The dark days of winter give us a break from gardening, but it’s not like you can turn off your interest in plants like a light switch. So let’s indulge our green leanings in six simple projects that celebrate the Christmas season and make good use of a blustery day…
1. Hand Made Christmas Cards
In 1843, Englishman Henry Cole didn’t have time to write Christmas letters to all of his friends so he hired an artist to create a card he could send instead. It was the start of a trend that took off big-time in 1915 when the Hall brothers of Kansas City USA created the folded card with envelope, which allowed space to write a greeting, but only a short one. It was just the right size for an annual note, and more private than a post card.
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A handmade Christmas card made from paint prints of houseplant leaves
Even in these socially networked times, I try to make a few handmade Christmas cards to share with friends and family. It’s a great project for an indoor day, and kids are natural card makers. This year’s batch is made from collage paper Christmas trees made by painting houseplant leaves with shades of green craft paint, and printing them on heavy paper. Cut into triangles of different sizes and affixed to cards, they became little forests of cool textured evergreens.
Wondering what your card should say? According to Hallmark, the authority on these things, the most popular of all holiday messages is this: “God bless you, keep you and love you...at Christmastime and always.”
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A small Christmas terrarium is brought to life by low-care succulents
2. Christmas Terrariums
Gardens in glass, called terrariums, began as a way to ship and preserve delicate ferns, but they also make fabulous tabletop accents for the holidays. Because the miniature scene is enclosed, a Christmas terrarium naturally stays neat and requires little upkeep. You can use all kinds of wildcrafted materials found outdoors in a terrarium, from rocks to chunks of lichen-covered bark. The miniature landscape provides the perfect spot to feature your tiniest figures of Santa, teddy bears, and all the rest.
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You can make a wreath with cuttings from your yard
3. Garden-Foraged Wreaths
Once called 'welcome rings', evergreen wreaths have been symbols of Christmas since the late Middle Ages. The circles of greenery represented the promise of seasonal change to late ice age peoples of northern Europe, and later took on religious significance as Christianity took shape. You can make a wreath by weaving bits of greenery into a wire form, or you can make a woody version from grape vines or slender green sticks. Use wire, jute, or string to hold the foliage bundles tight.
You can use smaller branches and bits of leftover stems and foliage in a table arrangement, like a miniature Christmas tree.
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Nutritious and sugar free, fermented sauerkraut makes a great gift
4. Fermented Sauerkraut for Christmas
When I told my friend I was making homemade fermented sauerkrautt instead of cookies for sharing this Christmas, she didn’t laugh. In fact, she asked to be put on the list! Indeed, most of us hit cookie burnout early in the holiday season, but this never happens with crunchy, probiotic sauerkraut.
It’s especially good to make in winter, when it’s easy to find a cool place where temperatures stay just under 60°F (16°C), the perfect temperature for salt fermentation. It takes only an hour to chop and prep the cabbage, radishes and other vegetables, and seven to ten days for the fermentation process. For something festive and different, make a batch of red cabbage kraut. The colour will fade as the kraut ferments, morphing toward hot pink, which makes it even more special.
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Homemade flavoured vinegars are perfect for the salad lovers in your life
5. Homemade Flavoured Vinegars
Talk about a money saver! You can turn inexpensive white vinegar into a salad condiment accented with rosemary or raspberries in a few days, or even use vegetables like celery, peppers or garlic. Homemade flavoured vinegars always make a nice presentation when packed up in pretty bottles, which can then be reused many times over.
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Gardening friends will value precious seeds saved from your garden
6. Share Saved Seeds
They say that the best gifts are things the recipient would have chosen for themselves, like more seeds! If you grew and saved more seeds than you need, time to get busy and spread some joy, because every gardener wants more seeds.
Happy holidays from all of us at GrowVeg. May your days be merry and bright!
