Something Different. A Wall Fairy House (from gravel and grout!)

Ok, Ok...y'all will probably think I'm crazy but I saw a couple of Fairy Houses on Pinterest and it piqued my interest.  As a kid my favorite thing to do was make buildings out of Legos.  I could spend an entire Saturday building one house after another.  So, the idea of building a little house out of rocks...well...that's just a different kind of Lego building!

I've been working on a rock retaining wall for the past year and the idea of tucking a little door down in the base of the wall was more than I could resist.  I used an old yardstick to cut up for the door. It gives the door scale so you can see how tiny it is.  My yard is a corner lot and always bursting with flowers so people stop and ooh and ah a little bit.  I've always enjoyed looking out the windows to see people's reactions to all the flowers.  Now it is fun to watch them to see if they notice the Fairy Houses.

However, it is hard to do just one Fairy House.  Since I was gluing gravel and rocks together (and then grouting later with leftover green grout from my bathroom project), there was a lot of down time. Glue five pieces of gravel (from my driveway...talk about a cheap project!) and then wait for it to dry.  So, while I was waiting for things to dry I'd start another one, and another one, and a bridge, etc....

The one up above has a window (a pane of glass from a tea light holder) and is hollow so I can take off the rocks above it and drop a tea light inside.  It is a pain to do but I figured that would at least be fun for Halloween.  I found a tealight though that come on at 5 every day and stays on for four hours.  It is still working a month later on the first battery).

Since this is the new part of the wall, it doesn't have a lot of plants growing yet. Once I have it all planted the houses will really disappear for most of the year.

The best part of the Fairy Houses have been the reaction from the kids on my block.  Almost every day I see them down here checking on the Fairies.  I have found two letters tucked up against one of the houses. One to the tooth fairy and  one asking who lives in the house.  I answered them both on little scrolls of sparkle paper.

:0)

But, since I'm an artist,  I'm calling these art and they count in my New Year's Resolution of creating 75 pieces of furniture and art this year.

I'm not quite finished with the bridge and the last fairy house (and I've promised to make one more for a dear friend who wants one really badly). But for those of you who loved legos as a kid...I highly recommend this as a project.  It was a blast!