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Old 28-03-2003, 12:44 AM
Isom, Jeff , EM, PTL
 
Posts: n/a
Default [IBC] Worse than Mallsai?

My son (15) has shown an interest as well. I couldn't be happier - a shared
interest at that age is priceless! Anyway, I would recommend Ficus or some
other forgiving plant that will survive inside during the winter (you don't
want that burgeoning interest to die during the winter). You want a
forgiving plant, because most kids (not all) tend to be a little forgetful
at times...

Jeff Isom
Cleveland, OH / Sunset Zone 39
My kids' school is offering a $2.00 "mini Bonsai Kit". It

consists of a
2.5
inch x 0.5 inch mica(?) pot, a compressed peat pellet, 4

Jack pine seeds,
a
pair of Barbi doll scissors, and a tiny book on bonsai care.

My
10-year-old
daughter got suckered because she knows I'm doing some

bonsai.

I trust you spoke to the person who organized this folly

without sounding
too
enraged.


OMG pull your heads out of your soil mix! Remember back so

many years when
you were kids and every little gadget or kit in the back of a

comic book was
the
greatest thing on earth! It was all junk then and it's all

junk now, but it
is a part of
everyones childhood. How your imagination soared! Those are

the good times
you look back on and laugh about. I have one of those stupid

little kits on
the bookshelf
with my bonsai books. Yeah it's dumb but it's the cutest

little thing. And
for the small price
of $2.00, you got your daughter interested in your hobby! What

a deal!
Most kids
look at us like we are nuts!


I agree. I have one of these kits, too. I wrote about it here a
few months back. One of those $5 impulse buys at Barnes&Noble
books. ;-) There's a bigger "Bonsai Kit" too -- also a "Zen
Garden" kit. They're $10 -$15 I think. I don't have THOSE kinds
of impulses. ;-)

The tiny little book is surprisingly accurate, considering it
probably contains 150 words! ;-) I have it on my bookshelf with
all 135 of the "big" books. It produces the occasional
chuckle -- which (these days!) makes it worth the $5.00 it cost
me.

So $2.00 is a BARGAIN!

The round, black pot (it isn't mica) now houses a mame privet
which looks OK in it.

Besides, the seeds WILL (or should, with care) germinate, in or
out of the little peat hockey puck. The kids may learn something
there (and you might, also ;-). Who knows, you and your kids may
grow a mame grove of jack pine (Pinus banksiana -- so the kids
can learn a bit about nomenclature, too.)

If they want to do it, let them -- then go out and buy them their
own juniper, or ficus, or (for a REAL educational adventure)
Serissa to work with while the pines grow.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden

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