Indoor Gardening and Houseplants: House Plant Successes, 2 by Chillybean

Chillybean wrote:
For years I did a great job of killing house plants that I just gave up. For a time several people gave me house plants as gifts. Maybe they felt I needed some, since they never saw any.?? I made a sign that was posted inside the mudroom where all guests would see it.

On a whim, I bought a Christmas cactus in 2012. Immediately after getting it in the house, the buds all fell off. Well... I should have guessed with my track record. The plant will likely follow suit. Amazingly it never died and bloomed twice the following year. How that happened, I don\'t know. I get two rounds of blooms most years. I read you can force blooms, but I do nothing to it, other than randomly move it from place to place and water only when I remember, which was not very often. A friend told me the cure for forgetting to water is to get more house plants. Ha!

(Later I learned that cold drafts can cause the flowers to fall off a Christmas cactus. Probably just taking it from the store to car and car to the house on a chilly day did this, but I did not know that at the time. )

Last summer, I really wanted a Prayer Plant, but was told they are not a beginner house plant. My local nursery sells them, so I picked up a small one. It wasn\'t expensive, so if it died it wasn\'t a big loss. I put it in the warmest area of the house with indirect sun and spritz it with water nearly every day and it is one happy little plant. It is about to open up another leaf. This is probably my favorite indoor plant at this time; I really like the pattern on the leaves and how this changes as they age.

I must\'ve gotten a little over confident... my Plant of Steel (Sago Palm) is dying. I was afraid of overwatering; I think I overdid the lack of water. I have a handful of other plants and they are doing ok.

A few years ago, I started spending more time planting things outside, so maybe just the overall learning what plants need is what helped. ??

Are there any others with similar house plant experiences?