How to Make a Succulent Birdcage Wreath

Since Easter was so early (too early) this year and since rabbits and eggs are a sign of Spring I left my bunny wreath up on my front door for a while. Now that April is coming to a close I figured I really should take it down since I don't want to be "that house". You know the one. They leave their Christmas lights and decorations up (and on) until March.

I will admit I am a little guilty of this. I took all our Christmas décor down shortly after Christmas except the faux pine wreaths on the garage lights. They were just too high up for my lazy self to get down without a stepstool.

When I finally went to take them down I accidentally broke one of the light fixtures (I still can't believe I did that!). I was so bummed that I had broke a (possibly) unfixable, and (possibly) irreplaceable fixture that I just wanted to go into the house and forget all about it. Yet I begrudgingly continued on with taking the rest of the wreaths down. I tromped on up the stepstool to the next wreath and was pleasantly surprised to see a hidden robin's nest with a bunch of light blue eggs nestled in it. I guess it's ironic that my house will continue to have Christmas décor on it until after May. That's what I get for being lazy. I captured pictures of this range of "wreath taking down" emotions on my Instagram if you would like to laugh and feel all warm inside at the vision of my ordeal.

Since I now (continue to) have a Christmas wreath and an Easter wreath on the outside of my house and it's almost May, I guess that's my cue to put up a Spring wreath. Since I don't have any Spring or Summer wreaths and we all know I'm not going to buy one, I decided to make my own.

I was of course on Pinterest when inspiration struck. Everyone's been pinning outdoor/garden ideas since it's getting to that time of year when everyone wants to be outside in their yards that they've worked so hard on making perfect. My yard is far from perfect. It's the complete opposite of perfect. But I digress, I'm sure I'll divulge the dirty details on our yard in some other post coming up.

This post is about making a wreath. A succulent wreath. I saw an adorable pin of a succulent birdcage from Craftberry Bush. I loved it so much that I immediately wanted to make one! I've been a little obsessed with succulents lately since Mel and I went to Home Depot and they have the mother load of succulents right now. Seriously, if you can't find a succulent you like there right now, then it doesn't exist. I wanted to buy them all but I settled for a pot with 3 in it and tore out our dead (not so) lucky bamboo that I had by our kitchen window and put my new cute succulents there to gaze at while doing dishes.

Thankfully they still had a huge assortment of succulents when I decided to make my birdcage wreath. I went and picked up 6 succulents and some sphagnum moss to line my birdcage with for a hefty $15. I already had the perfect half birdcage with a flat back that I had picked up at Kohls after Christmas for 50% off for about $13.

 I love birdcages but they are expensive. When I saw this one I almost didn't buy it since it was still kinda pricey and I had no idea where I was going to put it. I placed it on my dresser where it just hung out, empty, collecting dust until now.

When I got home from buying the succulents I went straight to work. Here are the supplies I used:

• several different succulent plants (I used 6)
• a birdcage (I used a flat back one so it could hang on my door)
• sphagnum moss
• potting soil
• small pebbles (I used some that I sifted out of Jackson's sandbox)
• a kabob stick (you can use any kind of stick, I just already had kabob sticks)

 I started by lining my birdcage with sphagnum moss. This moss is used to make those hanging pots that look like moss sitting on wires. It holds a lot of water so it's perfect for watering and for keeping dirt inside the wire birdhouse. I put the moss in a bowl filled with water and then squeezed out as much water as I could and lined the entire birdcage.

 Here's a pic of the birdcage lined with moss.

 After that I put some pebbles on the bottom for drainage and covered that with dirt. I wasn't too worried about drainage since succulents don't require too much water so I will be watering sparingly. Which is perfect for me since I often forget to water the plants (I'm such a bad plant mom).

 I filled the dirt all the way up to the top of the moss.

 Now I started arranging my succulents in the birdcage. I bought some succulents that would look good hanging as well as some that would not be hanging to give it a nice varied look. I took the hanging succulents out of their pots first since I was going to have them on the outside of the birdcage. I knocked off as much dirt as I could get off of the roots since it would be easier to insert the plants without extra baggage. I used the kabob stick to poke a hole in the moss to insert the succulent roots.

 On some of the plants with longer roots I gently pushed them into the hole with the kabob stick.

 I continued knocking off dirt from the roots and using the kabob stick to plant the succulents all along the outside. I planted the non hanging succulents inside of the birdcage. I also knocked as much dirt off of those plants since I already had enough dirt inside the cage. I watered very sparingly when I was finished. Here is a picture of the inside of the birdcage. I was able to poke some of the smaller offshoots from the inner plants through the bars so they can be seen from the outside.

 Here is a pic of the finished birdcage. As the succulents continue to grow I can poke more out and they may even fill in the top area more.

 While I was planting the succulents, leaves naturally fell off of many of the plants. While I was at Home Depot a very nice man who helped me find the sphagnum moss filled me in on how to "propagate" or breed succulents from a cutting. Succulents are apparently super easy to grow!! You simply take the leaves and lay them in a dry area with indirect sunlight for a few days so they can callous over. Then you lay them on some dirt and they will grow roots and eventually a whole new succulent. I'm so psyched to try this! I may never have to buy succulents again and that would be awesome since they can be very expensive.

Here's some pictures of the finished birdcage hanging on my front door. I am in love with this birdcage! I did spend more than I normally would on a project like this but I can keep the birdcage displayed somewhere outside and inside for the entire year. Also if I can regrow succulents from the leaves then it was totally worth the price I paid for them.

I don't know about you but I want to make another one of these succulent birdcages!! I will for sure be on the look out for an ornate cheap birdcage that I can put in the corner of my backyard (filled with succulents that I propagated of course) and bring in to decorate my house in the winter.

-Sherri