Spring Cleaning Miniature Gardening

When my local craft store went out of business a few years ago, I picked up a bunch of the holiday trees they had on mark down as well as stacks of wooden circles and ovals that are always useful.  I’d had them about a year when inspiration struck that they would look right at home in a cemetery.  I have quite the collection of tiny grave stones and even more had showed up with one of the Bones Kickstart rewards sets. I pulled out ones that looked good with the trees, picked out bases, and that’s where it all stopped.

Fast forward a few years, California is on lock down, the OTT Spring Cleaning Challenge comes up and here is where it all starts up again.

These things came together quickly after I painted up the headstones and they are already looking pretty good.  I finished all four stands and thought,” That was easy.  Why didn’t I get more trees?” Of course now comes the basing and flocking followed by undergrowth and overgrowth but they are glued together finally!

Using two different mixes of flock, one browns one greens, I flocked up the bases of my trees.  I noticed a couple of the labels are barely visible through the paint and flock so will make sure they’re removed next time.  Ah next time, that moment in the future when I will get things 100% correct.  Too bad it’s in the future and all I have to work with is “this time”.  They’re actually not that visible and as I plan to add more plants they should disappear by the end.  Yes, I am going to add more plant life to the bases as I want these to look more like difficult terrain and less like a well manicured park.

I have now finished landscaping the graveyard.  I think they look suitably overgrown and a little mysterious.  I also think they will look great with a wrought iron fence around them.  I used fantasy minis in the pictures but can see these pieces used in more than a few genre’ games. As a bonus, when I was looking for my collection of terrain materials I thought It might be in a medium sized cardboard box in the closet.  While trying to ascertain how best to remove said box from the almost Tetris level of closet organization When I noticed it was sitting on a much larger, transparent plastic bin full of all my Woodland Scenics bags! It is almost like Christmas except now I have to figure out how to get an even bigger box out of there.

While digging through my closets and garage I came upon even more terrain materials.  Not only did I find the box of Woodland Scenics materials I knew I had misplaced, then I found a box of trees I didn’t know I had, finally I found a bag of trees I have no memory of acquiring.  I then realized I had a number of projects that had waiting for this very discovery.  Seems like I am about to start landscaping in miniature as I have parts for Samurai forests, groves from alien worlds, and a great deal of Urban Landscaping for Wolsung.  So I changed the Spring Cleaning Blog to reflect that.

Welcome to my Miniature Gardening Spring Clean Project Blog.

So not only have I discovered I own a fair collection of flocks and foliage but I have a good selection of flowers as well.  Time to get planting.  I have some crates I found recently that I think will make wonderful planters for my Wolsung neighborhood. I’ve gotten them to the painted stage and now they just need sealant before I go on as I hate rubbing off the paint I’ve already applied.  The tall ones will look good with tall ornamental plants whereas the four short ones will be my first roof garden of flowers and vegetables. Well, I hope they will be as I am improvising much this as I go.

In addition, I have a number of wooden discs and ovals that will make nice planted beds, maybe a tree surrounded by flowers.  That way I place them on the sidewalks as planted cutouts or in the middle of traffic circles.  Once the Terrain Crate2 delivers some wrought iron benches I will have a small park area.

So my planters were sealed and I began filling them with Das Pronto air hardening clay, both to represent soil and give weight to the pieces.  Asit is air hardening a I will have to build up the deeper ones in layers.

I created a flower stall for my market place from one of my Micro Arts Market pieces.  Next is a baker’s stall and a produce stand.  I think the Wolsung Gardener looks quite at home among the flowers and look forward to getting his gardens started.

I finished off all my little planters.  The small ones with flowers were the easiest as all I did was flock them and glue in the flowers.  The tall ones with evergreens were just as easy and will look great separating the outdoor seating of my cafe from the plaza.

The tomato plants were a little more work but relatively simple.  I glued three toothpick halves into each container and painted them green. When they dried I glued on Woodland Scenics Clump Foliage pieces. Unable to go to either the Craft or Model Railroad stores right now I went “Shopping in My Closets” as a friend of mine says and found my bag of various colors of Fimo and Sculpy polymer clays.  I made a bunch of red spheres about the right size and once they had baked (do this for 2/3rds of recommended time as they are so tiny they will burn) I glued them onto the plants.  Now Nona Scylla can always have fresh tomatoes.

The ornamental trees, which could flank a doorway nicely, were also a bit of work as what I had were really bushes and I wanted them to look more like well manicured ornamental trees.  So I glued half a toothpick in each planter as a pin and then found some aluminium cylinders in my bits box that were just the right height to glue onto those.  After they dried I raided my canvas painting supplies for my Fiber Paste by Golden to create the texture of bark. This stuff is an acrylic modeling paste, clear paint, with a fine texture mixed in.  Great for building up texture on a canvas (think Van Gogh) or the surface of a model building or tree trunks.  Then everything was painted, surface was flocked, and the bushes were glued into the trunks. I’m rather pleased with how these came out and am going to have to make more like them.  As for now, time for more trees and planted areas.

My experiment in planters went well so I will have to make more of those or go “shopping in the garage” for other suitable containers.  Until then there are courts, plazas, sidewalks, and parks to garden not to mention the stately homes of the Ash and Oak membership.

I have two identical trees that look highly manicured and maintained so thought they would be the perfect choices for my next experiment; trees in planted beds.

I received a pair of fountains with the Mantic Terrain Crate Kickstart rewards. I was never sure what I was going to use them for until I started this little Urban Renewal project.  I glued them to wooden discs before painting them.  Simple but effective.  Some environmental shots next time as the collection is really coming together though I’m not sure why everything seems to be in pairs.

Statues… I need some statues…

So I went shopping in my Unpainted Minis closet and found two statues in the Reaper Bones 4 Kickstart rewards. I had forgotten they existed so was super excited to find alternative versions of them in ruins. Double Score!

To fit in with my Wolsung – Moderns terrain collections I decided they would look best as bronzes plus it works so perfectly with their fantasy Hoplite theme. The ruined ones are for another time.  The initial gallery is Work In Progress shots while the individual pictures are the finished pieces. I forgot to add a figure for scale so will have to remedy that soon.

Before the statues were rediscovered I took some pictures of the new terrain setup with some of my Wolsung collection.  I really like how much color and texture is added not to mention cover from terrain and places to set objective counters. I’ve taken pictures with and without minis to focus on the feel of the scenes and must say that I am rather liking them and will add some of these to the Wolsung Project Blog.  If any of you folks are interested in that blog, it can be found at; https://www.beastsofwar.com/project/1223909/

Wonder if Necron099 has room in his backyard to set up a game…