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Once upon a time in a land probably not very far away, I had someone else buy me a plant. It was dark and made these big old leaves that looked super cool and tropical. LOVED IT. I still have that Alocasia Regal Shield, although in the intervening years a few things have changed. First of all, I learned what the name of it was, which was an act of Congress. There are SO very many different varieties of Alocasia - not to mention Colocasia - that almost every AI on the planet g

I have a friend who has some issues - validly so, and nobody is judging her for having them. That said, she is very against medication, and part of the reason is the plethora of terrible experiences she’s had with them over the years. But, when you have someone with bipolar disorder who also has ADHD and anxiety, and you add to that combination that they are only managing their illnesses with medical marijuana for the anxiety, sometimes things go sideways. Anyone who has a pa

‘Guttation’ is literally just the process by which those water droplets—you know, the ones that stain your wood surfaces if you have a tropical plant sitting on them—come OUT of the leaves of your plants. It comes from a Latin word, but since that’s a dead language and there probably aren’t a lot of Latin scholars left out there, we’ll just skip over the root word part and go straight into the cool sciency bits.

You know how you bought those jeans and they were your absolute favorite jeans and you wore them to everything 10 years ago so you saved them because one day you just KNOW you’ll be able to get back into them. But now, when you put them on, you have to lie down on the bed and use a coat hanger to zip them up, then you stand up looking like an overstuffed sausage? That’s root bound.

“Ears” at the top - very pronounced lobes, sitting high and perky - that flow down into a slimmer waistline and then pooch out near the end in a way that anyone would immediately recognize as the “booty” of the leaf. Let's talk about them.

I have never fully understood what "bright indirect light" means. I'm not sure I understand it now, if we're being completely honest. It's the least well-defined term in the entire plant world — a phrase that appears in approximately 100% of tropical plant care guides and explains precisely nothing about what you're actually supposed to do in your house in Northeast Georgia. So I guessed.

Thirteen days ago I left for cigarettes and came home with lily bulbs, onion sets, and a vow that THIS IS IT for a while. I meant it. Mostly. Monday I went outside with purpose. Not a plan, exactly — more like a general direction and the muscle memory of someone who has done this before. The retaining wall is in, as it has been for years now. The red clay is tilled and waiting. The plum tree — a veteran of this particular hillside — is leafing out like it does every year, unb

I did one of my "should probably be infamous by now" went to the store for birthday cards and came home with another plant. Obviously. And this one is...a little worse for wear.

First, you have to have a great best friend. My SO, being the wonderful, thoughtful human that he is, runs marinas for a living. Lake life and all that good stuff. Then you just...build a trellis.

Yesterday, while I was out and about picking up materials to build a trellis for a giant Monstera Deliciosa, I found an Alocasia Odora 'Batik.' So, in typical plant hoarding fashion, I brought it home. Obviously. I then compared it to the Alocasia macrorrhizos 'Dawn' - here's what I found.

The other night my SO noticed the grow lights were still on in the spare room after he went to bed. This is something I'd never noticed, being a Benjamin Franklin-style early-to-bed human. He, on the other hand, stays up and does whatever it is people do who stay up late in the living rooms of suburban houses. Watch things, presumably. Exist in the dark. Anywho. Nobody knocked over the grow light. Allegedly. This is a mystery in three parts.

The Bag You Can't Have (Probably) Season 4, Episode 11. Sex and the City . "It's not a bag, it's a Birkin." And even name-dropping Lucy Liu, Samantha can't get one. This waitlist is longer than my perimenopausal chin hairs, the price tag has five figures before you even consider tax, and they're genuinely not going to pick you — even if you could drop that kind of change. Really though. Is it even that cute? Nah. The Bag You Almost Bought (Possibly) Coach. A well-loved staple

Why is it my brain automagically pops to "let's plant something" every time the temp drops? I spent the January ice storm and subsequent snow storm re-potting every plant in the house, much to my SO's chagrin. I set up tables in the other half of the living room, flung Not Dirt everywhere, and had an absolute blast while he watched TV and the dogs looked on boredly.

Picture a tropical paradise. Lush greenery, birds chirping (or squawking if you, too, think modern dinosaurs are super creepy), bugs humming, it's hot, and maybe there's an ocean nearby. Now, in your mind's eye, look down. Do you see rich, black soil that is dense and moist?

Ladies and gentlemen of the plant world, the naysayers would have you believe all Philodendron Pink Princesses are bad, but when you look at the evidence - the REAL evidence - you'll find that every single charge traces back to not their failure, but to our own failed expectations. PPPs, beautiful, dark and brooding, were the "IT" plant not so very long ago...

I have a water prop thingy. It's an AHopeGarden — twelve holes, tray, lives on the buffet in the living room that holds office supplies and dongles and apparently also lives rent-free in the back of my mind as "I should really clean that."

What nobody tells you about launching a small business in 2026. I knew it was going to be hard. I accepted that. I still do. What I didn't know was how incredibly frustrating it was going to be — fighting the tech stack, fighting the people closest to me, watching my best efforts get relegated to "oh, that's cute" or lost in the void of the internet while Google pondered whether or not it had time for me.

Conversationally with a plant person, I would absolutely NEVER tell you what's in that tub. The water looks like someone pulled a blue baby out of it, and we are not going to discuss why. I dropped a felt-tip pen in there. It looks blue now. Moving on.

I left for cigarettes. That was it. It's a bad habit, I know, but that's not the point here. Focus people. LOOK at this?!?

Let me be upfront about something: there is no such thing as a bug-free greenhouse. Anyone telling you otherwise is either lying or has one plant on a windowsill and is calling it a collection.