The stork made a call today - and I'm now the proud mother of two lovely, new houseplants!
I stopped at a nursery this afternoon and spent an hour or so poking around their half-indoor/half-outdoor Houseplants area. They had an incredible selection of potted plants, along with some succulents, and I loved having the chance to match some "faces" to the 
names of the plants I read about in a vintage magazine article on houseplants. Some of them were familiar, I'd just never heard their names before! Several caught my eye, but I had limited myself to adopting only two and eventually left the nursery with a medium-sized grape ivy and a small "Indian Summer" coleus. The ivy is just big enough that it adds some real oomph to my kitchen. I've popped it in the corner of the room - up on top of the cupboards that line one wall - and laid the longest strand of leaves and tendrils along the top of the cupboards. The coleus has beautiful deep red and geen leaves. A beautiful plant for foliage--
- I had a hard time choosing from all the varieties of coleus! This baby found a home just behind my sink.
names of the plants I read about in a vintage magazine article on houseplants. Some of them were familiar, I'd just never heard their names before! Several caught my eye, but I had limited myself to adopting only two and eventually left the nursery with a medium-sized grape ivy and a small "Indian Summer" coleus. The ivy is just big enough that it adds some real oomph to my kitchen. I've popped it in the corner of the room - up on top of the cupboards that line one wall - and laid the longest strand of leaves and tendrils along the top of the cupboards. The coleus has beautiful deep red and geen leaves. A beautiful plant for foliage--
- I had a hard time choosing from all the varieties of coleus! This baby found a home just behind my sink.I've got some studying up to do on caring for my new plants. And they'll definitely need re-potting. It's kind of neat knowing that these were houseplants popular in the kitchens of yesteryear. We usually think that the only way to add vintage flair to our kitchens is with dishes and appliances and curtain fabric, but houseplants are another fun way to do so. Hey, if I'm going to spend this much time cleaning my kitchen, I'd better dress it up a bit!
10 comments:
You are such a tease, I felt a bit of excitement at seeing the announcement! Congradulations, plants are living and give such loving touches to any space. Soon you'll be greating them in the morning and finding joy in their care. Thank you so very much for your writings. It brings such joy to my stressful life. I look forward to it every day. You are a great inspiration.
Good choices! These are easy plants to care for. And, nothing like a little real green to brighten things up.
At least the coleus is easy to propogate, so you can share cuttings with your friends and relatives. I'm not overly familiar with grape ivy other than my mom has a huge one in her living room. Neither like to be over watered. (I say that, and I never remember to water my plants until they droop. :( ) For years, I had a huge coleus plant that I finally decided to put outside for the summer. Wouldn't you know, we had a freak early freeze. It didn't survive. I almost cried.
had earth hour down under last night, we just went to bed early and turned off the lights as usual
I love coleus and mainly we use them here as an annual outdoor plant, though I do bring some of mine in come fall and keep them, but I need to keep 'at them' with sciccors or they get to 'leggy'. They have so many colors and variety and I was just thinking the other day, when I too was reading a vintage article on houseplants, that I really need coleus inside. I know our local greenhouse have some trained as indoor plants, but come spring you can get every color imaginable in little 6-packs to plant in your garden, so maybe I will choose some to make up an indoor collection for myself while the variety is there! Congrats on the plants, they are that final layer of design, I think, that just adds a finished touch and says. 'Yes, I love my home and I can care for things".
Also, I don't think we have Earth hour on the east coast, of course I read no modern new, magazines or tv so maybe I just missed out. Though, hubby said nothing of it, I wonder if we do not have it here?
Gotcha, Jeanne! ;) It's funny, but there is a kind of excitement in having some living things in my home again. (I'm just hoping I can keep them from attracting more living things, i.e. bugs!) Thank you so much for your lovely comments. Keeping a blog about this journey has been soooo helpful for me. Having that accountability has made all the difference in the world.
Packrat, I'm so excited that I'll be able to give cuttings of the coleus to others. It's a beautiful plant. I guess I just need to add watering my plants to my housekeeping routine so that I won't water them too frequently or too infrequently. I can totally understand about the plant you lost. We have a HUGE Dieffenbachia (sp?) at work with long, twisting, massive stems, and nobody can bear to dismantle it - though it needs to be done.
Amy, your time zone must have been one of the first to mark Earth Hour.
50sgal, whoop! I didn't mean to spoil you with some news from the modern-day world!!! Yep, Earth Hour moved around the globe yesterday - marked in each time zone from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m.
By "leggy," do you mean that the stems on the coleus get real tall? Or that the ends grow out quickly?
If you ever have a bug problem on plants, wash the plant with dish soap! then rinse. I flood the plant pot with soapy water to clear the dirt of any bugs too. It kills aphids quickly and is biodegradeable too! Also house flies die over night if you fill a dish pan with dish water and leave over night. In the morning flies are dead in the water. No bug spray or fly strips needed.
That first tip sounds especially handy. I noticed a gnat-y thing flying about near the ivy yesterday and started getting really wigged out about bugs! That sounds like a me-friendly way to "clean" the soil in the pot.
by leggy, I mean that when you grow them outdoors and they are used to a certain amount of light, that you would never get indoors unless you kept them in a conservatory or greenhouse, they tend to grow long tendrils that hang down with smaller leaves, as they are trying to reach the sun and get too heavy and fall down like 'long legs'. What is great about coleus is they are super easy to propegate. When you trim your new baby, which you will most likely do to stop her form getting leggy, if you at a node where a new leaf bud is forming you get two things, the original plant will grow leaves there making it fuller and not 'leggy' and you have a cut leaf you can place in a jar in water on your windowsill, it will look lovely, especially in cute jars or juice glasses that you like the look of and eventually little roots will appear, when this happens you can put this new baby, your grandchild I guess ;) in a small pot with good loose potting soil watering alot at first for it to get used to the soil. Now you have a new plant for yourself or for a friend. Pass on the love, right!
Thanks so much for the tips on pruning the coleus and in coaxing some grandbabies from her! I'll keep an eye out for legginess.
Post a Comment