Indoor Play Area Board - Part Three - Foliage

Foliage

Trees

Bushes

Flowers

Unlimited supply of Elmer's glue

Now that you have the pond and the roads in pace it is time to add the foliage to your play board. This is a little more difficult and you will want to do this yourself, rather than let your child. Purchase several small artificial plants that are glued into Styrofoam based pots. Using a knife, cut around the edges of the pot until you can remove the plant. You will have a chunk of Styrofoam on the end of the tree. You will use this to glue the tree in position on the board. Shape the Styrofoam so that it will look like a mound of dirt under the tree. This will be covered. Remembering that you will be adding buildings to the board, determine where you will want the foliage, and using the Elmer's glue, glue the tree to the board on the underside of the Styrofoam.

At Jo Anne's Fabrics I found some artificial flowers that looks like grasses with teeny tiny flowers on the tips. Using just the last 2-3" I glued them in the edges of the pond to look like reeds growing out of the edge of the water. I also glued some around the edges of the buildings and a few under some of the trees.

Ground Cover

5 bags sheet moss

Straw

Pine needles

Unlimited supply of Elmer's glue

You can use anything you wish, but we decided on moss and pine needles. This is probably the easiest part. Paying attention to the areas you have marked off, working in sections so that your glue does not dry, spread the glue in the same manner you used when making the roads. Using the moss that comes in sheets, unroll the moss and press it onto the board firmly. Glue the moss on the mounds under the trees in the same way. You can use different types of moss for the different areas. We also glued a little sand around the edges of the pond to look like the water's edge.

We also cut the pine needles into small pieces and scattered them under trees that look like pines. The straw we cut into pieces. Some we cut into 2" pieces and made tiny hay bales, and cut more of the straw much smaller to spread around the floor of the pen for the farm animals.

If you would like more photos, leave a comment below and I will be happy to email photos to you.