maxcelcat | Entries tagged with gardening

I live in a relatively tiny flat. So my garden has to be on a similar scale. A while ago, about three years in fact, I got some tiny miniature cactuses in six little pots, each about the size of my thumb. Some time after this, I felt sorry for them, so I made some new pots for them from some old tea cups I had lying around.

Now, to make a teacup into a pot for a plant, it needs a hole in the bottom so the water can drain. This can be easily achieved - if you have a drill and a drill bit specificity for Masonite. I have such a drill bit! The first time around, I used my dad's hand drill, with some success. And some bruising.

This time, I borrowed a cordless drill from one o' the members of my family. Even so, there was this one bastard of a cup which drained the battery when I tried drilling through it. I'd already made something of a dent in it last time around, but damn, they made that little cup with the flowers pretty damn tough.

Anyway, made me at least three new pot plant cups, and repotted the three little cacti into separate cups so they'd stop crowding each other. To quote Deb "How fucking cute!!!!"

I have an extremely small "garden" here in the cluttered one bedroom flat I share with

evildoom_bunny and

schnitzelrug. A large portion of my garden, in fact all bar one plant, is made up of succulents. Cacti and the like.

Yonks ago I picked up half a dozen random little mini cactus's, in pots about the size of a thimble. There are well cute, and thrived surprisingly well in the flat. Of late, they were starting to look a little cramped, some two years after I got them. And

schnitzelrug had taken a liking to one of them and kept on pulling it from its pot, so I thought it time to repot the little guys. Which is kinda a pity, because then they'll just go on to be bog-ordinary normal sized cacti.

A while ago (regular readers might have heard mention of this) my family sold our ancient beach house. I picked up a whole bunch of random crockery, mainly because I couldn't bear to see it thrown out. Including a lot of random cups from the Seventies. My flat is so tiny, nothing is allowed to be in here unless it's useful for something. So I decided to make 'em into flower pots.

Now, a flower pot needs one important thing - a drainage hole. Which is kinda the opposite of what a cup needs... So I had to figure out a way of making holes in these things...

And it can be done! All you need is a ceramic drill bit, the sort of thing you'd use to drill tiles, and a drill, and a lot of patience. Especially if you're a masochist and have only got a borrowed hand drill. I managed to drill holes in the bottom of three cups and a vase thing, two others were such stubborn bastards that I had to give up on them. But I found new homes for all of the mini cacti:

cacti in cups

Wow - that picture is some weeks old now, both these plants are a lot bigger now! The cups were so tiny I had to put the potting mix in with a spoon... I should write a book called "small flat gardening" :-)