Gardening
Plant a Terrarium for a Unique Winter Garden or Gift
Use open containers like glass vases for drought tolerant plants that prefer lower humidity and drier soil.
Photo credit: photo courtesy of MelindaMyers.com
Create a garden under glass to enjoy or give as a gift to new, experienced, and even reluctant gardeners. This self-contained system makes it easy to be a successful gardener with minimal care.
Purchase a terrarium or repurpose something hiding on a shelf in the basement, garage or shed. Even a cool glass container, cloche or bell jar turned open side down and placed on a shallow planting tray will work. Just glue a decorative doorknob or handle on the top for easy access.
Make it more festive for the holidays. Visit the ornament aisle in your favorite craft store. Create a mini terrarium from DIY Christmas orbs for holiday decoration or the perfect hostess gift.
Use closed terrariums like this when growing tropical plants. They thrive in the high humidity and moist soil.
Leave the top off or use open containers like glass vases, or mason jars for cacti and succulents. Use a cacti and succulent mix for these drought tolerant plants. They prefer the lower humidity and drier soil that open terrariums and cacti potting mix provide.
Once you have the container, you need to fill it with potting mix, plants, and other decorative items. Consider a layer of decorative stone, twigs, sea glass or sand at the bottom for added color and interest. Some gardeners include a layer of charcoal to help absorb any odor. The key is not overwatering as the decorative stone and charcoal won't prevent waterlogged soil from killing your plants.
Consider covering the stone layer with black landscape fabric to prevent the potting mix from filtering through and covering up these items. Cover this with a layer of well-drained potting mix for tropical plants and cacti and succulent mix for drought tolerant plants. Add contours to the soil level if space allows for added interest.
Select a variety of plants of different heights, textures, and colors to create an attractive terrarium garden. Many garden centers now sell small specimens perfect for these mini gardens.
Low growing tropical plants such as baby's tears, creeping fig, moss, and ivies make excellent groundcovers. Small specimens of dracaenas, crotons, palms and podocarpus make nice upright features. Fill in the middle ground with ferns, nerve plants, polka dot plants and more.
Once assembled, terrariums are relatively easy to manage. Moisten the soil and cover. Crack the lid open if condensation builds up on the glass. Then replace the cover and monitor the soil moisture and condensation. Add additional moisture carefully. A turkey baster is an easy way to water only the plants in need of a drink.
Place your terrariums in a bright location away from direct light. Heat can build up in this covered ecosystem and cook your plants when placed in a sunny location.
Now is the perfect time to gather or purchase fun glassware, planting and decorating supplies, and, of course, plants. Then take a break from the hectic holiday season to plant up a few holiday decorations and green gifts for your loved ones.
Melinda Myers is the author of more than 20 gardening books, including Small Space Gardening. She hosts The Great Courses "How to Grow Anything" DVD series and the Melinda's Garden Moment TV & radio segments. Myers is a columnist and contributing editor for Birds & Blooms magazine. Her web site is www.MelindaMyers.com.
Antiques
Estate Jewelry is Bringing Strong Auction Prices
Recently, estate jewelry has been bringing some of the strongest prices we've seen. In today's column I'll define exactly what estate jewelry is and share more about prices for this desirable item.
Even estate jewelry dealers' opinions differ on what estate jewelry is. However, the consensus is that estate jewelry is simply jewelry that was previously owned by someone else. There seems to mainly be agreement that costume jewelry isn't estate jewelry. It's generally believed that estate jewelry is fine jewelry crafted from precious metals like gold or platinum. Estate jewelry often includes gemstones like diamonds, opals, rubies, emeralds, jade, sapphires, etc.
Estate jewelry can be broken down further by the age of the pieces. U.S. Customs defines an antique as an item that's 100 years old or older. Therefore, jewelry made 100 or more years ago is considered antique. But what is considered vintage varies. Some consider vintage to be 50 years old or more. Others consider vintage jewelry to be 30 or even 20 years old. Some describe jewelry that isn't old enough to be antique or vintage as pre-owned.
Age is just one of the factors that determines the value of your estate jewelry. Most collectors want antique or vintage pieces as the value is typically higher for them. As with most items, the craftsmanship with older jewelry is often much better than with newer pieces.
The designer also makes a difference with estate jewelry. People will pay more for well-made pieces by companies like Cartier and Tiffany. Further, the size and weight are important factors. Larger, heavier pieces are worth at least the value of the gold they contain. Diamonds and other gemstones can have significant value. In one of our auctions several years ago, a 3-1/2 carat diamond sold for over $30,000. Whether you have an old mine cut, Marquise cut, oval cut or any other diamond cut, the 4 Cs of diamonds still apply (color, cut, clarity and carat.)
Our November auction featured estate jewelry, gold coins and watches that brought nice results for the consignors. A newer 14-karat gold Italian 20" serpentine necklace sold for $650. An 18-karat jade ring brought nearly $900. A 14-karat gold with 2 1/2 carat old mine cut diamonds and sapphire ring went for over $1,000. An 18-karat 7-inch turquoise bracelet with small diamonds reached over $2,100. A men's platinum moonstone ring with two small diamonds on the side sold for nearly $3,000. A Tiffany 18-karat white gold, platinum, emerald and diamond ring fetched over $4,000. A jeweled 18-karat gold dagger cut through all other items to reach the top auction price when it sold for over $8,000.
We will be running Session 5 of the model railroad, die-cast cars and models next month. We are now accepting quality consignments for our next multi-estate auction including estate jewelry, sterling silver, coins, art, comic books, sports cards, advertising signs and other valuable antiques and collectibles. I'll be teaching my "Evaluating your Antiques" class again on March 23rd at the Bay Path Evening school in Charlton, MA. Please sign up for our email list on our website or follow us on Facebook to stay up to date on upcoming events.
Contact us at: Wayne Tuiskula Auctioneer/Appraiser Central Mass Auctions for Antique Auctions, Estate Sales and Appraisal Services www.centralmassauctions.com (508-612- 6111) info@centralmassauctions.com