What’s on Your Windowsill? (Plus Giveaway)

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

A visit to Erika’s apartment a month back has inspired a new sense of excitement about my own windowsills. The morning after the tour, we experienced a rare winter treat here in Toronto: sunshine! While my windowsill has been transformed several times since, here’s what it looked like on that first morning of sun.

In the photo above you can see [left to right]: ‘French Lace’ scented geranium, Chilean oxalis bulbs that I recently planted, another oxalis that has gone dormant, variegated Cuban oregano (that thing does not stop growing. I have cut it back hard, several times), and the edge of a ‘Centennial’ kumquat tree.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

This is the other windowsill in my office [left to right]: Microgreens freshly sown in a recycled salad container (behind), spineless blue agave (front), lithops, another dormant oxalis, donkey’s tail sedum (Sedum morganianum) (hanging).

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

And here’s what it looked like yesterday afternoon when the sun was shining once again [left to right]: Pelargonium ‘Fair Ellen’, yet unidentified echeveria I bought a few days ago, pelargonium ‘Mabel Grey’, another unidentified echeveria from the same purchase, sea onion (Ornithogalum caudatum).

What are you growing on your windowsill?

Please post a link to a photo or post on your blog about what’s on your windowsill. We can inspire one another and beat the winter is almost over blahs.

Next Friday, March 19 at 5pm EST I’ll randomly select two people from the comments below to win one of the following price packs:

prizes_mar2010.jpg
  1. One of our “I Heart Dirt” tees, six packs of organic vegetable and herb seeds from Cubit’s Organics, a package of assorted garden buttons and magnets (also designed and produced by us), and one of the few remaining Grow Great Grub book launch party door prizes that includes a specially made “Grow Great Grub” button and a pack of organic vegetable seeds by Urban Harvest.
  2. Six packs of organic vegetable and herb seeds from Cubit’s Organics, a package of assorted garden buttons and magnets (also designed and produced by us), and one of the few remaining Grow Great Grub book launch party door prizes that includes a specially made “Grow Great Grub” button and a pack of organic vegetable seeds by Urban Harvest.
Gayla Trail
Gayla is a writer, photographer, and former graphic designer with a background in the Fine Arts, cultural criticism, and ecology. She is the author, photographer, and designer of best-selling books on gardening, cooking, and preserving.

Subscribe to get weekly updates from Gayla

100 thoughts on “What’s on Your Windowsill? (Plus Giveaway)

  1. I love growing herbs on my windowsill…that way I have fresh herbs year-round, and when everything outside is frozen solid, I have a bit of green to brighten my day!

  2. No windowsill, but on stands in front of the balcony I have a bunch of succulents (15 year old jade and it’s children, an aloe plant, a small purple heart plant and a miniature pomegranate tree which is about to bloom!

  3. I love Orchids. On my windowsill I have five Phalaenopsis orchids as they are the easiest to grow for beginners. I also have Oxalis, Spider plants and Sansaveria. My houseplants love the window sill as they get morning sun.I am excited right now as my orchids are producing new growth and I hope to have flowers soon.

  4. So far we have basil, cilantro, red bell pepper, lettuce, jalapeno, heirloom flower mix. So far everything is growing well but I do see some getting a little spindly ;( can’t wait to put them out in the mini greenhouse once it warms up around here!

  5. We’ve had a few pots of mesclun and lettuce growing in our bathroom window. We’ve been living off of WWII rations since the end of December and we’ve greatly missed a variety of greens in our diet. Hence the early start in the window!

  6. I have a lots of plants inside for now.. most will go to the porch when it gets a little warmer! In my kitchen window I have either a Thanksgiving or Christmas Cactus.. as a rule I have heard to tell the difference is by when it blooms..mine blooms year round!
    I just found this site via Twitter post and have no pictures.. yet!
    Love the site!!

  7. Lemon balm, 2 varieties of eggplant, basil, salad burnet, mint, thyme, lemon thyme and a dwarf meyer lemon on the windowsill…but they’ll be moving outside soon enough =)

  8. Some herbs for cooking on my kitchen window sill…basil, oregano, sage, thyme, chives. Am going to be recycling a plastic salad container in the next few days to use to try your microgreens idea.

  9. Bah, no photos but I will post some later! (I’m at work) I just moved last Nov into this dark little corner of my apt complex’s courtyard… and I was dreading thinking about how I was going to grow anything outside my front door… needless to say my windows are packed!

    In my kitchen window I have some stevia, strawberries, borage, chive & green onion sprouts, and a soy bean sprout, all protected by a fire-place guard so my dogs can’t get to them…

    In my other windows I have black krim, cherry, and andes tomato sprouts, variegated corn and adzuki bean sprouts, which will be moved to my parent’s garden in about a week or so…

    and finally four cute succulents in my bathroom; split stone, lola echeveria, rainbow elephant’s bush, and one other that I can’t remember it’s name but it looks like a butterfly.

  10. Right now the only thing on my windowsill is our bird. She loves to get on it and look out the window. She also likes to pace back and forth, and thus, it is plantless. :)

  11. My window sills are bare, because my cats take delight in jumping up onto any surface and very deliberately pushing whatever is on that surface off and watching it fall to the ground. They’ve smashed so many pots and ground so much dirt into the carpet in my apartment that I’ve given up on having indoor plants. :D:

  12. Oh dear – I don’t have a widow sill, not one in the whole flat. Just French doors leading onto the balconies. But French doors are windows too, so I’ve pushed a little trolley on wheels up to the ones in the bedroom. Does that qualify as a window sill? If so, I’ve got :
    Borage
    Savory
    Tomatoes
    a pineapple top
    an avocado pip
    Penstemon
    Poached egg plant
    Godetia
    Morning glory
    Nasturtiums

    My husband wants to know why he has to sleep in a greenhouse while other people have real bedrooms …

  13. My windowsill is sporting Oregano, Rosemary and Thyme, plus a little pot of totally random last-year’s-leftover-seeds Veronica something-or-other. Not edible, not supposed to be an indoor, but loves it and looks lovely!

  14. I, too fight the good fight against a cat bent on destroying my plants. She ignores them all except for my habanero pepper, actually. She ate all the leaves off it in October. It’s recovered surprisingly well for a plant that was just a bundle of sticks a few months ago. It lives in a birdcage on my dining room table now, and I move it obsessively over the course of the day to follow the sun.
    This flickr set includes photos of the pepper, my seed starts for the outdoor garden this year, and the rosemary and lavender which are usually inside by a window, but are outside to get some sun today, due to unusually warm weather.
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/adridne/sets/72157623593675656/

  15. Once upon a time I had a back patio that was perfect for a little herb garden, and I filled it with Thai peppers, oregano, basil, chives, parsley, two kinds of thyme, oregano, catnip, and more. Sadly, I had to leave it. It’s been a little while, but I finally have windowsills on which I can grow things again, and I’m so happy! This would be a perfect way to get started.

  16. I am sorry to hear about so many of you with cats that eat houseplants! Reminds me of how lucky I am that my cat pretty much only goes after grass-like plants.

    Jess: Beautiful amaryllis.

    Kristen: What sort of oxalis? I’m a recent convert.

    Michelle: I’m a big microgreens fan, especially during the winter.

    Megan: Meyer lemon!

    Elletra: I know ‘Lola’ echiveria. I think one of my unidentified might be that.

    Sue in Milan: I think that counts and in some ways might be better since you’re not dealing with tiny sills that only fit small pots.

    Kathleen: Your pepper cage is a smart idea.

    Nisha: Hooray for basil!

  17. My cats don’t leave much room for anything else on my windowsill – they object to anything that comes between them and sunshine.

    That being said, I’ve started lupins, foxglove, and geraniums in a seed-starter.

    I also have a window box of lettuce started that is being moved outside during the day right now! It lives on the kitchen counter the rest of the time so the cats don’t push it out of the way.

    I have plans for the rest of my seeds over the next few weeks but juggling them so they get sun and avoid negative cat-action is going to be tricky! :-)

  18. I’m a recent convert to gardening, though I did it along side my mom as a kid. Right now I’ve got a few boring (but GREEN) house plants, one sad ficus in need of more light, and herbs, maters, cabbage, and peppers under lights. No cats to knock stuff off windows, just a 4 year old Tasmanian devil, er, son.

  19. I doubt I’ll inspire anyone with this one: I’m a coleus murderer, and my windowsills are the evidence! I always overwinter my coleus, and this has been the year that they’ve ALL died. Luckily, I got some cuttings on Craigslist from a kindly stranger. Since I posted about it at my blog (link below), the cuttings have mostly rooted and are now in soil, yup, on the windowsill. Cross your fingers, folks!!!

    http://ronypony.blogspot.com/2010/02/coleus-of-strangers.html

  20. I gow the Oxalis regnellii or false shamrock. I love it as it folds up its leaves at night and opens in the day.It is also nice outside in a container through the summer here in BC.

  21. I have three african violets, one in bloom, an ivy cutting that I first saved from a bridesmaid’s bouquet nine years ago and an un-named plant with long fuzzy leaves that is now budding and if I’m lucky like last year it will continue flowering into July. No seedlings yet. We often get frost in June in Manitoba, so I have to wait until the end of March to plant my seeds.

  22. I have a windowsill miracle story to share- I broke my leg about 6 weeks ago, and was unable to get around with a water jug to take care of everything. I delegated some, and just forgot about others. In my daughter’s room, an aloe and an amaryllis have not only survived, but have thrived on the neglect.I watered them this week, after more than a month in a south window and no water.

  23. I have two garden windows. This is where I start my seens for the veggie garden each year. It’s like having a built-in greenhouse!

  24. I am pretty new to this gardening stuff, and at this point in my life don’t have anything more exciting than philodendrons growing on my windowsills, and one very dead clematis. So sad. I’m looking forward to the arrival of my seeds in the postal mails so I can start getting more variety in my greenery.

  25. Janice-

    Regarding your foxglove in the seed starter -you may already know this, but foxglove is the source plant for the heart drug digitalis. Make sure the cats avoid this as it might be very toxic for them. My windowsill/ledge has a couple of standard houseplants – a starter pothos ivy and spathaphylum (sp?). Hoping to start come chives soon.

  26. I don’t have stuff on windowsills in the house. I also have a cat. The only windowsill I can have plants on is the bathroom. So now, no one can take a bath because plants are there.

    I’ve got an orchid, two poinsettias (one has bloomed again!), an amaryllis, a recovering kalanchoe that I got from a friend at work, and an empty pot that used to have a venus flytrap.

    I had successfully wintered the flytrap in the fridge, but then I put it right up against the window and it died. That really upset me because it was three years old. I need a new one.

    A picture of the “windowsill” is here-
    http://www.marfisa.net/IMG_0329.jpg

  27. i use windowsills for propagating a lot, so…there are some carrion plant, ghost plant, pothos and hibiscus cuttings. a mature hibiscus, a mother of thousands, an elephant plant, some mint, tomato seedlings, and a sansevieria in my bedroom. there are often napping cats in my windowsills also!

  28. In my front window I have a beautiful pot of basil seedlings next to a pot of wonderful little parsley seedlings all waiting to be transplanted outdoors. In my bedroom I have a jasmine plant purchased on my honeymoon and a cute little tropical plant who’s name escapes me, but it was a gift from a friend. I also have a few various hanging plants throughout the house, good luck bamboo, oh and an african violet sitting on the table in the kitchen…

  29. We don’t have anything in our windowsill, instead we have it in our back doorway–not so inspiring as the rosemary has died, but our olive tree is doing well!

  30. I ALWAYS buy indoor plants with the hopes that I will get them to grow strong and healthy! I only have four windows in my place and only one is not surrounded by outside walls but that window just happens to be blocked by my washer and dryer…BUT! I just bought grow lights so hopefully I will quit kiling my indoor plants :)

  31. I thought I never could grow anything but my girlfriend gave me a chia pet herb garden for Christmas and I am successfully growing basil, cilantro and marjoram. I know it doesn’t sound like much but I am going to try much more and you inspired me even more when you appeared on Steven and Chris. Thank you for helping all of us fearful ones. Mary Anne

  32. Wow, this is easy for me since I just happened to post a picture of my kitchen window where I put all my newly bought succulents. I am really not very good with house plants so I tend to stick with the outside stuff that is a little more forgiving. Plus, there’s rain, so there’s hope!

    This post has inspired me to try more house plants. My windowsills are all pretty narrow but I bet I can find something.

    Here’s the picture of my succulents in the window.
    http://myskinnygarden.blogspot.com/2010/03/teds-greenshouse-cactus-and-succulents.html

  33. My cat likes to sample a variety of houseplants, so I limit mine to what I can stow out of his paw-grasp. Among them, a corn plant with lime green leaves, a prayer plant and another plant that grows profusely in the west/south light of my bathroom. It has waxy leaves and green/white varegated markings.

  34. oh, I am so glad you asked. no one in my family asks anymore, they just got used to it. I have a very large Japanese coral bark maple which I brought in to force it to pop its leaves, because it will be part of the spring garden auction basket for my kids school fundraiser. I have three very phallic looking plumerias which have bored me for months because they are very still. I planted them up right away. I should have kept them dormant for warmer weather but when they arrived in december I just wanted them vibrant and blooming right away. they still look just out of the package. lets see… I have many new starts of carniverous plants. A white top pitcherplant, a yellow pitcher, a few small carnivorous ones which I don’t know the name but I am sure they will wow me as soon as they get established. My daughter Kate and her cute friend Lydia potted up two coral Angel trumpets. And just your typical what will root in a small space type items Avocados, Yellow honeysuckle vine, a red bleeding heart vine, a bunch of purpley flowered house plants. I hope I didn’t get to technical for you…

  35. I’ve got purple ruffle & green italian basil starts on the inside of the kitchen window. On the outside of the bedroom window in a box with a suction cup holding it onto the window, I have bird seed, in the hopes that I can grow some birds out there.

  36. Another one with cats here. So my little windowsills have nothing but cat hair. One window over the sink has two african violets that were rescued from a ‘get well soon’ arrangement destined for the trash. For some reason the boys leave those alone. I also have an avacado pit in a starbucks iced coffee jar (those are great for forcing bulbs by the way!) and a couple of cloves of garlic sprouting greens that I cut for cooking. Mmmm…

    It’s the best I can do.. but it’s a little bit of green, so it’s something. :o)

  37. hooray!!! i love windowsill gardening…mostly i windowsill garden in my classroom at school as i find it piques the interest of the kiddos and i like to garden outside at home! in the classroom this year i have lots of stuff….a sideways hanging basket with a staghorn fern, 2 epiphytes hanging on string, curly-leaf and serrated-edge night-blooming cereus, a baby jewel orchid, a phaleonopsis (about to bloom!), a birds’ nest fern, a large wax plant, basil sprouts, blue victoria salvia sprouts, gomphrena sprouts, a caterpillar fern, some star jasmine 4″ pots that need to be planted outside and a lovely philodendron that is bright burgundy. Also there is a wonderful blooming black curly-leafed begonia, a pink hyacinth and a great euphorbia that looks like a mini-poinsettia. I have a really large windowsill! Also decorating the same space is a large chunk of a citrine cave wall and some Mexican decorative flags….it’s lovely that even on dark days, we can have some beauty indoors…

  38. I am forcing hyacinth bulbs in my window sill in a large, shallow glass bowl. Of 14, 7 have bloomed in very girly pinks and purples. 2 bulbs were, unfortunately, duds. I am hoping the remaining 5 come out as white!

  39. In my sunny southern exposure window at work I have a very old, very large, very root bound aloe plant. It has flowered every year for the past 5 years, looooong stalk with a large flower at the top. I have pictures of it, but none with me right now. Also a fairly large, fairly old variegated ficus. At home I don’t have as much sun and have resorted to ferns. I have two birds nest ferns, love them, and a rabbits foot fern which always causes comments. I used to have a lot of different kinds of ivy, but every winter they would get infested with aphids and I finally gave up on ivy. I also have 6 rosemary plants I am overwintering under a plant light in the basement. I’d love to have a greenhouse window in my kitchen, it’s on my wish list. Must have MORE ROOM to grow indoors. Here in NW Pa, winters are long, cold and cloudy, I need as much green and dirt indoors as I can get to keep me sane.

  40. we have only two windowsills in our apartment, but they are absolutely packed full of plants (i little many others have a bit of a problem when it comes to acquiring new plants). pics are on my folia site in which i title the whole thing my ‘plant mountain’.
    hope the sun is warming your soul!

  41. I have horrible windows for sun, but the two that get some sun have aloe, chives, oregano, basil starts and microgreens.

  42. Having just gotten my seeds and set a date for seed starting with a girlfriend, I am so excited! Even a week of rain and – yes- the winter is almost over blahs- won’t keep me from admiring my pussy willow’s catkins or the little red tulip sprouts poking up from the wet ground. Yes, winter here in Minnesota is nearly gone, even if the melting icebergs on every curb don’t make it seem so…

  43. I have a ‘wild’ tulip, some large converted vases that have crocuses and daffodils, a small chamomile, a primrose, and some sweet pea seedlings getting an early start before I plant them around my stairwells and fencelines….

  44. Oh, my windowsill is a sad, sad sight! I managed to kill my big, beautiful jade plant that used to live there. I tried to replant some of the branches, but my cat keeps eating them. We are trying to grow some avocados from pits, but nothing is happening so far. And I have one scraggly looking sweet potato plant. But I’m feeling inspired now!

  45. We have lots of sun in the Canadian prairie. I have a boxwood topiary (lollipop style) on the windowsill of my office – he needs repotting, badly. In my living room I have a ‘string-of-pearls’, with some major agave plants below on the floor as these guys are way too large to fit on the sill.
    Similarly, on the floor below my very best sunny window, I have 2 large pots of red oxalis, which I started many, many years ago from ‘bulbs’. I always take them outside in the spring where they form the most perfect rubyred mounds, then split them up for friends before I take them in again in the fall.

  46. Funny, I also have five Phalaenopsis orchids in my window, they love it there and are happily blooming now. I also have a happy aloe plant – do they flower? really? Then there’s my approx. 14 yr old and my approx. 8 yr old cyclamen – anyone want them? lol… they continually flower. I also have a very old cactus that was quite neglected by me and is quite small and stunted. Right next to it is a similarly neglected pear cactus, extremely stunted – only one pear. Upstairs I have a very tall cactus and a big barrel cactus – they took a tumble one day, but the tall cactus was able to cling to the blind string and hang on – the barrel cactus still has scars.

  47. Right now, at my back door, I have 2 Christmas cacti, a kalachoe, a very sickly poinsettia, some leggy mint, chives, 2 sweet potato vine cuttings, a peace lily and pothos plant, and some dianthus ready to be repotted! C’mon Spring! The mountains of Western North Carolina have been unusually snowy and cold this year!

    Pictures are at http://barbyandbrad.com/2010/03/window-garden/

  48. Growing on my windowsill are some gold tomato seedlings….I can’t start digging in my community garden plot til April 15th, so Im starting as much as I can right now….

  49. I “Ice Garden”. My windows freeze over during the winter so I don’t have plants on the sills. Just a stack of terra cotta saucers waiting to be filled with planted pots in the spring. When the sunlight shines through the iced windows it looks like a beautiful, frosted garden.

  50. I have a small cactus, orange bellpepper seedlings an a small gingko plant. Sadly my windowsill is very small and y other windows do ntgt any diret light…So I have a BUNCh of seeds started under a light in my livingroom. I pretend it is a window..lol I have started Mama Mia tomatoe, green bellpeppers, redbellpeppers, cherry bomb peppers, green beans and pole beans am READY for spring!!!

  51. i am ALWAYS growing sprouts in my kitchen on my countertop it’s year round salad garden.
    this year i tried out forcing bulbs in some pretty pots.some lovely grape hyacinth, and miniature irises.
    THEN i’ve got miniature greenhouse starting all my seeds!
    I am planning a sort of witches healing garden.
    The planning of this garden had been what’s gotten me through the winter.
    dreams of my healing garden are healing me!!
    i am starting from seeds all the basic culinary herbs, like rosemary, basil,thyme, dill, chives and oregano. i have herbs like st.john’s wort, lamb’s quarters, valerian,calendula,lemon balm and catnip for the exciting the kitties and calming me,
    then i have a really exciting assortment of flowers, like a fairy garden mixture, poppies, sweet peas,foxglove, alyssum,sunflowers and flax .
    yes, i realize i was overly ambitious..i have even MORE seeds coming in the mail!! ~YIKES!~ either way.. i am SO PUMPED for this years garden! yay!!

  52. I just recently moved to a new house with a window in the shower, so I immediately filled the window sill with tropicals and water-tolerant plants as a screen between me and the outside world. It’s like taking a shower in a tropical greenhouse now!

    I also just relocated my sugar snap pea and cucumber seedlings to my bedroom window (the sunniest room in the house). I too have a cat, but luckily he has his designated window that stays plant free and he’s not a jumper, so stays off the other windowsills.

  53. I have been growing african violets in my window and a jade plant for over a year now. i just started strawberry seeds which have tiny little sprouts right now. and i, just this afternoon have laid out my seeds, my soil, and my little pots to start my basil, cilantro, parsley, and rosemary for the window sill in my kitchen. spring makes me so excited to get started on the growing!

  54. I have Sunflowers, Basil, Cilantro, Angel Trumpet, Marigolds, Foxglove, parsley, muscari, johnny jump ups, pansy, zinnia, green beans, black beans, tomatoes, okra, sweet banana peppers, hot peppers, cosmos,hibiscus,snapdragons…. thats it for now!

  55. I don’t have wide enough windsills to hold anything, so I actually got some wooly pockets. I planted some cilantro, rosemary, basil, & thyme in them.

  56. I’ve got tarragon, parsley, sage and rosemary hanging out until its time to pop them into the garden. I’ve also got a bay laurel that needs to be repotted.

  57. Don’t have level windowsills to grow on, but I have a bookcase right next to the window. We also have a cat that gets into everything!!! So finding plants that are nontoxic to him is quite a challenge. We finally came up with a solution of converting and old fish tank into a terrarium. We’re now growing chives, basil, cilantro, oregano, tomatoes, and peppers. Every home needs a little green!

  58. Currently I have several jade plants, a spider plant and a lovely red chili pepper plant! And each spring, I find room for my tomato and green pepper seedlings!

  59. In my bedroom (under the skylight – so the floor is my windowledge!) I have a 30+ year old chese plant, avocado tree banana tree baby herbs and several Oxalis. On my bathroom windowledge I have a tulip, baby passion flower, lemon tree another oxalis and a bay cutting. On other window ledges I have managed to sqeeze in various geraniums hyacinths and tulips. I love the daylight filterd through green leaves, making the dullest day have a comforting greeness to it! Various window ledge photos are on my flickr album. I love the comments and other peoples images on this subject – I am not alone in my planty world! http://www.flickr.com/photos/daisydvg/sets/72157623618040590/
    I have loved and been inspired by your site Gayla for many years now – keep up the great work!
    Alice xx

  60. I have very tiny windowsills. So most of my plants aren’t on sills because they just won’t fit (and even if they did, the cats could get to them there). But I do have some herbs on my kitchen windowsill in a pot I found that is somehow the exact right size.

    Here’s my windowsill: http://jennahsgarden.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/screen-shot-2010-02-06-at-5-05-39-pm.png

    And here’s the rest of my inside plants: http://jennahsgarden.wordpress.com/2010/02/06/house-plant-inventory/

  61. Our windowsills are quite overcrowded! We have a lot of south-facing windows, so we try to fill them up, plus we have skylights, so there are a few plants placed around under those.

    Lots of aloe plants, a mother onion, two oreca palms we started from seed, a couple spider plants, a small ginko tree, a couple san pedro cacti, and an unidentified succulent or two are in the living room and laundry room window sills. Then we have a small tray of carnivorous plants on the table near a sunny window, and the bathroom is full of snake plants, a rubber plant, something spiky that looks a bit like a flattened agave (came with the house), and we have several other plants that I forget the names of that we bought specifically because they help filter the air indoors (the spider & snake plants do as well). I also have a plant that my mom got while she was in the hospital having me, so it’s nearly 27 years old! It’s some kind of viney thing that we’ve tacked up with rubber bands to the skylight, and it stretches from there all the way down to its pot on top of the kitchen cupboards.

    On the back deck we have a shelf underneath one of the windows that’s full of succulents – a huge jade plant, several chicks & hens, and quite a few I don’t know the names of, but they sure are pretty. And we have a few pitcher plants out there and in our hoop house as well… we have a mild climate, so we leave the succulents outside year-round. Plants love our south-facing and somewhat sheltered back deck.

    We’re plant addicts, as you can tell… :)

  62. Lets see……I have a Mayer lemon seedling I grew from a pip in a pot my mum made, a leggy basil seedling, a much abused aloe vera as the whole family uses it for burns, an orchid that my daughter bought because she couldn’t face the thought of a plant living at Walmart, a rosemary plant grown from seed, some pots of narsissis (done flowering sadly), some lemon grass rooted from a stem I bought at the super market, a scented geranium I got a cutting from a friend etc etc.
    Flcker won’t let me sing in so I’ll try to link to a photo later.

  63. Right now my window sill is mostly taken up with seedlings. I have three varieties of tomato and four of peppers going. My goal for this year’s garden is really good fresh salsa. I also have a few adult plants sharing the window space: three more type of pepper and a succulent that a friend gave out as bridesmaid gifts (don’t know what variety, I keep meaning to ask). Obiously we’re big pepper fans in my house, so I always have more of those than anything else.

    Kathleen: I know what you mean about the cat. Mine only eats the peppers, nothing else. I went through four plants last year. Now they all live under chicken wire.

  64. This very weekend I rearranged my whole living room to give my windowsill to my freshly planted seedlings! I’m so excited. I did the same last year…I underestimated my green thumb and wound up with 30 tomato plants!

    Picture:

  65. I have an avacodo tree starting, a suculant, I have no idea what it is called, because they are hard to kill, and an orchid.

  66. Nestled on a purple knitted scarf on my window sill I have six pots with starts of yellow roses and the seeds of basil and cherry tomato seedlings.

  67. What a great post i have on my ever sunny window sill
    1.2 african violets
    2. garlic
    3. snap dragon (3 years old)
    4. Spiderplant
    5. jade plant
    6. 4 Geraniums
    7. maiden hair fern
    8. burro tail
    9. wandering jew
    10. Basil
    11. Kalanchoe
    and i have a south faceing window so i always try to fill it up as much as it will go :) its so nice to hear that everyone is starteing there seeds through

  68. Oh how I wish I had bigger windowsills as they would be full of plants. I have a wanna be windowsill that sits on the kitchen counter and holds little pots of various herbs, cuttings, and rootings.

  69. My hubby recently got me ‘you grow girl’ as a valentine’s day present; since then, I’ve been planting like crazy! We have a teeny apt. with a teeny window ledge but that’s not stopping me! The family includes some Italian Oregano, sweet basil, rosemary and Sage. I hope to bring in some lavender and thyme soon.

    thanks for the inspiration!!

  70. I’ve got lettuce and spinach starts germinating in toilet paper rolls – got the idea from this site! Plans are in the works for some herbs as well. Cheers!

  71. Beautiful windowsills and so cheery to see in the wee remains of winter. My sills are still fairly empty as we have just moved but I’m starting my garden’s seedlings now and soon we’ll have lots of litle greenery around here.

  72. Picture: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bintie/4440806584/sizes/l/

    My kitchen window faces east so I use it for lower-light plants, cuttings, and parts of my frog collection! L-R are jade plant cuttings, a burro’s tail cutting, hoya and lipstick plant stems rooting in a volumetric flask I “liberated” from a lab at school, a NOID orchid (with a new leaf!), an echeveria cutting in a Nokki frog pot, and a rooted schefflera cutting. There are also 14 frogs visible plus a tiny bit at the bottom left corner of the photo.

  73. Some herb regulars: rosemary, thyme, sage. A jade plant. And some from kitchen scraps: green onions, avocado, pineapple top!

  74. I have some african violets, an orchid and a few forced bulbs growing on my windowsill. It’s a big picture window, so plants tend to find a spot there!

  75. I’ve just started to get ready for spring and in my “free” windowsill, I’m growing a pots of sage, thyme, and rosemary and have a couple of trays of arugula, basil, and kale seeds starting.

  76. I’ve always kept african violets on my windowsill just like my great-grandmother used to. There’s always a cycle of blooming and/or freshly propagated babies sprouting. Right now I have seed trays for my summer vegetable & herb garden on the sill, too. I’m lucky to be back in my rural hometown this summer so I can have a fairly large garden.

  77. I am currently sporting a new small jade, a large jar with succulents and two houseplants that have survived another year: variegated schefflera and something with pointy green leaves with yellow spatter spots on it.

    I was looking for gardenia at New Year in China Town, but I couldn’t find one I liked.

Comments are closed.