This Week In Houseplants

Sorry it's late but I was buying plants

If you live in the Leeds area of the UK do NOT sleep on Tong Garden Centre. My boyfriend wanted to visit a few tropical fish places so he made a route to cover 5 garden centres near Leeds. I know, a wild way to spend a Saturday - something happens when you hit 30 and it’s literally my favourite day out.

We also hit up Ikea. Look how cute this little cloche is. Very Beauty and the Beast.

BTW, people keep clicking on pictures, so I’ve added links, for example the picture below goes to the product on Ikea’s website. It’s not an affiliate link, it’s just handy if you want to look. If it’s annoying, let me know. I’ve linked plant guides to the pictures of the plants. I don’t know if people are clicking pictures accidentally, or if they think it links to something.

We went to Deans (my favourite plant shop ever) on the way home (it was definitely not on the way home) and I picked up this Hoya crassipetiola for £4.49:

It does not fit in my tealight holder, which is FINE.

This Anthurium was from Tong for the princely sum of £17.99. I THINK it’s a queremalense, but if anyone knows better I’m all ears.

A gorgeous variegated Schefflera for £17.99:

This MONSTERA orchid that was £17.99. It was half price because the flowers are on their way out. My boyfriend fell in love with it.

It is SEVERELY rootbound so we cut the pot off as soon as we came home. Look:

It was left to soak in a bucket of water overnight and the bucket was dry this morning and the roots are still white. She thirsty.

Inb other news, I’ve decided I’m ready to have my heart broken by Calathea again, so I got a velvet touch. Probably my favourite plant of all time in terms of aesthetics, BUT never have a met a plant so intent on her desire to have both thrips and spider mites simultaneously.

I also got a Peperomia Sarcophylla. I have a care guide here, but tl;dr they’re a peperomia that looks like an anthurium but the care is all peperomia - they’re chill af.

It was pretty much the perfect day out. To make it even better, we had Pizza Express for lunch and they have a separate vegan menu. I had the doughballs and the Mushroom de bosco and it was lush. And then home to rearrange Smaug:

Yeah, he’s a work in progress.

I’m hoping he’ll start putting out bigger leaves now he’s got a bit of structure. And stop being so freaking leggy.

This is not plant related but I’m including it anyway. I bought four extra shelves for my Billy bookcases and rearranged them so they were less chaotic:

The shelves are now too short to fit most of my plants but they’re tidier. My plant stand is the chaotic one now.

I LOVE the bathroom plant stand (from this newsletter) but I’m not so sure about the living room one. Because the shelves aren’t flat (the centre of each shelf is raised) the plants are wonky. I feel there’s a better solution out there (that isn’t simply to stop hoarding plants).

Please let me know if you have a plant stand that you love!

Links I’ve loved this week:

This article on how plants were once deemed to sexy for women

And this video that has NOTHING to do with plants, but that I love. I’m currently learning to draw, came across this and it’s just so cute.