It's Time To Get Your Sham-rocks On!

Can you believe how cute these little guys are? They are just what they say, grow your own shamrocks kits. I bought them for my kids to make. I'm sure you could get something similar in many places. I found these at Joann's for only $1.00 each! The directions didn't say how long they took to grow. I figure it would be best to start now, if I want shamrocks by St Patrick's Day!
They come with a bag of seeds, instructions, and a soil pellet. The seed packets had WAY too many seeds for this container. The instructions suggested 10 seeds per pot (and yet had about 100 seeds!). You add water to the soil and that too, became more than the little pots could handle. So this little project turned into one for my preschool kids as well! YAY!
I let my kids decorate their own pots. In the VERY beginning of doing crafts with my kids, I had an idea of how their stuff should turn out. Thankfully I quickly realized it's about their vision for their craft! My kids drew (with a sharpie) whatever their little hearts desired (or in this case-wherever, as he's drawing on the bottom of the pot where no one will see it...or else I will have dirt on my floor!).
We planted these just 2 days ago and already they are growing like weeds! You can tell here that we obviously went way over the suggested 10 seeds per pot. I generally do that.
I love new plants! They are so much fun to watch. On projects like these I let my kids take care of them completely. It's a great learning tool for them! I think we get our love of growing things from our parents (I know that's a shocker). Growing up we had those long raised beds. My favorites were eating the pea pods straight off the vine, oh and don't forget the rows of carrots! Yum-me! I loved those raised beds. For a few years I had a large area to garden in. I am back to a postage sized yard to fit my gardens in. Something about gardening is so inspiring and satisfying to me. It keeps me grounded. I try to do growing projects with my children as often as I can. One of my daughter's has a bonzai tree. That's been a fun experiment for her to try. Back to the growing of the green, here...
Here are the other ones that I came up with for the preschool kids. This was from the leftover soil and seeds! Would you believe that we only used one of the three seed packets, for all 7 pots (and that was having way more than 20-30 seeds in each cup, too!)!? The other 2 packets of shamrock seeds got sent on their way to family and friends to grow their own shamrocks! I was so excited when I thought up using these sample cups for growing these in. I love for kids to get to see the roots growing. We already have roots that have reached the bottom of these cups! How fun! There's still time for all of you to run out and start your own shamrock garden's! I love that these were a craft for today, a science experiment for the next month, and a decoration for St Patrick's Day! When you do get yours going, we'd love for you to add pictures of them to our flikr group! Hope you have fun with this craft!
Rebecca