Hedging My Bets

With the next Big Game looming ever closer, I needed to crack on with some more hedges, as despite Giles' prodigious output and willingness to part with ready cash (unlike stingy old me), we never seem to have enough hedging to dress the three huge tables that we require to accommodate so many players.

Although nowhere near as good a scenery guy as Giles (or for that matter Roo - he of the enormous hill), I thought I'd do my bit. Being not particularly happy with my last lot of hedges, I thought I'd experiment with a few different techniques. Off to my local supermarket then, to purchase some packs of suitably green scouring pads!

The first and most time-consuming method was to roughly tear some of the pads into strips, some wider than the others. These strips were then scoured, pinched and generally distressed, and then a narrow strip was stuck on either side of a wider one.

Once dried these were roughed up a bit more, drybrushed along the bottom with brown paint and then stuck to bases. A scattering of greenery and a coat or two of hairspray finished the job.

Not bad, but a messy, frustrating (I had to hold some of the strips in place with double-sided carpet tape while I glued) and drawn-out process which put quite a strain on my supply of scouring pads.

Wanting something quicker and more painless, I decided to cut the rest of the pads into strips of roughly similar width, drybrush them (brown at the bottom, light green and a smattering of yellow along the top) and simply glue them singly onto bases, thus representing a more trimmed garden hedge as opposed to the thick, unkempt specimens above.

Once again a scattering of basing greenery was applied and the whole lot given a voluminous, long lasting hold with the hairspray.

I was now left with some offcuts of plasticard, and these were pressed into service by simply sticking on bits of modelling foliage (a bag of which had kindly been donated by Giles a while back). Flock and spray as standard, then serve on the tabletop to admiring guests.

None of these will win any awards, but they'll at least help to alleviate the great hedge shortage and keep me stocked up with scenery.