A week before Christmas I inherited five nearly dead African violets. My daughter manages a mobile home village, and one of the residents had passed away over a month earlier. We ended up buying the mobile home for a granddaughter, and I rescued the plants and brought them home to nurse back to health. One was already too far gone, so I got the other four watered and fertilized and set them in the north facing plant window in the laundry room. A few days ago I repotted them into fresh potting mix and divided one of the plants into four, so now I have seven African violets to play with. They join the Happy Yummy sweet pepper that I brought in from the garden last fall. I had a bit of potting mix left over, so I planted a couple of pots of lettuce this morning. It's old seed, and may not even be viable, but I figured I'd give it a try anyway. If I can get a couple of plants to nibble on, I'll be a happy camper.
The plant window is beginning to look like spring!
I hope I can keep them alive. I'm not nearly as good with indoor plants as I am with my vegetable gardening.
Pots of lettuce on the left, and the Happy Yummy pepper on the right (looking both happy and yummy). I've had to do a bit of selective pruning on the pepper plant to keep it small enough for the window, but it seems to thrive. I can hopefully keep it going and get a good head start on the sweet pepper production next spring.
The prettiest and largest of the violets. One other is blooming, but it is plain dark purple.
Pretty enough to deserve a close up photo.
The Happy Yummy pepper has had a lot of blossom drop, but managed to bear five nice peppers so far. I wish they would hurry and ripen!
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Love your winter garden. I just noticed your (new?) header. You have my favorite garden book on top of the pile. The first book I got when I started gardening 30+ years ago, and I still reference. Have a great week.
ReplyDeleteYes, Sheila, that is my very favorite gardening book ever. It's going on 37 years of constant use. Hardly a week goes by that I don't read it!
DeleteWatching Jim Crockett on PBS got me and my husband gardening years ago. The Victory Garden was never the same without him.
DeleteI gardened before that, thanks to my Grandmother who passed her love of vegetable gardening on to me. I actually began with a small garden of my own way back in the late 50s! But it was Jim Crockett, the PBS series and the book that really piqued my interest. I wrote a blog entry about the book on August 11, 2008.............
Deletehttp://tinyurl.com/mfesbus
http://annieskitchengarden.blogspot.com/2008/08/august-11-2008-crocketts-victory-garden.html
I have a problem with starting plants from seed.....I tend to get a million of one or another, then get tired of caring for them (because I never manage to get them all transplanted) then I can't even give them away and just end up in the compost bin. I suppose there's worse things that could happen or I could do.
ReplyDeleteCarolyn, I do very careful seeding....I use a toothpick and put down one seed at a time! I only put four lettuce seeds in each of those pots. If any germinate at all (I'm not holding my breath) I'll snip off all but one plant per pot. I plan on just keeping them in that window.. If they grow they grow, if not I haven't lost anything. It was just too cold to take the potting mix back out to the shed, LOL!
DeleteI always start way too many seedlings. I know I give away more than I keep each spring, and I keep more than I should. That's why I had about 48 pepper plants in my garden last year, and why my freezer is still full of peppers!
The idea of an indoor pepper plant in the winter is awesome! Would be perfect if I could take care of it AND keep our cat Hisser out of it. She eats the leaves on any plant she can reach.
ReplyDeleteTeresa, this was a plant I grew outside in that pot all summer. I'd never tried over wintering one before, but this variety is so darned sweet and good I was hoping it would continue bearing. It sure is taking a long time to ripen (the peppers turn yellow-orange), but I can always pick them green if I get too hungry to wait for them.
DeleteThat is a beautiful window to display your new plant friends:-) I use to grow African violets many years ago..they are such pretty plants. Purple + white my favorite together...peppers in winter-WOW...you have an amazing place to grow inside:-)
ReplyDeleteRobbie, I think I tried to grow one once, long ago, but I usually manage to kill any kind of house plant except those made of silk or plastic! I love that plant window, but it is on the north side of the house. It surprises me that the pepper plant does so well there, but the African violets should love it. I also got a tomato plant to grow, flourish and fruit in that window one year.
DeleteI love that window too-I may have asked this before but-is that a custom window or something that I can buy at the 'window store'? 'cuz I need one of those babies! Thanks
ReplyDeleteBarbee, the window was here when we bought the house back in 1989. When we had all of our windows and sliding glass doors replaced last year, we were going to have a new one installed (this one is single glass with aluminum frame) but the price was prohibitive. Since it's in the laundry room, at the back of the house, we opted to just keep it.
DeleteThe African violets are so pretty. Reminds of the one I managed to grow for years that it developed a long stem and the whole plant just dangled on the side of the pot! I thought of entering it in a flower show as an oddity 'cause it looked so odd. That pepper sure looks healthy and happy and yummy. I wish I had brought in a pepper plant to pet indoors.
ReplyDeleteMrs. R., I hope I can keep these alive for years. Heck, I hope I can keep ME alive for years, LOL! They are still thriving after nearly a month in my care, so there is hope.
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