Spring 2020

May 4, 2020May 4, 2020Leave a comment

Our 8-year-old Pink Jasmine bloomed two weeks early this year! It usually starts blooming in the first week of May and is in full bloom in the second week. This year, it was in full bloom in the last week of April.

Pink Jasmine

The plant is not in its best form because of the two typhoons Faxai and Hagibis. There are fewer flowers than usual but the fragrance still fills our home!

This is our favorite rose plant which produces at least fifteen roses every flowering season. Last month, there were around five roses and now the second round of flowering has started. This rose plant gives us a feeling that it is always happy with its big fragrant roses and healthy leaves. 😀

Double Delight Rose

Double Delight Rose

I had never bothered to know the variety of the rose until my friend asked about it. I found out that it is called “Double Delight”. A very apt name!

Pink Jasmine and Double Delight Roses

I had sown some Fenugreek, Dill, and Holy basil seeds early spring. Fenugreek and Dill grew faster than the others.

Fenugreek

Dill Plants

Fenugreek Plants

There were a lot of small Aloe Vera pups (offsets) growing in the pot, so I cut off the bigger ones. I got a bowl full of natural moisturizer!

Aloe Vera

I have not repotted the Aloe Vera in years. I have grown it in the same pot, only cutting off the bigger ones twice a year.

This year’s experiment, Onions!!

T, now in Grade 2, is now learning how to propagate plants. When he saw the sprouted onions in the kitchen, he asked if he could plant them. So we read a few articles about how to grow sprouted onions and let them grow roots by putting them in a bowl of water. After three days, we saw the roots growing and planted them in a pot.

Sprouted Onions

Growing Roots

T is waiting for it to grow and is very happy to check on the plants every day.

Curry Leaf Plant

And finally, after trying to find a curry leaf plant all these years, I bought one online. It came home looking sad 😛 I really hope it grows well. Fingers crossed!

Tamarind Surprise

August 23, 2017Leave a comment

I usually get Tamarind blocks (used in Indian cooking) from my grandma in India. She has few tamarind trees from which we get enough tamarind for the extended family for one whole year.

Sometimes I find seeds in the tamarind block which have escaped deseeding. Recently I started planting them in the pot where I grow veggies. The first seed I planted was in Autumn last year.

One fine morning last week, there was this surprise! There were two tamarind plants! 🙂 After browsing for a while, I learnt they can thrive indoors in high light conditions during winter. That’s great news to me.

I’m planning to transfer them to separate pots. I hope they survive this winter!

Black Nightshade (Manathakkali /Kamanchi/Kaachi Soppu)

May 26, 2017May 26, 2017Leave a comment

Last summer, when my MIL visited us, she found the black nightshade plant growing around the trees in the pavement. This is a common plant in India. (Manathakkali/ Kamanchi/Kaachi soppu). The leaves and berries of the plant are used in cooking.

I’ve never noticed them before. These plants were also growing in the garden maintained by our apartment. When the gardener was weeding them out, MIL took a well grown plant and brought it home. It was peak of summer and the plant didn’t look healthy. There were lot of berries which were falling into the other pots nearby. Then it was fall and winter. The plant died.

This spring we noticed lot of plants growing fast in the pots in which I had planted garlic & dill. Initially, we thought it was a weed but later recognised it. The berries that fell last summer had started growing now.

Harvested leaves – 21 May 2017

I had enough leaves to cook this recipe from Padhu’s Kitchen 🙂

Keerai Kootu Recipe-Manathakkali Keerai Kootu

Black night shade plant with berries – 26 May 2017

Now there are white spots/ discolouration on the leaves. I’ll update this post if I find the reason for discolouration.

Indoor Herb Garden

April 21, 2017April 21, 20175 Comments

I’ve always wanted to have an indoor herb garden. I also mentioned it in my last post. I had bought seeds for coriander, dill and spearmint. I bought these colorful planters from the dollar shop and planted it around early March.

Coriander, Spearmint & Dill – March, 2017

I’ve got spearmint plants growing outside but just wanted to try growing them from seeds. It’s taking a lot of time to grow. The coriander and dill plants grew faster.

Spearmint growing from seeds

Dill, Spearmint & Coriander – April 20, 2017

Although it’s not sufficient for Indian cooking, I’m happy that I’ll always have some in my garden! 😀

Growing Garlic & Dill

February 11, 2017April 20, 2017Leave a comment

Another ~40 days for the Sakura (cherry) to bloom and we are really anxious to see some fresh green colour in the garden. Last spring we were too busy with cousins visiting us and then a month’s trip to India. This year we are all set for our early spring vegetable gardening!

Bitter gourd was the only success last year. We lost many other plants to pests. The spearmint plants just dried up. I hope it does not repeat this year.

For growing coriander I had used the Dhaniya seeds used for cooking. But they didn’t grow into healthy plants. And Dill, I’ve always wanted to grow them but didn’t know how. I recently knew they sell seeds and I started to plan for the indoor herb garden.

Coriander plants – Fall of 2015

Spearmint harvest – 2014

Spearmint harvest – 2015

We went to the Home depot to look for a good stand for the herb planters. We didn’t find a right one 😦 We just bought some Coriander, Dill and Spearmint seeds. We also bought a rose plant.

Coriander, Dill and Spearmint Seeds

This morning, Ganesh was repotting the new rose plant. Just then the idea of planting garlic struck me. Few garlic bulbs in the kitchen were already sprouting. I checked some gardening websites and decided to plant them. I also found that Dill was a good companion plant to grow with garlic. We planted both garlic and Dill. It was a nice start to the day!!

Garlic & Dill – 11 Feb 2017

I will update this post with the pictures when it starts growing 🙂

Thanks for reading! Have a nice day!

Update:

April 20

GrowingGarlicDilUpdate1

Growing Bitter gourd – Unexpected Success!

August 8, 20161 Comment

It was my husband’s idea to grow Bitter gourd this year. I thought our balcony might not be the right place for the plant. I wasn’t confident and left it to him. But it turned out to be a great success. We harvested 3 bitter gourds in the first round. Expecting 5 more in the second. 😀

First round of harvest

Succulents – My new found love!

March 29, 2016Leave a comment

Recently, I’m more interested in growing succulents in our garden. They are very easy to grow and maintain. I’ve had no problems till now.

This post is about the cacti we grow at home. (Almost all cacti are succulents)

IMG_2630 copy

The three cacti in white containers are from IKEA. We bought it last summer. It grew well until winter. I hope it will start growing again now that its spring.

The other cactus is called a moon cactus. It’s a grafted cactus. The upper cactus lacks chlorophyll and thus red in color. As it cannot survive on it’s own, its grafted on a green cactus. We bought it at a local garden center.

And that’s a pair of Shisa from Okinawa :). Shisa are cross between a lion and a dog from Okinawan Mythology. The left Shisa has it’s mouth closed and the right has it’s mouth open.

My Little Balcony Garden (2012)-2

February 3, 2016February 3, 20164 Comments

Posting some more photos of my garden 🙂

Fenugreek (Methi) Seedlings

Tomato flowers

Little Tomato

I grow Fenugreek and Coriander plants in these big rectangular pots. I planted both at the same time but Coriander seeds take a very long time to germinate.