How to make a fairy garden

Children love fairy gardens, they are magical and great for imaginative play. Surprisingly to some, they are actually really very easy to make and don’t have to cost a fortune. They can vary in sizes, shapes and look however your child dreams. Here I share with you how to make a fairy garden for your own children to enjoy. 

Possum (aged 3 years) absolutely loves fairies and I absolutely adore it so much. They are so whimsical and I know many children find them calming and find comfort in their believe of them. 

For so long I’ve wanted to put together a fairy garden and have it as an extra little outdoor play place space for Possum. I’m so excited to have finally got around to it and can’t wait to share with you how we did it. Of course there really are no rules when it comes to making a fairy garden. They can look however you want them to, you can be as creative or as basic as you like. Children will no doubt have the magic to bring it all to life. 

Recommended age: 2 years + 
(Active supervision is required on all my blog posts)

How to make a fairy garden

Possum is quite interested in gardening. She loves flowers, especially the ones that smell, and has a curiosity for all the different types of leaves and petals that she can find. 

For our fairy garden I decided it would be a good idea for us to visit our local nursery. It was a wonderful experience and one I encourage you all to do with your kids, even if you’re not making a fairy garden. Possum loved talking about all the different plants, using her sense of smell and feeling the wide variety of textures between her fingers. 

Which plants to use

Unless your a botanist or have killed enough plants to teach you a thing or two about gardening, it can be so hard to know which plants to put together and what would work best for a fairy garden. I gave Possum quite a bit of choice with the plants that she wanted to use for our fairy garden and figured we could make whatever she chose work in some way. One of the key pieces of advice that I was given from a gardening professional was – don’t mix your plant types. So, for example,  if you’re wanting to use succulents then stick to succulents. They don’t really like water too much so you don’t want them with something that needs water, like bulbs. 

The variety of plants that you see featuring in our fairy garden are –  

• Pansies
• Flowering kale
• Common Pratia (grassy ground cover)

Some of the extras that we decided to be planted separately –

• Hyacinths
• Coytloden White Sprite

While we were at the nursery I purchased a solid ceramic pot with a drainage hole at the bottom. You could, of course, use whatever you had available to you. I do strongly suggest that you ensure it is sturdy, has good drainage and wide enough to fit your plants. Good soil is recommended if you can afford it. 

Where do I put my fairy garden? 

I decided to position our fairy garden in an area that receives lots of beautiful sunshine. 

About a week ago I purchased some absolutely adorably fairy ornaments from a website called, ‘Garden Sparkle‘ (not sponsored, just wonderful and I want you to know about them). They have such a gorgeous range of fairy garden pieces you’ll no doubt fall in love with. We treated ourselves to a few. 

Now to begin…

To start, we spent a few moments talking about what we wanted the fairy garden to look like, we needed to make a plan. Possum went about placing the plants on top of the soil, just so we could see how it was going to come together. Once we were happy we could begin planting and positioning everything.  

Gardening with my little girl was so much fun. It gave us an opportunity to work together on a project and talk about wonderful things like the roots of a plant and why such things are important to it’s survival. Our simple conversation certainly worked on building Possum’s descriptive language and knowledge of plant names and the different parts of a plant and how they are to be cared for. 

The flowering kale was a wonderful addition to our fairy garden as it acted like a gorgeous tree for any little fairy to take a rest under. The pansies were sweet smelling pops of colour and filled in empty spaces. We did add a small succulent for variety. The ground cover we purchased looked just like a grassy pillow. It was all starting to come together. 

Next we added some coloured stones in two different colours. 

Fairy garden ornaments can be costly if you are on a budget, so you may want to consider visiting a pet store and looking at the ornaments sold for fish tanks. They will last the weather really well. 

Hang on, something is missing….

In come the gorgeously whimsical fairies, ready to settle into their new home. These fairies could be placed  on a wire and easily inserted into the soil to stand independently. Of could you don’t have to use fairies, your child might have some of their own figurines to add. 

Our completed fairy garden, what do you think? Possum absolutely loves it and has asked to play with it everyday since we put it together. I love that it’s another something that gets her outdoors and involved in imaginary play. 

As you can see, our pot, which we have used for this fairy garden, isn’t really that big. I personally love that our fairy garden is on a small scale and perfect for little hands and imaginative minds. What a beautiful addition to any garden. 
 I hope I have been able to inspire you to go out and make your own fairy garden. They really are worth the time you put into them and to watch your children play with them is something very special. 

Do you have a child who loves fairies? 

Maybe you’d like to try our fairy dough recipe.