Fall replanting/transplanting reminds me that I am in constant need of pots.
I am a bit of a snob about my pots too, as I hate the readily available plastic type. I hate: its texture, flimsiness, non-breatheability, essentially cheapness in quality.
Granted, they are great in a pinch and I horde the ones that I get from the store/nursery so I can do starts, propagate and etc because I am so cheap (aka poor, ok, not too poor, just cheap).
Give me terracotta, lovely glazed pottery, or metal (yeah, yeah, overheat/gets cold) pots, but plastic makes me cringe.
In my search for proper plant-ware, I hound stores like TJ Maxx, Tuesday Morning, thrift and antique stores for interesting pieces and find some awesome deals, like this plain white pot for a buck:
Which brings me to my obsession for color (I do like the minimalism of the white pot, but I get bored easily). Having just learned of glass paints I wanted to get some garden crafty on.
Also being utterly pretentious I wanted to paint a design on this pot too that I would find humorous, so here's the Space Traveler commonly known as The Little Prince:
(Little Prince on his little planet)
(The Lamplighter and King)
(The Business Man and the sun behind the Lamplighter's planet)
(The most famous Little Prince quote translated: "One cannot see well but with the heart. The essential is invisible to the eyes")
When I came up with the idea I realized that this would be best for a friend of mine who enjoys The Little Prince as well. When I was done I sort of wanted to keep it, but I knew that she would probably gain more enjoyment from it than me.
I think it's obvious she should plant a miniature rose in it, but it's her pot, her choice.
Luckily I have 3 more pots that I can brainstorm on.
But back to being cheap, in need of pots and glass paint!
My cheapness has gone to the next level and recently, I had a mini-flip out about buying yet another simple ceramic piece I wanted to paint for a buck, and thought to myself, what can I use as a pot, that I can paint cool stuff permanently on, like a glazed item?
The idea of something metal led to the idea of TIN CANS, as I already use large tomato sauce cans as planters already and glass jars and beer bottles.
Though I find the aesthetics of plain tin cans and glass jars/bottles to be fine on their own, it's nice to spice things up a bit!
Here's the result:
A gold colored design glass paint beer bottle might make a nifty vase?
Large baked on glass paint tin can to be a pot. Maybe I'll work with the lines/grooves more another time?
I would like to note, like plastic shrinkies, I think the large tin can has a lining and may off-gas (I could be paranoid about a smell coming from the oven, but I like to always add caution when necessary). So, while it was fun to make, I may just stick with regular tins or paint that doesn't need to be baked on, even though this makes them super-able to weather the outdoors!
Either way, fun experiment and may the garden crafty be with you, especially during the doldrums of winter!
