This post is probably going to be a lot more picture heavy than for the last 3. I seemed to have taken a lot more pictures of this one, both as I was working on it and after it was completed, and then I also did a little photo shoot with it the other day, because it was a nice day out and after being at home for probably 3 weeks straight now with only a couple grocery store trips, and a couple trips to a local trail/park to take our dogs for walks, I felt like actually getting a little dolled up and taking some goofy pictures. (I actually do have plans to do another photo shoot wit this one with the little girl that I babysit for and setup a little tea party and have this one as one of the teacups on the table, but obviously that won't be happening anytime soon now).
When planning this project I kind of did it in two phases.... first planning a color scheme and general feel that I wanted to it and then doing a little research to make sure I was right about when certain flowers would be in bloom so that at least for the most part, what is in bloom at the same time in the miniature garden would actually be in bloom at the same time in real life. (Or at least close enough to not be completely ridiculous). My original design on paper for the scene ended up not quite fitting well in actuality when I started to mock it up on the actual base, but the basic design didn't really change I just had to have a bit less in the front parts or the garden then I originally thought. I had thought to have some low boxwood borders around the front edges of the plantings, but that didn't end up looking good/fitting well. I also went ahead and put the table and chairs I had gotten for it together early on so that I could make sure I was leaving enough room for them while planning plantings and such
Once I had the basic plan I started making the plants for the garden. While none of the plants were difficult to make they are somewhat time consuming, and (to me anyway) kind of tedious so I find I have trouble working on it for too long a stretch of time without taking a break from it. I started with just making a few of each type to mock up one side a little more fully and then went from there. The tall boxwood hedge along the back is foam core board bent into a curve and covered with green decorative sand from Dollar Tree. The hydrangea bushes are the material sold in the model railroad/diorama section for making bushes, trees, etc. and the hydrangea flowers themselves are tiny punched holes that are shaped and then glued to a tiny foam ball. The rose bushes are the same "bush" as the hydrangeas just shaped differently and the roses were made from pre-cut flowers kits that I had leftover from making "Willow: Florist and Garden Shop". The allium are little foam balls covered in a fine sand and painted, with a wire stem and leftover leaves from a different leftover flower kit to finish them off.
Once I had a better idea of how the garden would look more filled out with flowers I started playing around with different options for other garden decor. I ended up putting the larger turquoise planters (which are actually beads from Hobby Lobby) with the 'iron orbs" (beads from Michael's) in them towards the back of the sides and didn't actually decide about what to put in the front until I was almost done with the whole thing.
With that decision made and the flowers finished up I glued some black decorative sand/fine gravel around the base of the plantings as mulch
With the plantings and mulch done it was time to set the table and chairs aside for the moment and glue the garden into the teacup. Oh and at some point in there I also covered the grass area with green ground foam
While the glue was drying, I got to work on the table and chairs. I spray painted them white and made a tablecloth for it by printing a scaled down floral design onto white cotton fabric. Like with the blankets for the fall picnic, I glued aluminum foil to the back of the table cloth to help it drape realistically (this time though I did make the foil slightly smaller than the fabric and glue the edges in a hem over it since I wasn't sure if being on the table like that if the edges of the back might show). I glued a tiny pink doily in the center and then moved on to the table settings
Like with all the pieces in this series there had to be a miniature version of the tea cup in it so I painted some teacups and saucers I had left over from another project to match. I then printed plates for the place settings and plates to use to make a 3 tier server, on which I put (from top tier to bottom) Petit Fours, cupcakes with icing piped to look like flowers, and croissant sandwiches (I again used tiny stick on jewels from the scrapbooking department for the bread). I didn't end up putting anything else on the table (like utensils, tea pot, or floral arrangement or anything), partly because I would have had to probably buy something else, and partly because there was already a lot going on in this scene so I didn't want it to start getting too visually cluttered.
At that point I thought I was done, and even started taking "'finished" pictures, but there was just something about it that didn't seem quite right to me, so I ended up painting the black mulch dark brown, and it just made the garden pop so much more. (I real life I prefer black mulch so that's what I was planning on going with for this miniature, but it just wasn't quite right)
And then after a little more looking at it I decided I did in fact want something at the front of the garden on each side of the opening and went with distressed white low planters (beads again, that I painted) with round boxwoods in them.
And now for all the random finished photos, detail photos, and a couple photos from my silly little photo shoot the other day.
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