Click for larger image.

make your own pot feet

Designer pot feet look great but they can get expensive if you have a lot of containers. Now, while the garden is resting, is a good time to get a head start on making your own. Diane Johnson of Minnesota makes her own and saves that extra money for more plants. How? With soap molds from the craft store. You’ll also need mortar mix, vegetable oil or spray, water, a container and a stir-stick for mixing. If you want a specific color, get some concrete dye, too.

To make a set of pot feet like the one in the photo above, add water slowly to the mortar mix until it’s the consistency of a thick cake batter. Now’s the time to stir in the dye if you want colorful pot feet. Spray the mold lightly with vegetable spray and pour in the mix. Then tap it gently to get rid of air bubbles. Let the mold dry for 24 hours. If the mortar is dry to the touch, go ahead and pop the feet out of the mold. Let them cure another day or two to harden. After that, your new pot feet are ready to hold up containers.

Do you have a gardening tip? Submit it here!

blue bottle lights

Here’s a clever idea for lighting your garden path that uses empty liquor or wine bottles and icicle holiday lights. Collect enough empty colored bottles to line both sides of your path; you can ask a local bar to save bottles for you. Cobalt blue glass gives off a soft blue light, but any color will work.

Dig a trench 6 in. deep and as wide as a single bottle along both sides of the path. Spread about an inch of sand in the bottom of the trench.

Next, take a set of icicle-style holiday lights, slide a single short strand into a bottle and set the bottle upside down into the trench. To stabilize it, pour more sand around it, until you have about 4 in. total. Not only does the sand hold the bottles up, it also helps water drain away from them. Continue in this way down the rest of the path.

After you’ve set all the bottles along your path, pack about 2 in. of soil over the sand and around the bottles. About 5 in. of the lower part of the bottles should be sticking out above the ground. These lights can last for several years or longer depending on how frequently you turn them on.