Brighten Your Home With Household Plants

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When you live in a concrete jungle where dreams are made, sometimes it can be difficult to remember what nature looks like.

But you don’t have to hike your way up to Central Park to see some green. You can brighten up your space with some cute plants, which don’t have to be as expensive as your apartment. Household plants can range anywhere from a couple of dollars to around 30, making them easy to replace if you get lazy and accidentally kill them (I’m not saying that you do this, just being realistic).

However, these plants are worth the effort because they have practical uses as well. Your 2 Bros pizza tasting a little bland? Walk over to the window and snip off some basil. Your Seamless spaghetti sauce not-so-saucy? Pick off a little tomato from your plant. (I’ve heard the stereotype about New Yorkers only ordering out, so I’m saying this to appeal to our demographic.)

Here are some other common, fun household plants that you can brighten up your space with.

1. Aloe Vera

Yes, this plant isn’t just a name on your organic-free-range-market bottle of face cream. Standing strong with a maximum height of 3 feet, aloe vera can easily be grown in rooms with a moderate amount of light and only requires a temperature 65-75 degrees. These don’t need to be watered that much; once every week or two is enough. And when the leaves get big enough, you can break them off and use the gel inside to moisturize your skin, treat sunburn, and even fight aging (as I’m sure that you know from your cream).

 

2. Sweet Potato Vine

Your favorite orange spuds aren’t just good for French fries. Sweet potato vines can complement your home with their pretty purplish-green leaves. Take a sweet potato, stick it in a jar (or small vase) with some water, and in a couple of days you should start to see little vines spurting out of it. If  a potato sitting in water is unattractive to you, you can transfer the potato to some soil after the vines have grown enough. And if you get hungry later, I suppose you can take the potato out and try to eat it or make fries or something (to find a practical use for this).

 

3. Spider Plant

I thought specifically about plants that would help improve air quality so I’d have a practical use to talk about, and here it is. The spider plant does look a bit like a spider with its long, thin, hanging leaves.  Put them in your home in a place with indirect light and water them well. They like the temperature to be about 55-65 degrees and are very resilient plants to have. But don’t be fooled by the creepy name-in the spring; they can sprout some pretty white flowers. And again, apparently they help improve air quality, giving you a some relief from the consistent stench of your pile of take-out boxes.

– by Connie Lee