Photos: Cookie Jar Terrarium Part 1: Setup

[ysabetwordsmith]

Recently I bought a little fern, so I'm making a new terrarium. You can also see the previous Antique Jar Terrarium.


This is the cookie jar terrarium. It's about 6 1/2 inches wide. I'll be able to reach in with my hands to work inside it, which is great.




It's about 10 1/2 inches tall with the lid on. When I bought it, the lid was taped in place.




The Goodwill price tag was $4.99 for the cookie jar. It also had part of another sticker on the bottom and some gum from the tape. Recently I saw similar and smaller containers sold for terrarium construction at $30-40. Like I've said before, don't buy anything labeled "terrarium" because people jack up the prices. Buy the same kind of container in a thrift store or whatever.




I bought this little fern recently for $6. The pot is about 3 inches wide but the fronds hang over the edges somewhat. I don't know what kind it is, but that's okay. Most ferns like damp and shady conditions, so they tend to thrive in a terrarium. Ideally you want one small enough that its leaves won't touch the glass. Avoid overcrowding a terrarium.




The fern is about 6 1/2" tall pot and all, but the plant part is only about a third of that.




This is TopFin Granular Activated Carbon. I'll be using this charcoal to make a filtration layer in the terrarium.




This is Thrive Natural Coconut Fiber Climbing Background. It's a thin mat of fiber that I'll be cutting up to make a barrier between the gravel base and the charcoal. I really enjoyed working with it in the previous terrarium.




These are my long terrarium tools. The ruler shows how wide they are.




This view of the ruler shows how long the tools are. It's less crucial in this case because the jar mouth is wide enough to fit my hand inside, but still convenient to have. If you want a set of these, shop around, because the prices vary enormously.




I'm using this cup to scoop and measure things.




I bought this bag of New Plant Life Pea Gravel for $4.99. That's about a same price for a much smaller bag of craft gravel. A small bag of gravel at the pet store runs $10-12 or more. Unless you only want to make one tiny thing, buy a bag from a farm or home improvement store where it's cheap. You can use it for a variety of purposes.




I scooped out a cupful of gravel and dumped it in a strainer so I can wash it later. Most pieces are about pea to bean size, in a pretty assortment of colors and shapes. It's a really nice bag of gravel.




Duck Adhesive Remover does a great job of cleaning off stickers, tape residue, etc. It can't remove everything but it comes close.




So after setting all this up, I washed the gravel and set it aside to dry.

I washed the cookie jar and its lid. I used the Duck Adhesive Remover to get off as much gunk as possible. I couldn't get all the sticker off the bottom, but I think everything else is clean. I haven't taken more pictures because it's not dry yet.

And this is where I got interrupted to go explore our new outdoor spigot and talk about hoses for it, so I'll have to revisit the terrarium build another day.

This also fills the "Thriftcore" square in my 4-1-25 card for the Aesthetics Bingo Fest.