Propagations - begonias and coleus

Part of this plant journey that I find fascinating is propagation.  What's that?  Taking a cutting of a plant and growing a new plant from that cutting (or at least growing a new vine to go back into the original pot to make the plant look fuller).  For the past year, I've done easy propagations like golden pothos, cebu blue pothos, marble queen pothos, and heartleaf philodendron.  I also propagated an adasnonii monstera from a vine my mother-in-law gave me that I've managed to keep alive.  Oh....that may be what those NOID small leaves are that I just potted up from my node propbox.  I guess we'll know in a few months. 

So today I got brave and took some cuttings of the beautiful coleus plants that my husband has growing in our shade garden.   Crossing my fingers that these root in a couple of weeks.  The first photo shows some coleus cuttings I got from my friend Jane a few days ago.  She has a small plant shop and I love getting plants from her!

Here are our cuttings from today.

There's one peeking in from the left that I need to go back and take a better photo of.  It's one of my favorites! 

This next one isn't a coleus but I think it's in the same family.  It's called a purple shield.  I'm hoping it roots like the coleus.  I guess we'll see in a few weeks.

I didn't take any cuttings of the outdoor begonias.  Their leaves are huge and I haven't figured out what I'm going to do to propagate those yet.  I know I really want to try because they are so unique and I need to get going on that soon so the cuttings have a chance to get established before I need to acclimate them to indoors.  The purpose for these cuttings besides me learning something new, is that we're hoping to overwinter these indoors and either transplant them outside next Spring or have a big enough plant that we can propagate cuttings from that into small plants to have a full shade garden next year.

On to the indoor begonia propagations.  I have photos of the ones that I started leaf cuttings of a couple months ago.  I'm pretty sure these were started mid to late April but I'm not 100% certain.  We had purchased a few begonias (I shared a couple photos of those the other day) from Lowes as little plants.  You know, those small starter plants that are only $5 - 8?  One of them may have been a rescue because it was not looking so hot and I just had to downsize it into a tiny cup the other day hoping to get it to size back up.  It's looking healthier but it's got a long ways to go.  I took one leaf from each plant as an experiment to see if I could propagate from a single leaf.  I think all but 2 have survived and are starting to put out new growth!  Look at the root growth on this first one!

This is the baby leaf (smallest of the bunch) from the plant that I'm desperately trying to save.  I guess this is my insurance plan in case the other plant doesn't make it.  As soon as the original plant puts on a significant amount of new leaves, I'm going to take a couple more and get them started.  Until then, enjoy this cutie!

I have a couple of begonias that look very similar to each other but one has a dark center what the other one is missing that trait.  The outer edge is slightly different as well. 

This last one is so iridescent!  The silver and light purple are stunning!

What are those cups?  They are snack cups with lids that you can get at Wal-Mart.  I have some coco coir in them and the lid keeps the environment humid/moist.  These sit on a shelf under a grow light with a couple other propagations and right now my philodendron micans (you can see part of the micans vine in that last picture).  

I hope this inspires you to try propagating some of your plants.  I have a couple cane begonias that I want to chop back a bit and propagate but they both had new leaves emerging up top today so I put it off again to let those come on out. That's going to be a new adventure!

Thanks for stopping by again and checking out more of our plant journey.

~Susan~

Plant Corner #1, Begonias, and Hoya Australis Lisa

A few people have been asking me how I'm displaying my plants.  I have several different areas in my house where our plants live at the moment and I keep expanding on those areas and rearranging but one area that I love is one corner of our bedroom. This area I've combined my love of crochet with displaying some of our plants.

The hangers are up there with thumbtacks but all the plants are in nursery pots and are pretty light weight. There are a few more plants on the side table below these as well.  Here are a few close ups of some of my begonias in this area.

My begonia maculata aka "Dotty" is right below the ones on the wall but she's in need of a trim and I need to start some propagations from her.  I've been trying to talk myself into that for about three months now.  Maybe tomorrow will be the day where I'll get brave and go for it. 

In this area I have most of my begonias except for the propagations that I have going, some heartleaf philodendron and cebu blue pothos that I successfully propagated, and several hoya.  I'll get some photos of those tomorrow.  

I did take some photos of one of my favorite hoyas tonight though.  This one was one of my "wish list" plants that I got for my birthday in April, Hoya Australis "Lisa"!

I love the variegation on this plant and how the new leaves come in pink at the beginning.  This has been a easy and fast grower and I love it so much!  This stunning beauty can make me smile even on my tough days. 

Like many of the plants in my care, the Hoya Australis Lisa likes bright, indirect light.  It's in a airy, well draining soiless mix of coco coir, perlite, orchid bark, horticultural charcoal, and worm castings. I tend to err more on the underwatering side of things to prevent root rot so this dries to 50% - 75% dry before I give it a thorough watering.

~Susan~

An introduction... of sorts

I'm starting over with my blog.  I had good intentions when I started this blog to make this a place where I shared about things that interested me.  At the time, I was very active in the online scrapbooking community and in a couple of online crochet groups.  Then life took a detour as life tends to do.  Maybe it wasn't really a detour, just the path that my life was intended to go on and now I've found myself at the point in this life's journey where I want to reconnect or connect with others who may share in some of the same interests I have.

Hello, my name is Susan and I'm a scrapbooking, crocheting, music loving, avid book reader, and plant enthusiast who loves my family.  My roots are planted deep in my faith in God and I'm on the journey of finding joy in moment.  

So, hello old and new friends.  I hope to see you all around here from time to time!

My newest "hobby" started off in the Spring of 2024 when my husband and I stopped in an area garden center to look at some plants to do our annual "spruce up the planters in the front of the house" during Spring Break.  While he was deciding what plants he wanted to try, I wandered into the houseplant section.  Here we are a year later and we have three rooms that are considered our "indoor jungle."  Part of the reason it's three rooms is our classroom plants have migrated home for the summer.  They'll get a couple months at the plant spa (aka our house) and then they will go back to our classrooms.  Here are a few of my current favorites.

Epipremnum aureum 'Lemon Top' - sport mutation of lemon meringue pothos by Costa Farms.

The leaves start out as a bright golden yellow and darken into a rich dark green leaf with variegation.    I love the heart-shaped teacup leaves! These leaves are huge compared to my lemon meringue which is another one of my favorites that I need to get a photo of. 

Epipremnum aureum Manjula

This is another pothos that I absolutely love.  This is the one that has more cream leaves.  I plan on getting a photo of my other momma manjula plant that has more green/white variegation tomorrow.  

Right now my favorite types of plants growing in my collection are pothos and philodendrons.  I also love begonias but I'm still figuring those out.  

On the scrapping front, I actually had time to scrap a bit this week and used Connie Prince's #2025 May collection to make a layout.

Thanks for stopping by my blog!