You may know that I absolutely love plants. Walking in nature and sitting under green canopies fills me up with energy and gives me a sense of living. Today I could not imagine living in a home without a single plant in it. My abundance of plants is a big aspect which makes my home special. I love to fill my room with green life and to be amazed by their beauty every single day. But it wasn’t always this way, and in this post, I want to share my story of how I got passionate for plants with you.
How it all started
I can barely remember, if I was already interested in gardening and plants in general as a very young kid, but I remember seeing pictures of myself watering the plants on our balcony back in Vienna very passionately. At some stage when I became older, I got my very first own flowerbed with carnations and dahlias. I made sure they always had water and at night-time I used to tell them the greatest bed-time stories I could imagine.
As a teenager I was still a little passionate about them, but I wasn’t good at caring for them at all. They would either dry out or get flooded by my lack of talent to water plants. Today I know that what was missing is a good routine for caring for them.
When I moved out of home at 17 my dad kind of adopted them. I don’t think I took any of them with me. As I visited my grandparents every now and then plants slowly started to move in again, one by one. One of the reasons I love being at my grandparents’ is due to the passion for plants we share. My guess is that I inherited it from them. Their home as well as their garden is filled with such an abundance of green life and you are always able to spot a flower somewhere. Besides the ornamental plants there are many fruit trees and a huge vegetable patch in the garden. Some of their plants they propagated themselves or they just started to grow in any random place on the lawn, like salat. Every time I visit them, I get at least one more roommate for my home and it is not uncommon for me to take plants with me on the train.
For a certain time, I avoided visits at nurseries, because any shop which sells plants is very difficult for me to leave without making a purchase. I used to ask myself if actually had space before buying a new family member. Today I mostly purchase it without thinking about my space issue beforehand. Oups! But I have to say until now I always found a place for them. This led to my home rather being a forest than a bedroom which I totally love. You can spot plants everywhere you look in my home. I love being surrounded by them and I could spend hours just taking care of them.
How it is today
Over time I also started to propagate and learned about the different ways it is done. Some plants like the Spider Plant grow new little baby plants which you can just pluck off and plant in a new pot. Other plants like the Pothos you can cut the stem before and behind a node and place it in water until it builds little roots.
I love to create new plants and some of them I give to people who love plants as much as I do. I am passionate about making an impact in the lives of other people by giving them a little living and green plant.
Two summers ago, I tried to grow tomatoes for the first time indoors, but unfortunately it didn’t go too well. This year I risked it again and now I have a whole vegetable garden at home. A few months ago, a good friend of mine and I were dreaming about growing our own veggies in an actual garden and after many conversations her mum allowed us to turn a small patch of her lawn into a garden. It is really amazing and soon we will be able to harvest our first crop.
How I care for them
If you have your own garden and plants in the house, you know that it takes a lot of work and care to keep it nice and primarily alive. Earlier I wrote that due to my lacking watering routine, many of my plants died. Over the years I realised that I had to set a date for watering my plants to keep me accountable. For me that is Sunday, which doesn’t mean that I won’t water them if I see that one of them is very dry, but every Sunday I water them all and give them individual care. Normally I start with my three orchids by filling water in their pot, so they bath in it for half an hour until I empty it again. While my orchids bath I take care of the rest of them. During the holidays I also look after the few plants my room mates have, since they stay with their families during the semester break.
I only started to fertilise them six months ago, since I didn’t want to add anything unnatural and thought it would harm them, but then I learned in a video that they need it from time to time. So, I bought a fertiliser which can be used both for edible and ornamental plants and use every now and then.
During the summer most of my vegetable plants are in front of my door and when it is really stormy, I take them inside. I am not really sure if we are supposed to have things in front of the door, but so far no one has complained.
So there you go, this is my story about my passion for plants. If you have any questions, feel free to send me an email.