty of water to your landscape in a minimum of time and for much less cost than it takes to develop a large water garden. It is also more manageable when it comes to time, requiring less than an hour of maintenance every few weeks. You can have a water garden with a, http://www.garden-fountains.com/Detail.bok?no=2000, in a small space. Sometimes called mini ponds or mini gardens. Starter gardens set by an entrance are a delight for visitors. Tucked into a corner of a patio, they're a pleasant source of sound or a sparkling focal point when incorporated into the landscape.



You can make a starter water garden with a fountain that's formal or informal, raised or in the ground. A starter water garden with a fountain is the logical choice for small yards or patios and mini gardens since they all provide a point of interest in a courtyard or in a tiny plot outside of an apartment.



Home or Factory Made Fountains?



Urns are popular containers for fountains. And they're easy to set up. Simply install a small pump in the bottom of the urn and fill with water.



Starter gardens can be handmade or arrive from the factory ready to install. Make one from a ceramic pot or try a small kidney-shaped pond formed with flexible liner and tucked into a flowerbed. A pre-made fountain, outfitted with fish and plants, or an aboveground preformed garden complete with flagstones stacked in a low wall around a liner can serve as a starter garden. There are even portable water gardens.



A starter water garden with a fountain is an inspiration. Many people who begin small find they've enjoyed their first creation so much that they want to do a second, more ambitious feature, building on the skills they have learned. Beginning gardens can also provide the first piece of a much larger project. For example, your small pool could eventually become the foot of a waterfall or stream.



Clay pots and pottery shards create a whimsical that takes little time to build or maintain. In cold climates bring such a fountain indoors for the winter. Your starter garden with a fountain could be just a temporary one until you move on to bigger projects. If you dispose of it, you can reuse the flexible liner and move flagstones and boulders in the landscape to another site. When finished with a water garden container, you can fill it with soil and use it as a planter. And you can reuse a pump in a new water feature or sell it to another aspiring water gardener.



Fish and Fountains



For plants and fish, a mini garden should hold at least 5 gallons of water, but leave out the http://www.garden-fountains.com/Detail.bok?no=1206. Splashing interferes with plant growth and creates currents the fish have to fight. Instead, equip minimum-size gardens with a small poolside spitter fountain or a gentle aquarium bubbler to aerate the water without creating too much disturbance.



If water becomes cloudy or foul smelling in a small starter water garden with a water fountain, remove 10 percent of the water from the bottom with either a siphon hose or water pump. This reduces the buildup of toxic organic wastes.

How to Get Ideas for Designing Your Garden

Design is an element of planning your garden much like it is for any art. You want your garden to look lovely not only to you but to anyone who sees it. So where do you look to come up with ideas for your garden to begin your gardening around your home? Where do you look to find design inspiration?

To get ideas for your garden, start with looking at your own interests and your own home. After all you will be looking at and living in your garden just as you look at and live in the interior of your home. Presumably your interior decorating reflects what you like and this is a good reason to carry that decorating scheme outdoors into your garden.

Is your home decorated in a country French theme? Carry the colors outdoors with the fabrics you use on your garden furniture and the flowers you plant. Country French usually uses the colors of yellow and blue or red and a touch of green. Create a garden room as a place to dine using these colors. And don't forget the almost obligatory pottery chickens or chicken platters in your country French theme.

Have you a nautical theme indoors with lots of blue and white to invoke the seashore? Plant white and blue flowers. Use nautical items to add interest to your garden. Rope wrapped planters with blue and white flowers and large seashells, as pots for small plants, are interesting touches to add.

Do you have things you love to collect like teapots? Use teacups and saucers, and even cracked teapots, as planters for small plants you display on your patio or terrace. Or perhaps you like old farm implements and have a select few to serve as pots for some flowers in your favorite colors to form the base of a country garden theme. Larger implements can serve as the basis for flowering vines to grow upon.

You could simply begin your garden based upon your favorite colors. This is a good place for beginning gardeners to start. Pick two of your favorite colors, being sure that they complement each other, and select flowers and other plants to provide these colors within your garden.

Look also to the style of your home when designing your garden. A lovely colonial would be well served with an English garden or earthen colored adobe home would look great with interesting cacti and succulents appropriate to the area. Keep this in mind when coming up with your garden ideas. Don't try to create an English cottage garden in the middle of the desert in Arizona. It just doesn't fit the climate or location.

copyright 2006, Sandra Dinkins-Wilson

Looking for more articles? Come discover all kinds of Gardening Tips at our site. Read articles about water, shade, rose, butterfly gardens, gardening tips, and more.

Olive Jars: Easily Add an Authentic Focal Point to Any Garden

One of the best ways to add interest to your garden is with architectural accent pieces. A unique piece can add a focal point and break-up the plant material. One interesting way I found to do this is with old olive jars. Olive Jars date back centuries and were used in the Mediterranean to store olives, olive oil and other foods. Many of these come from Turkey today and you can find them at antique shops and architectural salvage yards. What is really attractive about using them, is that they are unique and will make your landscape design such. Here are some tips to choose the right one.

1. Choose one that is appropriate in size for the space. A very small one adds nothing in a large landscape with tall plantings. It can even be a distraction. The same holds true for small intimate plantings with oversized olive jars.

2. Select planting materials that contrast well with the accent piece. Many olive jars have a rich brown color that provides an earthy appeal and stands out in a green back-drop. Some vibrant green glaze ones also work well in areas where you need splash of color, such as xeriscape and sparse settings with gravel and grasses.

3. Try setting the olive jar in different positions to give it a more natural appearance as if it was left there unintentionally. Perhaps slanted, on its side. One trick is to bury part of it in the soil at an angle.

4. Group several together to create a setting. Make sure to vary the sizes and try using an odd number of pieces. Groups in three or five work best.

5. Try making a fountain out of it. There are kits you can by to turn pottery into fountains. Make sure you are using one that has a glaze inside or has been waterproofed.

6. Don't be afraid if it is chipped, cracked or broken. These are typically the most sought after. They add an old world charm and resemble pieces from a architectural dig. All pottery left exposed to the elements naturally degrades. This is what you want when creating an authentic style.

If you are trying to get an idea of the types of olive jars available, you can see some at Olive Barn on the web or try some local garden shops or antique shops in your area.

Jacqueline Salinas - Bachelor of Science in Horticulture - Texas A&M University owns several internet related companies and with the primary emphasis on Garden and Home. Visit Olive Barn for more information. Contact her at jsalinas@olivebarn.com or visit her blog at Simplicity by Olive Barn. She is one of the founders of Garden Living Houston, an earth-friendly gardening ezine for Houston Texas.

Garden Art Ideas -- How to Make Your Planters Into Beautiful Garden Art

Garden stores have so many different types of garden art for your to choose from - there are beautiful water features like ponds and fountains, as well as statues, wind chimes, birdhouses, and so much more. But why not go ahead and make your own garden art? Why not make sure that your garden fully reflects your own personality, and nobody else's?

When it comes to making your own garden art, there are so many different possibilities as to what you can do that it can almost be overwhelming. That is why I am going to focus on just one type of garden art in this article: planters. Check out these fun and unique ideas for your garden pots and planters:

The Spilt Planter

Add a little humor to your garden with a "spilt planter." Find an ordinary pot or barrel and tip it on its side in your garden. Fill the planter part way with soil, and then spread the rest out in front of it as though it has spilled out. Choose a few of your favorite flowers and plant them in the spilled-out soil. Warning: this fun and whimsical idea is one that may have do-gooders coming up and trying to fix the spill… until they see that the plants are actually planted in the ground.

Bathtub Planter

Find a bathtub (a clawfoot tub, preferably) at a thrift store, garage store, or even from your remodeled bathroom. Fill her up with good soil and then plant a small garden! It can also be fun to use a bathtub as a pond. It is even possible to find a way to hook your garden hose up so that you can have water coming out of the bathtub waterspout.

Thrift Stores Gems

There are many other things that plants can be planted into (besides planters and pots… and bathtubs). Why not go to an antique shop or a thrift store and see what you can find! You can plant a pair of cacti in a pair of cowboy boots. Why not plat a snapdragon in a tea cup? You can use vases, pots and pans, tires, helmets, and so many other things as planters. You may not know what item can double as a perfect garden planter until you go out and find it.

Pottery By Your Own Hand

Why not sign up for a pottery class and make your very own planter! Granted, you may make a pot that is only large enough for one petunia, but it is so much fun to create your own shapes and to glaze your pot in whatever color you want. Homemade pots with a flower in each make excellent gifts, as well.

Pot makeovers

If you already have a pot that you like, why not just dress it up a bit? Go ahead and glue a ribbon around the rim or even add sequins, buttons, scrabble letters, or other items! You can also completely makeover a pot - you just need some Mod Podge (a wonderful, glue-like substance) and some magazines. Cut or rip out some favorite pictures from magazines (or use photographs, newspaper, brown paper bags, tissue paper, etc.) and Mod Podge them all over your pot. Use a weather-proofing finishing spray to top it off. (If you are using a terra cotta pot or another pot that breathes and is not glazed, be sure that you heavily coat the pot with Mod Podge before you add your pictures, and consider placing another planter inside the pot to keep the magazine pictures from puckering when you water your plant.

Anne Clarke writes numerous articles for websites on gardening, parenting, fashion, and home decor. Her background includes teaching and gardening. For more of her articles on gardening and garden art, please visit Garden Art.

EXOTIC POTTERY AT AFFORDABLE PRICES: WWW.WORLDPOTTERY.COM LAUNCHES SITE

MONTCLAIR, New Jersey - April 5, 2002







Beautiful craftwork and cultural pottery gems are now made convenient and affordable through www.WorldPottery.com. Now you can order a souvenir from your trip abroad online rather than lugging it home and risk breakage.







The locally popular pottery market, World Pottery, is launching its new website: www.WorldPottery.com today. This new site, www.WorldPottery.com, strives to provide the public with unique, artful and functional pottery from around the world through the comfort and convenience of their home computer. Gardeners, collectors and interior decorators alike will find a world of pottery at their fingertips when shopping at www.WorldPottery.com . Pottery inventory changes frequently but is often representative of artisans from South Africa, China, Ghana, Great Britain, Greece, Kenya, Morocco, Southeast Asia and the United States. Customers are encouraged to inquire about specific items via email โ€" custom orders are frequently filled.







Visitors may search the site by style, dimension of desired pot, color or origin โ€" making it easier for customers to find what they're looking for. โ€œPeople love to decorate their homes with plants and flowers, from front entrances and patios to interiors,โ€ says owner Joel Patenuade. โ€œGardeners often don't know where to find artful clay pots โ€" or they think they can't afford them. WorldPottery.com has been designed to help gardeners solve their Pottery needs with a large collection of affordable, beautiful and usable pots that match their gardening and decorating style. Not only can we provide the pottery they want, we can show them how to care for their new pot so they'll enjoy it for a long time to come.โ€







Future plans for www.WorldPottery.com include addition of container garden advice and care tips, a newsletter and container garden contests. All products purchased online are shipped via UPS ground.







About World Pottery the store: World Pottery is located on 100 Grove Street in Montclair, N.J. and was founded in 1999 by owner and Montclair resident, Joel Patenaude. World Pottery has one of the largest selections of imported garden pottery ever assembled and prices are often below normal retail. Located in an old Gas Station, World Pottery is a โ€œfindโ€ for pottery enthusiasts. โ€œWe sell vases and some odds and ends but mostly it's garden pots,โ€ says owner Joel Patenaude. World Pottery recently launched a website: www.WorldPottery.com in an effort to bring its collection of world-wide functional pottery to gardeners around the country.







About Container Gardening: While drought conditions worry many garden-related business, World Pottery's Patenaude says the small amounts of water needed to keep container plants healthy can actually make this form of gardening more popular during water shortages, especially if one is creative. โ€œThe water from one pot of steamed vegetables โ€" once it has cooled off โ€" can be enough for several small potted plants.โ€



For additional information, contact:







Joel Patenaude



World Pottery



Tel



973-655-1888



Fax



973-509-2225



E-mail

worldpottery@comcast.net



Website

worldpottery.com