All My Gardens Have Come Inside

Which is to say, anything still growing in the little sunroom.  Originally just a little covered porch, I had it redone back about 12 years ago into a year-round room with heat, electrical, insulated walls and large windows.  I guess that qualifies it as a "room" now.

Among the few bloomers is actually one of the only year-round residents: a little African Violet.

It was originally a present that some student had given to some teacher at the end of the year about 5 years ago.  They didn't want it, so it ended up in the office, and they didn't take care of it.  I ended up rescuing it when it was on it's limp last legs.  Then I applied my mother's wisdom to it.  

1) I found it a location in indirect light and left it there

2) I always water it from below

3) I otherwise leave it the hell alone!

Seems to be working just fine!

Next up is my beloved Tree Philodendron "Audrey".  Audrey started out as a wee little think in a four inch pot when I first purchased her back in 1986.  And over the years, she's grown!  She now weighs 120 lbs in a dry container and well over 6 feet tall.  Every year since I first moved here in 1994, I take were outside to live in the warm months and then come's a day in mid- to late-november when I bring in into the sunroom to while away the winter.  Back in the summer of 2013 she took on a cohabiter.  A little fern suddenly appeared out of nowhere and grew among her roots at the edge of her pot content and unobtrusive.  After a another season, the fern popped up in a couple of other places.  And the same the next year.  Now, it's actually sending a runner up one of Audrey's trunks and sending out fronds!  And by all appearances, Audrey copacetic with it.

The frogs were just another whimsical purchase I probably made in some zoo's gift shop.

And finally, I love it when volunteers just show up in my gardens, and they're still surprising me even in the winter.  Here is a Torenia (Monkey flower).