Poinsettia Care

January of this year my mother gave me a poinsettia that my sister gave to her. My mother has never been able to get a poinsettia to stay alive through the year she usually ends up tossing it in the trash when the plant dies. This year she decided to give it to me. There are specific things you have to do with the plant to get it to re bloom from what I have read. The hardest part will be ion the next few months. You have to give the plant a limited amount of sunlight and keep it in the complete dark the rest of the time. I think I will be able to do it without much of a problem as soon as I get a timer. I have a growing station in my home with grow lights, all I will have to do is set the timer and hopefully there will not be a problem, and the other plants will grow as well. This is the first time that I have ever had a poinsettia so I have no idea what will happen. I have always heard that getting one to live through the year was very difficult, well so far so good. I think keeping it alive is probably the easy part getting it to re bloom will be the hard part. I'll keep you posted,m and if it does bloom I will post everything I did so that the next person will possibly get a bloom out of their plant.

Avocado update

Well I was looking at my plants today and noticed that my avocado has some more growth on it. Since I placed it outside I did not really know what it would do. It was so dry last week and this week so far it has been like the monsoons. I am happy to say that the little plant is still alive and growing. My brother is trying to grow one as well. I am looking forward to seeing how big his is. I started mine several months before he did so I don't expect his to be larger than mine. I will have to wait and see what it looks like and see just how big it is. Last I spoke to him he said his had nine leaves while mine had only four. The biggest thing was the leaves on mine were around six inches long and it looked like a leaf as you can see in the picture. The leaves on his did not really look like leaves to me. I have no idea how big this plant will get but it really does not matter I am having fun and that is the important thing.

Avocado plant in a pot

Several months ago I started germinating an avocado seed. I placed it in a jar just like you do a potato. It took several months but it sprouted and it finally got big enough to put in a pot. I know I will not be able to plant it outside because I live in the wrong part of the country, but I will have a nice plant in the house. While the weather is nice I will keep it outside, but as soon as it starts to get a bit chilly inside it will come.

House plant or outdoor plant ?

There are several plants that can go either way. They can be a house plant or a outdoor plants. Honestly some plants can be both. The one plant I have been lucky with is a coleus plant that I have been told can be both. Growing up my, grandmother sometimes kept a coleus in her home. So the plant evokes a special memory for me and my mother now that my grandmother is no longer with us.

For anyone who is not familiar with what a coleus plant is it is a leafy plant. The leaves are colorful (some are very colorful) and they are just leaves. When it matures it does have small purple flowers at the top of it so that it can seed out. I usually pinch them off so that the plant will live longer and sometimes bush out.

As of yet I have only started them indoors and then moved them outside and lost them when the weather cooled. This year I am planning to do something different. I am planing to bring in several of the coleus I started from seeds in for this winter. I have been successful in getting an amaryllis seed to sprout and live through the winter I am hopeful that I will be able to be successful with a coleus also.