Up Close and Personal

I want to take you on a tour of my beautiful house plants. I love these guys and visit them daily to see what they are up to. There is a sad story behind my plants, though. As you may have experienced with your own plants, gnats are attracted to damp, rich, organic matter. Gnats are therefore drawn to my lovely and cherished plants. My plants are therefore banished to the outdoors because we don't want gnats in the house. One solution to this problem is to not water the plants as much, and to keep the soil loose. But I only water as they need it, and I mix around the soil to prevent it from becoming too compact. There is nothing else that I have found that I can do. I'm sad, but the thing is - when I put my house plants in a shady corner of the porch they flourished. They loved the new found bright light so their leaves doubled in number and they became so vibrant. So now I am really sad because if I ever bring them back in I am sure they will hate me forever. *Sigh* Come with me - let me show you my favorite house-porch plants.

This green and purple fuzzy one is called 'Sow's Ear'. By the way, I don't know anything technical about my plants like the 'real' scientific names - which are no fun anyway!

I got it as just two leaves from a mama plant at my old job. I just took her home and stuck it in some soil and rooted it right up.

Look at the soft fuzzies. It's like when boys cut their hair real short and it has that funny feel when you rub it. It's nice, right?!

This 'Sliver Queen' we've had for many years. It came from Chicago when Josh's grandparents moved from there to Georgia. I can only imagine how long they had it before we got it. Same pot and everything. I've re-placed the stalks a couple of times because it was looking lanky - but like I said, I take it outside and it practically doubles in size in no time flat. It doesn't look lanky anymore.

We got this booger at Ikea for some ridiculously cheap price when it was like an inch tall. It's a big ol' beautiful and incredibly hardy 'Tropical Plant'. When I've looked for it online it seems it is one in a huge group of plants called Tropical Plants...that works for me!

I can't remember what this one is called. I got it from my last job with the Sow's Ear. And what have we here? This particular leaf has a funny little er, growth or something on it. I've seen these tiny white dots on the ends of these even smaller white strings on our wind chimes before. Are they eggs? Is it fungus?

My vote is for fungus. They are so delicate and kinda cute! They add character to my little plant!

Oh gosh, I wish I could have my house plants back but at least they are happy. Besides, I'd probably have my hands full keeping Joseph out of them.

Speaking of keeping Joseph out of plants...I don't think he'd like these chives very much. Sometimes I cut them all the way down just to watch how fast they grow back! And to get a whiff of their light onion fragrance. OMG, Josh just sat down on the couch next to me with a big bowl of granola cereal mixed in with cocoa puffs. I can't top that right now, I guess I'm done....