3 Tips to Grow Houseplants Yourself with Maria Failla of Bloom and Grow Radio

Welcome to the Grow youw Self podcast. Are you interested in growing indoors this year? This is a topic we have not covered yet on the podcast, but it is definitely a must listen. Today I have a very special guest that is a pro at growing indoors and she is going to guide us through three steps that we have to cover that are essentials to having success when we want to grow all the green things indoors. This is the ultimate in growing yourself because it means we never have to stop, no matter what the weather looks like outside. So let's dive into today's exciting and super fun episode with a very special guest. I'll see you on the inside of the Grow youw Self podcast.

Welcome to the Grow youw Self podcast. Surprising stories about the food we eat and inspiring conversations about what it really takes to live the whole and happy life we're all craving. I'm Nicole Johnsey Burke, your host and the owner of Rooted Garden and Gardenary Incorporated and author of Kitchen Garden Revival.

Is it obvious yet?

I'm kind of obsessed with the kitchen garden. The kitchen garden may just be the answer that you've been looking for on your own journey to health and wholeness. In this podcast, it's going to inspire and enable you to make garden right.

In your very own space.

If you're someone who wants to eat more good food that's actually good for you, fill your day with great stories you want to text to a friend. If you want to hear more about inspiring people and do a little bit each day better than the way you did it the day before, Grow yourself is what your ears have been waiting for. You won't just learn about gardening here. You'll learn how to make growing as a person a big part of your everyday life. And, and your life, your community, and your garden, of course, will be all the better for it. So put in your headphones, turn up the volume, and let's take a walk, go on a drive, or just hang out in the kitchen garden together. Welcome to Grow youw Self.

All right, well, it is time to welcome my friend, my newfound friend. I am always looking for people covered with green things on the Internet and this woman is definitely fitting the bill. So I am so excited to introduce to you Maria Fayella. She is the host of the Bloom and Grow radio podcast and YouTube show, and she is here today to teach us all the things about growing indoors. This is a place where I need to grow my own self, and so I've invited her to come along, share her wisdom, and teach us all how we can do that right away, actually, right where we are. So welcome, Maria. It is so good to hang out with you today.

Hi, Nicole. I'm so excited. I honestly can't believe it's taken us this long to meet and finally kind of merge our passions. Because you have, like you said, a podcast primarily focused on the outside, and I have a podcast primarily focused on the inside. But at the end of the day, it's all plants. It's all opportunities to grow. So, so happy that we're able to join each other on each other's shows and share our wisdom.

Me too. I can't remember when I first bumped into you. I know it was on Instagram because that's mostly where I hang out. And I was like, oh, my gosh, this woman, like, knows her stuff, and she has so much beautiful green surrounding her. She's in a jungle. And. And then I think I saw a post of yours recently, maybe a couple months ago, and you were talking about planning out your 2021 podcast, and I was like, me, me. Can I invite myself to the party? Is that allowed?

Yes. Yes.

So I'm so excited we get to have this conversation today. And I know the Grow Yourself listeners are going to love it because, well, I mean, first of all, houseplants, it's just they're having a moment right now. Am I right?

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Major.

Yeah. So I guess it's been going on for, I don't know, five, ten years, maybe longer. But even the other day, I was securing myself a peloton for 2021.

Good for you.

Yeah. So this part of my fitness goals. And the guy was like, what do you do? And he saw my web address for gardenary, and I explained. He said, oh, my girlfriend, she got so into plants during quarantine. And I was like, oh, really? He's like, ye. But mostly, like, houseplants. Like, all these, like. Like, they're just, like, covering our house now. I was like, yeah, your girlfriend and about a million other people.

Well, oftentimes I feel like houseplants are kind of the gateway drug for gardeners. I'm a perfect example where I lived in a tiny apartment in New York City when I got into plants. I also have considered myself a plant killer for the majority of my life. And houseplants were a stuff, small, tangible way that I was able to kind of change, reframe my perception of myself, but also my education, learn how to care for just a few little plants. Then, obviously, that grew tremendously. And, you know, I think I had 160 plants in 500 square feet at one point. But once, you know, once I started connecting with plants in that kind of contained, more sterile way, it kind of gave me the space to connect with the idea of growing in general and then gave me the passion to start trying to grow my own food. At that point, I just had a tiny nine square foot balcony that I grew as much edible stuff as I could. But it was a really nice, comfortable, safe way for me to kind of enter the gardening world. That wasn't overwhelming in the way that planning your first real garden could be. And then slowly take those incremental steps to now I just moved and I'm actually going to have my first real grown up kitchen garden this year. So I'm so excited to become to be your plant friend these days. But yeah, I definitely see plants as kind of being houseplants for many people, kind of being that entry, that gateway drug. And also coming off of 2020, I mean, we've been indoors, a lot of us haven't had the opportunity to go to our local parks, to go to our local community gardens where, you know, you share your garden boxes with people. And I think houseplants have become a lot more important because as we're spending so much time, more time indoors, it's even more important to be bringing that N to you, to your desk, to your kitchen, to your living room so we can at least benefit from seeing green and those beautiful effects that we feel.

I totally agree. I teach that inside of gardenary. It's interesting. I hadn't thought of it as the first step being houseplants, but it makes sense. I teach a concept of growing with your plants. And so as we know, as you just watch any kind of plant develop, it starts with a seed which turns into basically roots and stem and leaves. And that I really encourage. I talk about, it's kind of like if you want to start running, you don't just like head outdoors and do a marathon or a 10k like your first month. When I first started teaching myself to run, I just ran to the end of the block. You know, it's like, okay, now I'm going to walk a little bit now. Okay, I'll run to the next stop sign. And that with our plants we really, we get fooled. And when we especially like for your to your benefit was that you started indoors so you weren't thinking, I'm going to go buy like eggplants and tomatoes. But often if we are outdoors or we're in more of a Suburban or, you know, a spot even like you're in now, that temptation is the minute you hit the store to go buy the fruiting plants. Like a tomato, that's like the crown jewel. So you start there. And unknowingly, we're actually starting with a 10k or even a marathon when we start with a fruiting plan. And so we direct with gardenary. We say, okay, do herbs, then do greens, then move to roots and fruit. And I hadn't thought of the correlation, but it's definitely there. That houseplants are essentially leaves. Right. For the most part. I mean, every now and then you have like a Christmas cactus or something, but for the most part, the ficuses and the things, you know, the names of that I don't, like all behind you. We're talking about leaves. And that is. That's the first production off of a plant. So it makes sense that that would be a wonderful run to the end of the block kind of exercise. Then you go, ok, I've killed ten of these, now I know how to keep five of them alive. Right.

Totally.

Super cool. Well, before we jump in too much further, I already just gave your name, but I'd love for you to be able to tell our listeners more about who you are and what you do and what got you started with bloom and growing.

Yeah, I love. This is like instant friendship, instant connection.

Like, let's just go to the plants. No formalities here. Let's just talk about.

Yeah, so the quick rundown. So. Hi, gardenary community. I'm Maria. I'm the founder of the Bloom and Grow radio podcast. So three years ago and change. So my first job is that I. I'm a professional musical theater performer. So I'm a singer by trade, and I was. And also I've been in Plant Killer for my entire life. And most of that is because I used to live kind of a nomadic lifestyle where you would go to whatever show you had. So I've toured internationally, I've toured with nationally with musicals. I've gone to different cities to sit down. So, you know, I'd get a plant and then I'd leave a plant for three months and not understand why it wouldn't just keep being alive.

How weird. Not survive without your kids.

I know.

I mean, a puppy would definitely be okay. Three months without you, right?

Of course, yeah. And also just like, didn't have the knowledge or the care to really empower myself with the knowledge. I used to do weird stuff like only spritz the leaves of plants and Think that that was watering. I had no concept of light. And I'm so excited to dive into some basic houseplant care tips that, you know, I had to learn the hard way back in my plant killer days. But anyway, three years ago, I moved in with my boyfriend, now my fiance. In an effort to nest, I decided to do one more last ditch effort to try and care for plants because I felt like it would be nice to have a little balcony garden, have a little herb garden on our balcony, and have some plants in our home to bring some life to the space. The difference there was that I decided to actually try and learn how to care for these green things instead of use them as almost art pieces or decorations in a home. And something clicked in my brain and I. I mean, my heart, I felt like my heart opened up in a new way that I had never really experienced before. All of a sudden, you know, I was a classic millennial where I would look at my phone in the morning immediately when I woke up and scroll Instagram and have my coffee and just like, engage with my phone. All of a sudden, I found I was leaving my phone and I was taking my coffee and sitting with my little herbs on our tiny balcony or watering my plants. My plants, you know, they weren't only just making my home beautiful, but they were giving me these moments of stillness and joy and connection with nature, but more importantly, with myself that I, like, literally had never felt in the 27 years of my existence. And I was like, man, I gotta share this. I just, like, I figured out this big secret. I gotta share this with people. I was a huge podcast listener, and at that time, there were no podcasts specifically for houseplants. And I was wrapping up a show. I was in Cats on Broadway, and I was wrapping that up. And as my. I decided, okay, as a little passion project in between shows, I'll do 10 episodes where I interview experts and I'll pull myself out of my plant killer Dom, and I'll interview these plant experts, I'll develop my knowledge, and then I'll share the interviews. It'll just be 10 episodes long and hopefully I'll help other people like me learn a little bit more about houseplant care. And at the end of 10 episodes, I'm sure I'll have another Broadway show and it'll just live. It'll be my love letter to plants, and that'll be that. And lo and behold, I realized this was not a secret. I was not the only person going through this experience. There's a Beautiful community of people who love houseplants out there and people who love gardening that I just didn't know about because they weren't in my circles. And the podcast kind of grew farther than I thought it would and decided to continue creating shows. And, you know, three and a half years later, here we are, 100 plus episodes and growing and growing. And it's funny, you know, you can never stop. I love that gardening is a hobby that you can literally never stop learning. Like, there's always something new to learn, even in the specific niche of houseplants. I still feel like every episode I show up to interview, like, I'm a novice. You know, I'm still learning so much from all of our guests and this community of plant people, which I know, you know, is. Is so amazing. So, yeah, that's a little bit about bloom and grow, but every episode is primarily houseplant focused. Now we're starting to do more garden things as the community grows and starts to grow outdoors in addition to indoors. And, yeah, it's been a really fun ride.

I love it. What a fun story. You know, I. I can so relate to finding yourself as you find your, you know, your connection to plants. I think I was talking with my kids. We were on a walk the other day, and I was like, as soon as you start to, you know, to kind of pick up on truths about nature and ways that nature works, it's like. It's like a little keyhole where you sud. Can learn more about who you are too. It's. It's really. I love the way we're all connected in that way and how plants are kind of like. I love how, to me, they're almost like this little microcosm of life itself. You know, I can watch a plant live a whole season in 90 days and kind of get this like, oh.

Like, you know, there are truths about.

What just went on with that plant that I can apply to my own life. You know, you can go real deep on that if you need to.

I think, too, like, plants, indoor or outdoor, it's just like practicing kindness every day. That's a big thing. I talk about, like, our world. We need more kindness. We need more. More showing up with an open heart and kindness in our society right now with empathy and understanding with these plants, like, they can't talk to us. They can't really tell us what they need in English. Yet we show up with these plants, and we just constantly are trying to practice empathy, practice kindness, practice understanding with these things that can't truly communicate with us besides a wilted leaf or anything like that. And I just think that small practice on that small level of this potted plant sitting right next to me, that repetition does kind of build up that muscle that you can bring into the world. And I do feel like a more empathetic, open person since I've. Since I've started caring for plants, because I think it is all of those, like, micro, you know, moments with my plants.

Absolutely. I talk about that in the tending chapter in my book I introduced. I said, you know, people say that when we talk to plants, they grow better. And I said, well, I would really like it if my plants could talk to me. And I go through this little dialogue, like the plant saying, like, hello, feed me, or hello, can I have some water over here? I'm dying or I'm drowning. And then I was like, wait a second. I actually kind of like the fact that my plants don't talk to me because suddenly my plants sound like my children.

Anyway, I kind of go through in.

The chapter exactly what you're talking about, that it's this really unique situation where the plant really. We both. The plant really needs us. Us and needs our care, but it's not gonna kick and scream about it. So you just like your plants that you left for three months at a time. You know, they're not like throwing a temper tantrum on the floor. They're just gonna kind of quietly sit there and go away. And so, yeah, it kind of wakes you up to like, wow, what else have I been missing in my life that needs attention that I've been way too busy to pay attention to. So I love that. Well, so with Gardenary, our focus for 2021 is to live a garden centered year. So I think you and I share this. Obviously you miss Broadway, but for me, I talk a lot about. I think a lot of people have a perception that you're either like, living your life, you're either living to garden or gardening just isn't possible. You know, either like you, Maria, are just in there in your home, just caring for your plants every single minute of every single day, or it's just an impossibility. I know a lot of people in my sphere think it's either like homesteading off the grid or it's nothing. Like it's 100% at the grocery store. So a lot of people have the perspective that it's either all in or nothing at all. And so some of what we try to teach at Gardenary, and I definitely have to live And I'm sure you do too, as a professional and balancing life and relationships is that the garden, we don't have to live to garden, but we can garden to live better. That's kind of what brought us to this idea of a garden centered year. Not meaning that we're going to spend the whole year in the garden, but that we're going to use our time in the garden to fuel the other parts of our lives to make it better. So that's one of the reasons I'm so excited to talk to about houseplants today, because a lot of us, especially at the time that we're recording this and in the first few months of the new year, you can feel itching to get your hands on something green. But if they're anything like me, I am in the Chicago area and my whole landscape is currently covered with snow. So you have this funny tension in January every year where it's like, I'm so ready to grow, but I just can't quite get outside yet. So I thought it'd be so great to get tips from you. I know you're going to talk us through three of your suggestions and steps to having houseplant success, but I thought we could start just with an overview. In terms of your own life and routine and schedule, what does it look like for you to live a garden or a plant centered life? What kind of how does that inter. Like, how does the garden and plants come into your everyday schedule and lifestyle?

I love that concept and I feel like, because houseplants can be a beautiful tool for people who want houseplants, but also for gardeners, because houseplants can just literally be right next to your bed. They can be at your office desk, where with our gardens, we have to go outside and sometimes we have to go maybe a little far away if you have some sort of community plot. So, you know, houseplants can kind of be that low hanging fruit with being able to kind of incorporate plants into your life on a super daily basis, maybe even throughout the day more, you know, more than once a day. So for me, plants. I have been doing a lot of thinking and research about screen addiction this year, and man, this was an issue. Screen addiction and eye fatigue, mental fatigue, all of that has been an issue before 2020. Then after 2020, when all of a sudden we're all working from home. I just think that humans were not designed to look at computer monitors for 12 hours a day. And when you think about it, that's kind of what we do because we're at our computers during the day, and then we're binging our favorite Netflix at night. And don't get me wrong, that's me. I'm binging. I'm binging the newest Netflix food competition show right now. But. Right, but plants are, you know, houseplants are, for me, a beautiful way to remind myself to get off my screen and get back with nature, even if. Even if it. Even if it's in a small way. So one of my biggest rules is look at a plant before you look at a screen in the morning.

Oh, I love that.

So, you know, I keep plants pretty much next to my bed, and I like to wake up and turn, look at my Monstera leaves. The light, how the light is dappling on them. Maybe I touch them, maybe I wipe a little dust off the leaf. You know, I say keep plants where you make your coffee, because then as your water is boiling, you can zone out and kind of enjoy the pattern of a maranta prayer plant leaf, which are gorgeous. I mean, the Marantaceae family, their leaves look like they've literally been painted. It's. They're the most beautiful designs. And then throughout the day, I try and, like, ideally every three hours, but, you know, sometimes I'm successful there, and sometimes I'm not. But I like to just take a minute and just look at a plant, rest my eyes, even if it's looking out the window and, you know, looking at one tree and then looking a little bit farther and exercising those muscles that were. We're losing that strength as we just look, look right in front of us. Or I like to keep plants by my desk. I have right now a snake plant on either side of my screen. And sometimes when I just need a break, I will look at the plant and enjoy its pattern and kind of draw my attention up and down its leaf shape and then look back at my screen. And those things take five to 10 seconds. It's not a long thing. But they make such a difference. It makes such a difference in my life. I really can't stress that even though these things seem so simple and silly, and I think just being able to surround yourself with green indoors just keeps you at ease. I mean, now there's all these studies that are coming out showing that what we as gardeners intuitively have known for so long is really true, that being around the presence of green stimulates creativity. Having plants in your life, going for a walk in nature actually does do all of these amazing things for your body and your blood pressure and stress. And all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, for me, they're just beautiful reminders of nature when I can't be outdoors. And it's definitely been a game changer.

I love that so much. I'm definitely going to put a plant next to my coffee. That's a fantastic idea. I love the idea of having a plant right next to my bedside table. I definitely believe so. I journal, like, my practice. My rule is I scroll my pen before I can scroll.

I love that.

Okay, so like, I have to write. I have to write something down. I'm not allowed to touch a screen. And so this year I'm really practicing. Not even opening my phone unless it's like on the Peloton app or something, but not getting onto social media in the mornings. But I love the idea, you know, I had. Not really. When I lived in a warmer climate in Houston, I would go outside and pick greens early in the morning for like my husband's salad and stuff, but I haven't. I love the idea of being able to do that with a houseplant. I think that's awesome. I think so much what we like to do as humans. I love what you said about keeping it short and simple. It's not hard, it's not a long thing.

It's not rocket science. Yeah, yeah.

I think we love to overcomplicate things in our head. Right? It's like, like way I was saying, like, it's either it's either homesteading or it's nothing, you know, and it's either you're like a jungle woman or you, you can't keep. You have. You're a plant killer. And I love this idea of like 10 seconds, you know, I did a strength training this morning on Peloton and Adrian Williams. Oh my gosh, I love him so much. And he was like, he's like, 10 minutes. People say you can't do anything in 10 minutes. Well, I'm about to prove them wrong. And it was like such a good 10 minute workout. And I thought, 10 minutes. How many days do I say I don't have time to work out, you know, and it's 10 minutes. Like it's nothing. And you're talking about 10 seconds. I mean, such a small, simple thing that you can do that can shift your mindset for the day.

It's also very interesting how itchy and long those 10 seconds or 30 seconds can feel. And I think there's a lot of lessons in that as well because, you know, we are such a short attention span based Society these days where, like you want to scroll, you can't even watch the 1 minute video anymore or the 15 second reel on Instagram anymore. Oh my God.

So bad.

You know, I think meditation is a very intimidating word for a lot of people that, oh my God, I have to sit for 20 minutes and clear my mind. Never going to happen. But, you know, my meditation is looking at my plants for a minute before I look at my screen. And I think that allowing yourself that absence of thought, one of my favorite things too, this is outdoors. But watching dew drops, like watching dew drop off of a leaf, man, that is the best. And to me, that is a meditation. Just letting yourself just watch a droplet of water fall off of a leaf and not. And allow it. It's time and it's never that long. But yeah, it's. There's a. There are a lot of lessons in there.

I love that and I totally agree with that about meditation. I remember one time I was speaking with a friend. I was like, I'm horrible at meditation, but I had this great. I had this great mind. Or I said something like, I'm horrible at meditation, but such and such in the garden. And he was like, then you're great at meditation. It's like, you don't have to meditate in a yoga pose on a mat, you know? Yeah. And I heard the same. Brene Brown. I don't know if you listened to her.

I adore her.

Okay, so she interviewed Tim Ferriss and Dax Shepard.

Yes, I listened to it.

Okay, so good. When we were just talking, it made me think of, you know, she's talking about swimming and she's like, I started meditation, but I clear my head when I swim. And I'm. I swim too, to clear my head. And Tim Ferriss was like, oh my gosh, that totally counts as meditation. I mean, you're underwater and you're. You're thinking. You're just there with your thoughts. Like, that is literally doing it. And so I think we totally need to reframe. You know, sometimes the garden is like, that is the whole purpose. Like, don't even worry about, don't even worry about harvests or Instagram Instagrammable photos or whatever. Like, it's just. This is your. This is like the, this is the mindless thing you need to be doing and looking at in order for your head to get cleared up.

Yeah, my mom had. My mom is an unbelievable edible landscaper gardener. She's Italian. Her parents, like, I come from a lot. The. It's hilarious that I was a plant killer because I come from a lineage of Italian gardeners and farmers. This year, my mom. My mom plants tomatoes every year. This year, she put too many bird feeders in her garden, and we didn't see one tomato because all the. All the squirrels, everybody ate everything. And we don't do pest, you know, we don't do pest control. She's a very low key, low key gardener. And literally, I think maybe we saw like three cherry tomatoes from probably, I don't know, 15 tomato plants that we planted and nurtured and tied and, you know, all that stuff.

Summer.

But I have no regrets about that tomato hedge because I had such beautiful moments pruning the freaking tomato plants and smelling that smell. Like, that smell is visceral to me. And something happens with my nervous system when I can just stick my face in a tomato plant. And the act of caring for something, the act of taking time to try and string them up and do all of those things, that was it. Like that for me. Like, that was the growing moment. And yes, we were upset we didn't have tomato harvest, but, you know, no regrets about it. So. It is. It is. That's the meditation aspect of it, for sure.

It is. It's the journey rather than the destination. Right? Like, absolutely. Enjoying the whole process. I am that way, too. I mean, you know, as a gardening quote unquote professional, like, I know Instagram loves the harvest videos and photos, but I'm a obsessed with the process. Like, that's where. That's where my happiness comes. So I get a little. I lose the passion when I get focused on the end result, for sure. Okay, well, so we have clearly established that we need to be growing houseplants. So let's dive into your three main points. You want to drive home in terms of all of us trying to learn to keep these houseplants alive in 2021. So let's start with life. Yeah.

And we can kind of talk about these concepts with the knowledge of. It's very interesting. And I don't know if you know Joe Lample, but he's a good friend of mine from Joe Gardner. And we've talked about this before, how gardeners and house plant parents sometimes, like, have judgment with each other or also, like, feel like it's very separate. There are separate hobbies, and you can't do both. And I think it's interesting, though, that there are different things that you do need to kind of understand, like there are differences with outdoor and indoor. So we can kind of talk about it that way too. So with understanding your natural light indoors, there are just so many different factors that affect your light very similarly to being outside. You can have like, you know, the southern facing garden, but if you have the trees that block the southern facing, you know, boxes, then like, you're going to have problems. You know, you're going to have shade. So you really have to assess your light with your house. So obviously southern facing has the most light, northern facing has the least light. And this is obviously for the northern hemisphere, but you have to kind of assess. Are you. I lived in several apartments in New York City where, yes, I had southern facing light, but I had a huge apartment building right in front of me which essentially blocked all my light. So I had the equivalent of a northern window, even though, you know, my GPS was telling me south. So I think with a, with apartments, you have to understand that like no home is equal and your indoor conditions are going to be so different, even your humidity levels with plants, you know, how hard your forced air is. So understanding that your natural light environment is going to really vary and that, that plants need light. So, you know, a lot of times I get questions, you know, can I put a plant in a bathroom with, with no windows? And the answer is you can, but it's going to slowly die. And you can choose plants that will die slower, but plants need light. And sometimes I think indoors, people, people struggle with that. Something you can, something you can do is incorporate grow lights into your space. I have five. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Actually, no, I have seven. Grow light in my home because I like those highlight plants and I want my plants to be happy. But, you know, you can kind of assess, you have to assess the lighting situation that you have and then pick the plants that are right for that light. So fiddle leaf figs are a great example. Fiddle leaf fig trees, gorgeous structural violin shaped leaves. You see them in every design magazine. But the interesting thing about that is you see these fiddle leaf figs in these corners because they're such structural gorgeous, tall things that can kind of COVID that space. But those fiddly fig trees need tons of light. They thrive in light, you know, and we're putting them in corners, which deceptively are actually the darkest parts of most homes because the window sills don't reach them. And so fiddle leaf fig trees are also kind of a notoriously finicky plant, which a lot of people don't understand. So you put, you know, they're also expensive. You buy a $200 fiddle leaf fig tree, you put it in your corner, it looks cool for like two weeks and then it drops of its leaves. So understanding your natural light conditions is really important. And then understanding the plant that goes with those light conditions is a huge thing. So you can probably stick a snake plant in a darker corner that gets a little bit of bright and direct light, A ZZ plant, a pothos, an ivy, those plants that are low light tolerant. And I like saying low light tolerant, not low light plants, because no plant is really thriving in low light, but there are plants that can tolerate it. Something that breaks my heart about snake plants in particular, which are some of my favorite plants, is they're always touted as the low light plant. But snake plants actually thrive in high light and they flower in high light. But because they tolerate low light, they always get put in these low light situations. And it makes me feel bad because they never get to look like be where they really want to be because they can just do, you know, they can tolerate the other stuff. Interesting. Yeah. So I think assessing your home light is super important. You can do it with, you know, the compass on your phone. There are several, like, light measurement apps. I have a worksheet that's a free download on my website that actually gives you a worksheet and step by step instructions with how to measure your light in your home over like the course of a week. And then kind of take some averages to kind of figure it out. And also understanding that even if you have southern facing light, once you get a foot from that window, like the light availability in your home, because you're only getting it from really one direction, is so much less than whatever light availability you have outdoors. So the minute you get like a foot from that window, even six inches, that light like drastically reduces. So bright indirect light, I think happens a lot quicker than most people think. So if your succulents really need to be on a windowsill, succulents on a coffee table like six feet from a window, once again, aren't necessarily going to be set up for success. You might see some stretching, some etiolation. I don't ever pronounce that word correctly, but yeah. So those are a couple of things to think about with understanding your light. And if you have interest in understanding light. I have so many episodes on this topic because I think that it's a huge barrier to entry, barrier to understanding with people in their indoor environments. And I'll shoot you those links if you want to include them for people. Yeah. In case they're curious.

Yeah. I think light is. I mean, light's a big challenge. Honestly, we work mostly with urban gardeners, and so oftentimes light is. It's actually a huge challenge. Like for my rooted garden clients, we're in these, you know, we're in very tight urban settings. They may even have a large yard, but they often have large homes to either side. So very similar kind of situation. Houseplants to me have always been a little bit of a mystery in terms of light and even growth, because I am like one of my kind of catchphrases and things I talk about in my book and with gardenary is think about nature. So, so you even talk, you know, kind of mentioned this thinking about the snake plant, that it actually thrives in more sun. So the concept that I try to go back to all the time is, well, how would this grow in nature? And then trying to replicate that in my own setting. So we used. We use as, you know, like very formal raised beds and trellises. And so I talk about, like formal on the outside, but wild on the inside. You know, like, we want to recreate whatever might happen nature right inside that little box. And so I think we're kind of almost trying to do that inside these pots.

Right.

We're trying to make the plant kind of trick the plant into feeling like it's where it would be, it's where it naturally thrives. And so for most of these houseplants, correct me if I'm wrong, but they're mostly like tropicals, right. Or they, they originate more like a. Like on the equatorial kind of climate.

Yeah. So it's actually, this is a very interesting point you make, and I think a big differentiator between indoor and outdoor. Because a big thing that I talk about is we naturally are kind of setting our plants up for failure because these plants are tropical foliage plants that literally live in the rainforest. And most of them are climbing on the understory of the rainforest, which is what makes the them lower, light tolerant and climbing up trees to look for light. Right. A rainforest is like 80% humidity. They're getting rain all the time. So naturally these plants are acclimating to our environments, where sometimes, I mean, my previous home, we were at like 26 to 28% humidity every day, which isn't even good for humans, let alone plants. So, you know, you're never really going to be able to recreate those conditions that the plants really thrive in. But you can think about how they live and then try to replicate it by absolutely understanding their light situations. Because these plants grow on the bottom of the rainforest floor. That's why they can live in our homes, which are so much less light than outdoors. You know, they're epiphytic, so they climb plants, they climb trees, so you can make moss poles that they can train to climb up, or you can kind of help them climb up your wall or like, you know, do creative, fun stuff like that to help replicate that. Another thing, this doesn't have to do with light, but, you know, in the rainforest, these plants get rained on. I mean, plants. Outdoor. Outdoor plants get rained on as well. But indoors, something you don't realize is dust tends to collect on the plant leaves. Right. Rather quickly because we've got our air conditioners and our heaters blowing dusty air all over the place. So it's really important to replicate that rain shower. Either wiping the leaves just to get the dust off, which is what rain would naturally do, or I'm a crazy person and I stick my plants in the shower and I actually give them a rain bath like once a quarter. That's extra people don't need. That's like next level.

Oh, I am doing that. I'm taking a shower with all my plants tonight for sure. Well, that actually draws us to the next point, which is water and drainage. So you've kind of already hinted towards some of that, but tell us more, you know, about what we need to think about in terms of water and drainage.

Yeah, so the thing with indoor plants is obviously the containers are going to be much smaller than, you know, your gorgeous big boxes that you have outdoors, which I'm so excited to make my own this year. But, yeah, so. So indoor potting mix is very important. A high quality, airy potting mix for your houseplants is important. Never use outdoor garden soil in your indoor pots. And that might sound basic, but a lot of people don't know that. Some people think that you can just go out, get your shovel, like take some of your soil outdoors and bring it in, but that is never going to drain fast enough. And that will set your plants up for root rotten like nobody's business. And I'm totally guilty of doing that. So no, like, literally no shame. No one can ever tell me anything they've done as a plant parent that I probably haven't already done. So never. No shade, no shame.

Well, that's me for sure. I'm like, nature. I'm thinking about nature here. I'm gonna go dig up some garden soil.

Exactly. So. So, yeah, so using, you know, a high quality Potting mix also is just going to help, not bring in fungus gnats, not bring in like any weird pests that you don't want want, you know, infecting a whole plant population in your, in your house. The other thing that I think has been one of the biggest game changers for me as a plant parent, especially going from plant killer to plant, you know, to crazy plant lady, is using pots with drainage holes. Because so many of the pots that we buy at Anthropologie and CB2 and West Elm, like these gorgeous planters that we all want in our house, don't have holes at the bottom. And so people say, okay, we'll a layer of drainage at the bottom and then plant the plant in there. But with a lot of these smaller pots, that layer of drainage actually is making it worse for the plants than it is to helping them. I understand in larger pots, some people use that technique and it's fine. But in most of our six, you know, four to eight inch pots, that's actually raising the level of where the soggy soil hangs out and is going to kind of set your plants up for, for a higher chance of getting root rot. So what I suggest is if you are a beginner or just really, if you're any person interested in getting house plants, either buy pots with drainage holes or if you want to get the fancy CB2 pot, and believe me, I have plenty of them in my apartment, find an upcycled plastic nursery pot that your plant either came in or maybe a different plant came in and you can pot your plant in that pot that has holes and then slide that pot into the cache po, which is what they're called. That way, when it's time to water, you can take that nursery pot out, give it a water, let the water run through the bottom, and then return it to that whole list pot. And you are just setting yourself up for so much more success and just saving a lot of heartache. So when I had started out, I kind of did 50, 50. And slowly and slowly I've been really changing my whole collection of plants to exclusively pots with Dr. Because I just think it just makes it so much easier. It's not saying that you can't do it the other way. And I still have a few plants that are, that are in pots with no drainage at the bottom with the layer of drainage rocks. But you have to be so careful about how much you water because you have to think that water has nowhere to go at the bottom and it's going to take so much longer to either evaporate or get absorbed by the soil and fungus is going to happen. And it's just. It's not as easy. And don't we want this to be easy and simple? Right.

Absolutely. I totally believe in the setting yourself up for success kind of thing. I talk in my book about worst first. Like, do the hardest thing first. Especially, like, in this case, it would be like knocking a hole for drainage in the bottom of your pot. You know, taking time to get that set up right the first time, because it's once you like, getting set up for success, I think is like 95% of gardening. So love that. All right.

The last.

The last thing you kind of walked us through some of this, but is getting into a routine with your houseplants.

I think that a routine with your plants is beneficial on so many different levels. Number one, all of that mindfulness stuff. We talked about setting routines where you check in on your plants in the morning, just as a way to wake up. Setting routines. Maybe every Sunday is your houseplant maintenance day where you check all of your plants. You know, with houseplants plants, people have. You know, pests are definitely an issue indoors as much as they are outdoors, especially if a plant is stressed and maybe not in the right environment. The other thing is because your plants are grouped nice and close together, and there's not a lot of external factors that are going to kill off pests. If one plant gets a pest infestation like that can spread very quickly across your collection. So keeping your eye on your plan plants is a really good idea. So once a week, if you can kind of just have a maintenance day where, you know, you kind of touch every plant, you take a look, you make sure there's no aphids, you make sure there's no weird webbing that's like an indication of spider mites. You make sure that everybody's doing okay. You wipe the leaves that you need to wipe, you water the plants that need watering. And I would say it's not necessarily a watering routine because you should really only be watering the plants when they need to be watered. And when you're indoors, that's going to look different season by season and plant by plant. But having a set day that you're just kind of checking in with your plants, making sure they're all healthy, you know, pruning a yellow leaf, wiping a dirty, you know, wiping a dusty leaf, enjoying a bud that maybe wasn't there a week ago, and sharing that excitement of, oh, my God, I'M going to get a bloop next week. Week. Like, make a note to check in on this plant every day to kind of see that bud open up, because who doesn't love that? Especially in the wintertime. So I just think setting routines around your houseplants are beneficial for the plants and also for you and your brain and your heart. So why not do it and have kind of have that be part of your plant care routine?

I love that and I love the idea of being reactive. Like, you're proactive in the sense of, like, you schedule it, but then being reactive in the sense it's not like every plan gets this much water or every plant's gonna get like, it's more. It's more about just kind of a check in, like being. Making sure you're there, but then definitely, like letting it be a case by case basis in terms of what you do.

Totally.

I love that. That's. That's when we become skillful. Right. Like, that's the difference in an amateur and a plant killer. And a plant lady is someone who is really starting to get to know their plants and that only happens by spending time with them. Right. Like, that's the way you get to know anything is time, and it's trial.

And error and you might lose plants, and that's okay. And I feel like in 2020, like, my mantra was, we're pruning. But my second mantra was, and that's okay, you know, you might lose a plant and that's okay. You might do something wrong and realize, oh, all my plants have no drainage and maybe I'm going to make this mean something about me. No. And that's okay. Now you just take the next right step forward. So, you know, I think too, just like, especially if you're showing up new to houseplants, it's not all going to go perfectly. And that's okay. Just keep learning. Right. Just like our garden fails, you know, there's always a lesson in every plant fail. And sometimes I think the failures are even more important than the wins in the hobbies. So.

Absolutely. I, I'm a firm believer in this. I don't know. I don't know if it's because it's like a life death thing like that plants are living and they actually watch them die. I don't know if that's the piece, but I feel like there is this weird. I actually was talking to an American Express lady the other day and she, like, I was going through the whatever to approve my card and she's like, now what do you do? And I told her, and she's like, I am like, I like to call myself the hospice for planning plants. Like, I give them a nice slow death. And she, like, had no interest in improving that. And that is so interesting because, you know, any other. Like, let's take your art of Broadway or take. I'm reading the Practice by Seth Godin right now, and he shared this amazing image of a cartoonist who's, like, the most. Currently the most successful New Yorker cartoonist. And he had shared this image of, like, no and yes. So he has this huge pile of drawings that were rejected. You know, it's probably five to six times the height of the stack of drawings that are accepted. And I thought, you know, we have that understanding in almost every other skill in art. Like, how many takes do you do for a Broadway scene? You know, only. And then it's not the real thing. Like, that's not the successful piece. Right. It's just, oh, take, you know, take two, take three, take four. And it's like.

Or auditions. Yeah.

With any other.

How many auditions did I not book in order to get the Broadway yes? I mean, that was a lot of auditions before I got the yes for Broadway. Yes.

And it just. That's just part of learning something, right? And so I don't know if it's the death part. I don't know what it is, but there's this. There's this, like, barrier, I think, for so many of us with gardening and planning plants that the deaths, like, like, you know, losing plants suddenly means, like, you'll never. And it's like, no, this is. You're just on the journey, right? Like, these are your nos. These are your rejects on the way to success. And I love that you say, like, it's just pruning. Like, it's just experience. And. And every time, you know, you lose a plant or something doesn't go as planned, you now, like, you've actually built your skill. Like, you said, you learn more from the failures sometimes times. So.

Yep. Cheers. You're instigating that bushier growth.

Yes. Cheers to failing. Failing forward. Right. Like, we.

Absolutely.

Yeah. I think every. I think we can. I would like for all of us to set ourselves free that, you know, the. The fails in the garden are just as important as the winds. Well, I love this. So the things I'm going to take away from today is, number one, I'm taking a shower with plan plants. Pretty much from here on out. I'm gonna wake up and look at plants I'm definitely putting a plant next to the coffee maker. Jason is going to love me even more because of that. And I'm gonna switch my soil because I have been a nature girl and I've brought outdoor soil into my pots, so. And I'm gonna move a snake plant into the bright sun, see what it can do.

Do.

Yay.

You taught me so much. I love it. Tell everybody how they can follow you. Get to know you. And I know you mentioned a couple of downloads and resources, so tell us where to get those.

Sure. I'll send you the links to all the lighting stuff that you know. If people want to go check those episodes out, I'd love for gardenary fam to come check out the Bloom and Grow radio podcast if you have any interest in houseplants. I absolutely have an episode for you. And if you're new, I have a really fun free quiz that I love seeing people's results online for. It's called the Plant Parent Personality Quiz. It takes three minutes. You take it, and then you get paired with your plant parent personality, and you get recommended plants, diy, planty projects, and podcast episodes to start with. So that's a really fun little thing to do to kind of learn. Learn something about yourself and also get some great houseplant recommendations if you're looking for a place to start or if you're looking for maybe some different types of plants to add to your collection. And you can also find me at Bloom and Grow Radio on Instagram, Pinterest. I mean, I'm kind of on TikTok and everything lives on bloom and grow radio dot com. So I can't wait to hang with you guys a little bit. And I'm so excited to have Nicole on my podcast in a little bit as well, because I've got a big yard for the first time in my life, and I'm very excited to do some outdoor gardening and listen to your show and get super inspired. Inspired.

So fun. Well, oh, my gosh. I'm gonna go take that quiz right now. Like, I can't wait to figure out the plants that I'm supposed to be growing. This is so full of inspiration. I'm so glad that we got to hang out together, and I cannot wait to see all of the gardenary community totally killing it with their houseplants this month. Me too.

That sounds awesome.

Well, thank you, Maria. I will see you online and we will definitely for you on the gardenary.com blog will link Maria's resources to her quiz and to more pieces of Maria's support that you can get as you learn to grow yourself. So Maria, until next time, keep growing yourself and we'll be growing right alongside of you. Thank you for inspiring the world and for doing what you do so well. I know that you're making a huge difference, not just in the plant world, but in keeping us all centered and focused on what keeps us growing in good ways. So thank you for the work you're doing. We love it.

Oh gosh, thank you.

All right, we'll see you next time.

Ok.

Thanks so much for listening to the Grow youw Self podcast. We love chatting with Maria today and I hope you feel inspired to start growing houseplants yourself. I know I'm about to head to the store right now and get all the stuff she told me to so you guys can follow along on my houseplant journey. And definitely, definitely follow Maria's. At Bloom and Grow Radio, we have so much going on in the Gardenary world. We are teaching a workshop this week on jump starting your kitchen garden for 2021. You can get links to that at the Gardenary blog and today's show notes. But you better hurry because the workshop finishes this week. So check it out@gardenary.com blog and we'll.

See you next week as we continue.

To live a garden centered year. Thanks for changing the world by growing yourself. I'll see time you next next time.