Creeping Wire Vine

My latest obsession, Creeping Wire Vine. This beauty, known also as Muehlenbeckia is a resilient little lovely that adapts well when potted or planted directly into the landscape. It has the coolest tiny glossy green leaves, is drought tolerant and enjoys sun to partial shade. 

You can pick them up at most nurseries; they come in little plastic containers that can be repotted creatively and presented as favors at weddings or given as Mother's Day gifts.

To create this little topiary, you'll need:

• Creeping Wire Vine
• Small terra-cotta pot
• Potting soil
• Twigs
• Twine or wire
• Spanish moss

Here's how you do it:

1. Fill a small terra-cotta pot about half-way with potting soil, then repot the Wire Vine into the pot.
2. Add some Spanish moss to cover the soil.
3. Then insert two twigs to support the vine.
4. Secure the twigs together at the top using twine or wire.
5. This is the fun part. Gently wrap the Wire Vine around the twigs to create a topiary.
6. Done!

Here are a few creative ways to present them.  Personally I like the plain pot and the one with a bit of cord around the neck of the terra-cotta pot. What's your favorite?

Water regularly but do not over water and this little beauty will thrive happily indoors or out. Happy crafting and gardening!

Garden Hose Door Mat

Please enjoy this repost of a very popular craft I concocted back in 2012.

As we all prepare for a great season of gardening, I'm sure you're coming across some gardening tools that have worked their gardening magic and seen their day. For weeks I have been trying to throw out this very used and very leaky garden hose and the City garbage men refuse to take it! Annoyed as I was, I thought they must be sending me some type of message urging me to repurpose and reinvent this green coiled mess.

Anyway, as you can see, I decided to transform the garbage misfit hose into a very useful door mat.

You'll need:

• A leaky garden hose.
• A square dollar store door mat. I bought a square gray door mat for $1 at the local Christmas Tree Shop.
• E-6000 adhesive at a craft or hardware store. I used three tubes of the stuff for this project.
• Garden pruners (to cut the garden hose).
• A strong scissors to cut down the mat.
• Some heavy garden pots to use as weights to hold down the hose sections while the glue dries. Actually any heavy object will suffice.
• .75" x .94" corks (to seal the cut ends of the hose lengths).

Here's how you do it:

1. Place the door mat on a flat surface.
2. Using the garden pruners, cut a section of the hose so that it creates the outer half circle of the mat. Don't worry if the ends of the hose hang over the mat...you can trim them off when you've finished gluing all of the sections onto the mat.
3. Place a generous amount of glue on the hose then position it on the mat. Remember, you're working with the outer half circle first.
4. Position heavy pots on this first section to keep in place and let dry overnight.
5. When the first section is dry, simply repeat with all of the remaining cut hose sections to fill in the half circle using heavy objects to hold the sections in place.
6. When finished and all of the hose sections are dry, cut the ends with the pruners so that they are all the same length.
7. Glue and insert corks into each of the ends to seal the openings.
8. Finally, with a scissors cut the door mat base to the half-circle shape you've created.
9. Done!

This mat is super durable and easily cleaned by hosing it down.

Happy crafting!