Bringing the Garden Indoors

Another way I'm trying to beat the end of gardening season blues

Thank you kindly for your comments on last week’s post about my fall garden gloominess. In writing it I did think I was on the path to acceptance, but so many of you are so much more positive than me about the changing of the seasons, and I think I might still have some work to do.

But when it comes down to it, fall really doesn’t care whether I want it to come to my garden or not. It’s already here! This week especially has been cool, with highs in the low 60s (15, Celsius). Even though I’ve been feeding it seaweed fertilizer every week my garden is getting mad, or maybe just a little bit sad, like me. It’s doesn’t want to hold on, even though I’m doing everything I can do to make it hold on until this weekend when my mom and sisters come to visit.

I will say that the cooler the weather gets, the easier it gets to look out and see a less-than-colorful garden. There are fewer bees now, and I don’t blame them. I don’t like being outside so much now either, especially when the wind blows and makes a mess of empty nursery pots and falling leaves on the terrace. I go out to check the garden, and then I just want to go back inside, where it’s warm.

If last week’s post was about how I’m trying to appreciate the outdoor garden in fall, this week’s is about bringing the garden indoors, or at least as much as I can get of it. In my dreamworld I’d have a heated greenhouse where I could grow all year round, but there are some plants that can be grown in my little Brooklyn apartment, no greenhouse necessary. And then there are those bits and pieces of the garden that I can take inside, reminders of what the garden was and what it will be again.

A ‘Nutmeg’ scented geranium, along with cuttings of ‘Attar of Roses’ and ‘Grey Lady Plymouth’

Growing garden plants as houseplants

I’ve written before about how I’m not a big houseplant person. I’m not crazy about anything too tropical-looking or desert-y, even though we do have a Monstera and a cactus. I want to grow inside the kind of plants I grow outside, which is why I love taking in all of our scented geraniums/pelargoniums as soon as the temps hit the 40s. On Tuesday I gathered up all twelve of them—six are varieties I bought, and the rest are cuttings I probably need to give away since I have too many—and scrubbed their pots and cut out little felt circles to put underneath to protect the windowsills and furniture, and the apartment does feel so much more lush now.

I miss the scented geraniums when they’re outside. Inside they don’t flower as much (honestly mine don’t flower well outside either, so I’m probably doing something wrong but maybe that will be another post) but their leaves alone are worth growing them for. I really am evangelical for them, in case you couldn’t tell from reading this post.

Growing pelargoniums as houseplants made me curious about what other outdoor flowering plants could be grown indoors, so I was excited earlier this year when I saw a tiny potted jasmine being sold as a houseplant at the very beautiful and fancy Tin Building flower stall. I didn’t buy it since the price was fancy, too, but last month when I saw a bigger jasmine plant being sold at Trader Joe’s for ten dollars I snapped it up. A jasmine is trickier than the houseplants I’m used to growing. Pelargoniums like their soil on the dryer side, almost like a cactus, but the jasmine needs more water and sunlight that isn’t so direct. I’m constantly afraid of killing mine, but so far it’s doing well, putting on new growth and even still flowering.

My Trader Joe’s jasmine plant in a stoop find pot, plus some bodega pumpkins

Growing bulbs indoors

Bulb forcing is one of those gardening tricks that seemed very intimidating to me and almost magical, best left to the gardening pros. I’d buy the preprepared waxed amaryllis and the paperwhite bulb that comes in its own little curvy vase from Trader Joe’s, but the idea of planting them myself seemed beyond my abilities.

But my husband Drew convinced me to give it a try, probably because I was moping. He must have known that I’d be a better version of myself during the cold months with something to grow from seed—or bulb, in this case. And if I could grow flowers inside, so much the better.

So I bought a few paperwhite narcissus bulbs at the local garden nursery. Most bulbs need to undergo a chilling period, but paperwhites are already good to go. So I bought some bulbs, got some pretty rocks, and found a little vintage planter at the antique store. And I read up on how to plant them and had no idea how easy it would be. Maybe the easiest thing I’ve ever planted? You can plant the bulbs in compost, but I opted to go the water route (much cleaner for the indoors). I added a bunch of pebbles to the planter (make sure it’s one that’s watertight, without any holes), made tiny little indentation nests for the bulbs to sit in, root-side down, and filled the container with water up to the rocks.

Supposedly paperwhites can bloom in as little as four weeks. I planted three bulbs, saving two others to plant when the first batch goes over. That way I can having something growing right up until Christmas. But seeing how easy bulb forcing is really making me want to give some others a try. I do still find all the forcing/chilling instructions overwhelming, but this Better Homes & Gardens guide spells it out nicely if you’d to give it a try, too.

Pressing flowers

My usual thing to do in flowerless months is to look back at my garden photos sadly, and for most of winter the wallpaper on my iPhone (do people refer to it as wallpaper still?) is a photo of my dog or the garden or both. After a long few months of not growing anything I start to forget that I can grow, and I guess I need photographic proof. But maybe actual physical proof will be even nicer?Drew surprised me with a flower press a few weeks ago, so I made sure to go pick some flowers from the garden while I still have flowers.

That’s the first batch of pressed flowers in the photo above. Obviously my pressing skills need work, and I think some of those flowers need more drying, but, still, what an amazing way to save flowers! I want to make cards and bookmarks with them so that I can have my flowers around me all year round to look at. So much more satisfying than just a photo on my phone.

I also love the idea of pressing flowers throughout the summer, and having a big stack of them to work with in the colder months. Something flowery to do in the cold, rainy days of winter, and a reminder of what’s to come.