Words about contentment inspired this series that celebrates ingenuity, creativity, and resourcefulness. Join me in the comments and share what you've done with what you have!
I told you it had gone bonkers. Lost its ever-lovin' mind. The coleus plant I saved through the winter in hopes of propagating in the spring for this summer's flower pots unabashedly exploded on the round table. And I couldn't be happier. I was crossing my fingers for a handful of cuttings, and boy howdy, was I ever set to get them.
Now, before anyone goes off getting excited and speculating on the color of my thumb, let me say that coleus are one of the easiest plants to grow. This is a single plant in a small clay pot. I watered it thoroughly once a week, like I always do, and this is what happened. People? You don't have to have some kind of bionic green thumb to grow amazing coleus!
Let's all be happy about that.
The leaves of coleus grow in pairs up the stem. To propagate, snip the stem with sterile sheers just above a leaf pair. Then, strip the leaves off the stem until the lower two-plus inches of stem are bare, leaving the tiny leaf nodes intact. Roots will grow on this bare portion of stem simply by placing the cutting in water or planting it in a moist growing medium like vermiculite. When the roots are long, plant the cutting in potting soil, and there you go: a new plant.
It really is that simple. One plant becomes twenty in a snap snip.
I chose to root mine in water, so I swiped the hobnail juice glasses from the kitchen shelf, filled them with water, and grouped several cuttings to a glass. The fun thing about this is, they look like mini bouquets and could be just the thing to trot down the dining table as a centerpiece for a spring lunch. Or maybe grouped together on a tray. Or divided around the house - one in the bath, one at the bedside, one on the kitchen window sill, the rest on the bookshelf.
Whichever way, it works.
I'm always amazed at the amount of cold hard cash I have to hand over the counter at the local greenhouse in exchange for the list of annuals I plant every spring, and I don't even have that many pots to fill. This year (high five), I'll be able to check off a nice portion because of what I've got rooted, ready, and waiting back home.
And, if after I've planted some in every pot and I find that I've run short? No worries. There's more where these came from.
Do what you can with what you have.
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