Miniature Flowers Book: Someone recommended the book "Making Miniature Flowers with Polymer Clay" by Barbara Quast - - it is a BEAUTIFUL book but it is not 1/12th scale - something much larger.

Lesley, Johannesburg, South Africa

Air Plants - Air Fern: If you go to the airplant site you will see that airplants are real and need misting. Very real looking. They come from the bromeliad family. They absorb water through their leaves.

As for airferns, (the ones at the counter in WalMart), they are dead and dyed green but are very cute in landscaping with the same effect as airplants but they don't need water. They need to sit and look pretty but not as real looking. Have used both.

SuLin

To the person who landscaped with grass that sprinkles all over the place, try a hairspray as a quick lacquer fix.

Rita Faulkner

Pampas grass: Here's an idea! The leaves are the easy part. In most places that sell silk and plastic flowers they also sell bunches of long, grasslike leaves that would work. For the "fluffy" part, I think that marabou feathers on a long wire could probably be trimmed into the proper shape!

Alice Zinn

Pampas grass: In the fall there are many grasses in "bloom" with seed heads like smaller scale versions of pampas plumes which you could bundle together with some raffia strands to look like the dried pampas grass blades. This time of year, I don't know if a floral or craft shop would have something similar in the right scale or not.

Loretta

Wire & Plastic dip flowers: My neighbors little girl has a flower making kit like the stuff you were talking about, with the wire that you bend and then dip into some sort of liquid plastic stuff that dries kind of see-through. The name of kit is Pretty Petals made by Imagine Nation. The little girl got it as a birthday present, so we don’t know where it came from, but my guess would be WalMart. The box is pink and purple with a picture of a little girl making the flowers. On the cans of the plastic liquid stuff it says: color flower molding material. There was a paper inside of the kit that said that it was inspected and if anything was missing to call Natural Science Industries, West Hemsted, NY 516-678-1700.

Jeanne-Marie

Wire & Plastic dip flowers: You can make very elegant flowers with wire and Sobo glue but instead of dipping the flower form, you paint it across the wire. This dries clear then you can paint with acrylic. There is a tape called "Patricia's Garden" that gives the directions that are very easy to follow.

Helen from San Diego

Pretty Petals: I saw the Pretty Petals Kit at Toys 'R' Us. It was with a lot of other craft kits. Hobby Lobby might have it with the other craft kits they have for kids.

Sherrydon

How about Sleeping Beauty's castle? Could use one of the Dickens Village/David Winter type small resin castles, perched on a "sodded" floral foam hill for false perspective. In the foreground go crazy landscaping with wild flowers and all the brambles that have grown up around the kingdom while everyone sleeps. Sleeping Beauty is also called Briar Rose, so you could use lots of blooming roses in the bramble patch. Make a path that ends abruptly at the brambles -- or maybe show a narrow passage chopped between the brambles. Leave a horseshoe on the path and torn fabric scraps stuck on the brambles beside the passage to indicate that a slightly disheveled Prince Charming is on his way.

Loretta.Sniarowski

Working Fountain: I went to the railroad shop and bought a pump for a train engine car that blows steam. 12.99. It was recommended and it works! Need to be a bit creative. I drilled a hole, (carefully), through a garden like urn and set within a circular base I found at Hobby Lobby. A real water fountain!

SuLin

Working Fountain: For those of you interested in having a working, running fountain in your doll house, go to an aquarium store--an actual aquarium store-not Wal-Mart or K-Mart or Home Depot. The people in a real aquarium store are experts on fountains and power heads and the things that you will need to get your fountain working. Good luck.

Carol

Working Fountain: I make table fountains and one thing you have to remember is that somehow, somewhere the fountain mechanism has to be submerged in water and the water it pumps out needs to be able to find it's way back to the pump for recycling. You can find the smallest pumps at your local garden store (eg. Home Depot) for about $15. Some years ago I bought a "ready made" fountain that I thought would go perfect with my dh. When the time comes to landscape, I will incorporate it with some foliage, trees etc.

W. Marie in Edmonds, WA

Working Fountain: For anyone interested in working fountains in a garden ......if you can wait my August NN/DM, DIY article has one.... and I will say that the tinkle tinkle of the water, coming out of the fountain, does add a new dimension to a miniature garden.

Joann Swanson

Ideas for your inexpensive wedding scene: I did a gazebo for a wedding present and was able to decorate it inexpensively. I bought some lichen and ground foam cover from the hobby shop. The lichen is in realistic clumps that I just glued down to make bushes. You can use ground foam for grass or buy the kind that comes on a fine spider web-like mesh which will stretch out as fine as you wish to make vines, etc. Then I went to Joanne's fabrics and bought some cheap white satin roses (the smallest they carry), cut off the heads and glued them randomly into the bushes. Looked very pretty and didn't cost much at all. Plus, I had some of the lichen and stuff left over for other projects! Another nice touch is to make a placard announcing the name of the couple and the wedding date, and put it up on an stand or something. Makes it personal. Working at a florist shop, I get to see lots of wedding ideas. We just did two weddings where they each spent over eight thousand just on flowers alone. See, minis aren't so expensive after all!!

Bonnie Gibson

Working Fountain: couldn't you do this along the same lines as those 'tabletop' fountains that are so popular now? I know there's a book out with instructions for these available through the One Spirit book club. I think a cooler pump is used for the tabletop fountains, and I don't know if you'd need a 'thingie' to control the water volume...the pump could be hidden in the 'foundation' of your house.

Molly

Landscaping Plants

Flower Making Supplies: Ruth Hanke has everything you need for your flower making: florist wire, a vast assortment of punches, and paper in every shade under the sun. Her web site is: http://www.hankypankycrafts.com/home.htm

Lynn

Paper Flowers: You are correct; the paper flowers do fade over time. My pot of geraniums made from a kit were originally red and were later light red, almost pink. I carefully painted them with craft paints, diluted slightly, and they looked better. It would have been better to paint them before construction, though!

Joie from Emerald Isle

Plant Making Sites: Betty here are some site that offer how-to's on making plants: http://kuoi.asui.uidaho.edu/~nyssa/projects/gladiolus/ http://kuoi.asui.uidaho.edu/~nyssa/projects/pansies/ http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Shores/1928/projects/callalilies.html http://cottonridge.safeshopper.com/225/cat225.htm?456 http://www.dollshouseworld.com/articledhw.asp?artid=161&cat=Projects&pre=1 http://www.dollshouseworld.com/articledhw.asp?artid=1029&cat=Projects&pre=1 http://www.geocities.com/heartland/woods/5223/flowerinst.html

Peaches In Daytona Beach FL

Gardening Book: I've been playing around with this since I bought the book "Making Miniature Gardens" by Frieda Gray. The book is a great how-to guide for flowers! Really worth every penny and priced right at about $20. I picked mine up at the KC show, but you can order it locally from just about any book store, or on line at a site like Amazon. There are also some great sites on the net with instructions.

Sloan

Paper Roses: I think we need to ask flower makers what kind of paper they are using before we make our purchases. So I asked, being the shy type...the answer is painted rice paper. The paint keeps it from fading and the rice paper stretches a bit WITHOUT dampening when you form the petal with the stylus.

Laurie Sisson