How Our (work) Garden Grows

I think the cactus were at least 6 weeks old already at this point! 

It all started with a little "grow your own cactus" kit that I picked up at the 99 cent store. I didn't really expect much from it, but decided to take it to work where I had much better light and am sitting all day at work. So I set it up and I was surprised when I got 4 little sprouts popping up within a short period of time. Then I picked up another kit with a brain plant. My next door cubicle neighbor was getting interested and then began picking up little plant kits at the store and finally some real pots and soil. And things were growing!!!  Then another coworker who grows a ton of her own food brought us in some of her food plants to add to our collection! This past week our office had some a/c problems and we had some terrible heat, and oddly enough the sunflowers were the most affected. We lost 1/2 of them, but the 3 that made it seem to be doing well and about to start flowering. We lost one of the baby cactus along the way, but overall, I feel like we've had some pretty good success!

This sunflower looks like it's going to flower soon!!

This has been such a fun little hobby to have in parallel with work. It's nice because it's something to look at and check on each day and they don't need too much care, while being extremely satisfying (although both my coworker and I share the responsibilities, so it's not bad!) We've grown everything from seed (cactus, sunflowers, violets & lavender) besides the things my coworker brought in (basil, cilantro, lettuce & mint) and with persistence, we've made everything grow to some degree. People really like stopping by to look at the plants & I think it's because it's kind of a nice relaxing thing to have around. I love it because I don't have much space to grow my own plants at home with absolutely no outside space and tiny little windowsills w/ very little light, so although I'd enjoy having a bigger garden, it's nice to see these little bits of green grow every day!

counter clockwise from the back left corner: sunflowers, cilantro, basil, lettuce, brain plant, mint, lavender & violets

Brain plant!!! There were 4 seeds in the kit and we got all 4 to sprout and grow, but this quickly became the GIANT one and began growing a little fuzzy flower in the middle this week! This is only about 2-3 months old. Another that sprouted at the same time is barely the size of one of the large leaves on this one.

the cactus today! The first picture in this post was about a month ago. Still very tiny, but tons of growth and new spines! I'm not sure what kind these are but the possibilities include saguaro, organ pipe, golden barrel & fishhook barrel

That little dome in the lavender pot was on one of the original terrariums, but seems to be the magic trick in getting the lavender to sprout! Wherever we move it, things pop up! I'm pretty sure those tiny shoots on the mint appeared during this week. People keep asking when they can eat the lettuce and the mint :)