It’s winter time in South Africa and boy, this time I think we are going to have a very cold one as opposed to last year’s. So, during this lock-down period especially during the first two months, shops were completely closed. l could not get my gardening essentials. I needed a wooden planter for my herbs for easy movement. Think, think, think, I then went on to my favorite social media platform that harnesses my creativity – Pinterest. The reason why i love this media is because it literally confirms that your idea is not crazy after all, lol.

Moving right along, I found up-cycling ideas for plastic water bottles. The process was easy and to be honest, It is actually a good feeling knowing that you are at least trying to protect mother nature, which is something that is hard to maintain during our lifetime. Here is what I used in this process of transplanting my parsley:

Materials:

Process:

1. Pierce a knife through the empty bottle to a level/height of your choice.
2. Either use the knife or scissors to cut all the way around.
3. File the sharp edges using sand paper or slightly burn them. I forgot to do this part (see the picture) but you can, if you want. The reason behind is to avoid being cut by the sharp edges.
4. Poke little holes at the bottom sides to allow for drainage.
5. On the sides of your bottle, cut a small hole about 5 cm from the top. That’s for the string.
6. Put potting soil in your planter, if you don’t have, use dry leaves and shrubs for the bottom part and then garden soil on top. Potting soil is much lighter so when you hang your plant, the string is not overpowered by the heaviness. However, this depends on the thickness of your string. I used a very thin string and opted for the dry leaves and shrubs.
7. Hang. I just used the existing screws supporting poles to my car port, lol. For this part you can hang your plant on trees, fence, or anyway where it is hang-able.

Kindly let me know on how you up-cycle your empty water bottles 🙂

#Save the planet and up-cycle!