I planted my first plant in this apartment nearly three years ago. It was the result of a walk through a supermarket with my friend, where I suddenly saw the stuff needed for gardening and tried planting some herbs.

I had some moderately happy plants from the seeds that I bought. One day I was wondering to myself if I can get a capsicum plan from the seeds of bell peppers in the home. I took about 4 bell peppers and extracted their seeds. I planted the seed in the soil and watered it. After a month of watering I didn’t see anything growing. Suddenly, after 5 months a the capsicum appeared. The seeds were waiting for the right temperature to start sprouting.

This plant is now 2 years old. I have harvested about 5 small bell peppers from it. It’s beautiful and flowers during spring. Each year some branches die during the winter. Some leaves get infested with pests and I have to cut it but it continues to grow.

I’m not sure how long it’s going to continue, I’ve heard that these plants stop producing edible parts at some point. But anyway I’m glad that I like plants. It makes the house beautiful and you produce something you can eat. It feels great.

This year it started to grow some baby capsicum plants.

The hardest part of maintaining it was the pests. These are susceptible to spider mites. They usually live behind the leaves and eat the juice inside them and slowly kill them. I usually just wash the leaves with water and spray with pest killers. Last year another funny thing happened. I found a mint plant on the street. It was completely healthy so I took it home. And that’s how I brought Whitefly into my home. It was really hard to get them out. They quickly spread among my plants including this one. One night I gathered all of my pots and started cleaning the leaves. Whiteflies mostly live on the leaves.

You might think that I learned my lesson to not bring plants from the street into my home. I didn’t, just last week I brought 3 pots inside. 2 of them were very dry olive trees. One of them was Hydrangea. The Hydrangea had a lot of spider mites around it, I wasn’t even sure if it’s going to survive. But every new plant brought from outside can teach me something new. I don’t like my own plants to be stressed or nearly dying. But when I find one on the streets it’s time to learn how to bring a plant back to life.

I never planned to have this many plants inside. I’m glad that it happened. When I’m not feeling alright or need something to pass the time I always have some soil and pots to plant something. Or there’s some pruning to do. This is a far superior option to scrolling on the phone. Plants are beautiful. They are also alive. It’s not just growing but you see them reacting to the environment. They crawl around objects, react to temperature and sun. Get some plants. Use the shovel and move the soil around when you need time to pass.