I like lists!

I love to make lists. And countdowns. I will list or count down to almost anything, I even have a countdown app on my phone. Now, I have recently come to the realisation that I am probably a bit of a houseplant hoarder and definitely an avid collector. If I am at the store and I see a plant I do not have yet, guaranteed it will be coming home! With a few exceptions I don't have very many duplicates of the same type of plant, the main defactor to this is Schefflera. In the past I wasn't a Schefflera fan, no real reason, they just didn't do much for me. I bought a small one to add to the collection and that was it. Then I bought a lot of plants from Kijiji for $10 that included a fairly large Schefflera specimen, and into the window it went. THEN I found another, again on Kijiji (yay!) for $10 that was HUGE, so I got that one too. AND THEN Craig brought me home a Schefflera he rescued from being tossed out at work and HOLY CRAP it is about 6 feet tall and literally a tree! So now I have four of the very plant I used to somewhat dislike. Anyways, I decided to walk around my house and make a list (LISTS!<3) of all the plants I have, just to really get an idea of what my collection is like. Here's my list:

-lithops
-pink calla lily
-phalaenopsis orchid
-polka dot plant
-small green/yellow palm (unsure what kind)
-variegated pothos
-pink geranium
-sago palm
-christmas cactus
-shamrock
-variegated english ivy
-green english ivy
-small african violet
-hen and chicks
-2 baby spider plants
-tiny baby hen and chick
-baby deiffenbachia
-purple velvet plant
-small jade plant
-silver nerve plant
-peperomia
-earth star bromeliad
-strange Ikea succulent
-crown of thorns
-kalanchoe w/purple flowers
-small succulent garden (3 different)
-lucky bean
-medium deiffenbachia
-medium african violet
-peace lily
-china doll
-large jade plant
-small schefflera
-black calla lily
-snake plant
-red dracaena
-small agave
-large deiffenbachia and spider plant (same pot)
-lime green pothos
-spider plant in hanging pot
-lipstick plant
-2 round cactus (same pot)
-money tree
-small cactus garden (3 different)
-ponytail palm
-small lucky bamboo
-aloe vera
-syngonium
-marimo (lives in the aquarium)
-spiral lucky bamboo
-calathea
-ardisia (still alive after Christmas!)
-tall dracaena
-large succulent type vine (unsure what it actually is)
-corn plant
-medium schefflera
-two large spider plants
-large schefflera
-huge schefflera tree
-ficus benjamina
-big twisty dracaena (friends with huge schefflera)
-sad ugly rehab pothos (trying to revive from an office building)

That's all of them! 62 list entries... holy crap, I have quite a collection! Well that's all for now, pictures are of the two biggest schefflera. Hope you liked my list!

Where you goin', sightseer pig?

More plant pictures!

Just a few today, I bought a couple more plants while at Walmart yesterday (I CAN'T SAY NO), here they are!


A pretty money tree, and only $2! How could I say no? (Answer: I can't.) I'm really on this natural colour pot with colourful saucer thing right now. I will have to go to the discount store a THIRD time to pick up even more of these! I have used up all that I've bought on my last two trips.


Not a new plant, but I just noticed today that my shamrock plant has a little flower!


I had to trim some dying stuff off the poor schefflera and then re-stake it to hold up the rest, I'm hoping this one will come back! Beside it is the new arrowhead plant I got along with the others yesterday.


Another not-new plant, but doesn't the christmas cactus look cute in it's new green pot and blue saucer? There used to be three stems, one died and I'm still not sure why, but the other two are doing great!

Well that's all for now, stay tuned for more fun, including moving all of these plants to a new house!

Last one for today!

I think I will call it a day, this will be the 11th post in the Snowy St. Patty's Day Post Extravaganza(tm)!, and I think I'm all posted out for today. To finish off here are the newest houseplants to the family, a peperomia and a very sickly schefflera that I couldn't help but rescue from Walmart. Aren't they cute in their matching biopots and colourful saucers? I think I have a houseplant problem!

Magnets.

In this house, you best be liking refrigerator magnets.

A break from Pictures Of Houseplants.

Now time for a couple of random pictures of my house! I took these earlier while wandering around with the camera.


I call this one "The Hallway, with Keys."


And this one is "Blue Bathroom."

Deiffenbachia is still growing!

Remember the post from earlier showing how much my deiffenbachia had grown? Well here are a couple of pictures of it today! Look at it go!

BUTT PLANTS!

For the next installment in the Snowy St. Patty's Day Post Extravaganza(tm)!, here's a few pictures of the fabled butt plants! Aren't they wierd? They are so wierd! I guess how they work is each year a single new pair of leaves (the butt) emerges from between the old pair and the old pair slowly shrivel up and die and then the cycle goes on. Hmm!

The Amazing $5 Corn Plant!

Continuing with the Snowy St. Patty's Day Post Extravaganza(tm)!, and the emerging theme of Pictures Of My Houseplants, here is a little picture and story of the $5 corn plant, because I can't leave a plant behind! We were at Home Depot the other day as we do sometimes, and they had a sale of large houseplants for $10. Lots of dracaena, which we already have quite a few of, and a few dieffenbachia which we also have a couple of already. There was also this corn plant, which was looking very scraggly and brown and sad. When we asked the lady if it was $10 as well, she answered that she would give it to us for $5 because no one wanted it and it was pretty sad looking. Sold! I took it home, cut off all the brown stuff, cleaned it up and put it in it's temporary home in an old dutch oven (temporary because we are moving soon so I will repot it at the new house, and I want to give it some time to recover before replanting it), sat it on a box in front of the window to get some light and look at how nice it looks! I forgot to take a "before" picture but I think it's looking pretty good!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Here are some shamrocks for you!

Wee succulents!

Aren't these wee succulents adorable? I got them at the grocery store as well in a multipack that included... butt plants! In case you were wondering the ones I started from seed a while ago didn't work because I kinda forgot about them and they dried up. But I got a couple of fully grown ones that I will post later on today as part of the Snowy St. Patty's Day Post Extravaganza(tm)!

Pothos

Isn't this lime green Pothos pretty? We bought it at the grocery store (instead of groceries...) and it's Craig's favourite houseplant!

Finally my deiffenbachia is growing!

Soooo remember a long time ago in November I posted how I had a deiffenbachia leaf cutting I was determined to root, and it was supposed to take forever this way but I was being patient because the leaf looked healthy, and it had already been two months with nothing happening? Well...



Finally after *7 MONTHS* some action is happening! The tip of that leaf that is emerging used to be level with the small open leaf! The white ring near the tip of the opening leaf was at the base of the small leaf FOREVER and I thought nothing would ever happen and it is finally showing some signs of life! It has actually opened a lot more since this picture was taken but I need to go take a more recent picture to show. It must've been saving up energy forever to get that leaf growing. Neat!

Snow Day!

It is very snowy and cold and grey out today, my original plan was to go shopping at the discount store (I LOVE THAT PLACE) but I think times like these call for pyjamas and movies! The four car pileup I passed on the way home from dropping Craig off (on the road I had previously been on, ack!) further confirmed that plan! Starting off with Mrs. Doubtfire, to be totally honest I will probably watch it several times because it is my FAVOURITE movie. I also have a bit of a backlog of pictures so I will probably make a few more posts along the way! To start, here is a picture of the local neighbourhood wildlife (giant magpies and very brash squirrels) eating some bread I threw onto the side yard for them!

My Aquariums

I took some pictures of my two aquariums and their inhabitants today, and thought I should make a post about them. Ready? Ok!


Aren't they cute together? Not totally identical but the backgrounds and holey stone on the bottom right match. Left one is 26 gallons, right one is 5 gallons.


This is the 26 gallon bow, my two convict cichlids Ethel and Walter live in here. You can kinda see Ethel in the opening of skull mountain, and Walter is on the right. Since taking this picture I noticed the upper edge of the backer was showing and have since fixed it *twitch*.


A close up of the purple plant (I love the colour!) and look Ma! Some of the shells you brought back from Mexico!


Here's Walter lookin' a little blurry. It's very hard to get pictures of fish! Try as I might I couldn't get one of Ethel.


Here's the 5 gallon, in here lives Obi Wan the snail, Mo the marimo and a flame gourami named Darryl Strawberry. Obi and Darryl are over by the rock on the right, and Mo is the big green circle in the middle.


Look Ma! More shells!


Here's Mo the marimo with Darryl hiding behind. Marimo are living balls of aquatic moss from Japan, it's hard to tell from the picture but they are very fuzzy and feel very velvety! They seem alive because they sometimes move around and float/sink. They're also good for adding some oxygen to the water because this tank's a bit small for a bubbler.


Last but not least, Obi Wan the snail! He's fun to watch when he really gets cruising along.

Well, that's it for now, hope you enjoyed my pictures of the aquariums!

My new truck!

ERMAHGERD! I got a new truck today! Well not NEW, but new to me! It's a 1996 GMC Sierra 1500, and my favourite vehicle colour, red! Originally I thought I wanted to go with a black vehicle but turns out I just had to go red. Here are some things I like about it, followed by some pictures.

10 Things I Like About My Truck
1. It's big.
2. It's red.
3. It's old and HEAVY.
4. Opening the door feels like swinging open a safe door.
5. The extended cab is old school so there's no doors, you gotta squeeze on in over the front seats.
6. It's got the kind of e-brake you step on.
7. The seats have buttons you press to make them move around.
8. It's fun to be a wee person driving a big vehicle.
9. It has a cassette tape player AND a CD player (cha-ching!)
10. It's BIG!

And now some pictures!






Yay!

Mmm... lunch.

Yesterday's lunch, delicious and easy, thank you asian supermarket! So good I made it again today! Udon noodles, fish balls and fried crab flavoured nuggets. Yummm!

Butt Plants!

This is my first attempt at cultivating butt plants, aka "Lithops". Google it and you'll see why I call them butt plants. See the tiny green dots in the picture? Success!

Latest Plant Update!

Remember the pictures a while back of the little bulges on my dracaena? Look how big they are now!:


That plant is getting new growth all over the place!:




I've also rearranged a lot because I've gotten quite a few new plants lately, as well as gotten rid of a few that weren't doing well. Here's the current plant table by the fish tank. My christmas poinsettia is still alive!


I had to cut down a big piece of my palm tree, it suddenly got all dry and died off. Hm...


A polka dot plant, the tiniest agave ever, a sweet smelling hyacinth and some butt plant seedlings! More on those later...




That's all for now on the plant front!

Best Looking Pie Ever

Isn't this the most beautiful looking shepherd's pie ever? Mmm... melty cheese...