You may suddenly find yourself thrown into a situation where you have an entire house or an apartment or a condo to decorate all on your lonesome. One of the best choices for decorating a lonely home on your own when you are on your own is to utilize houseplants. Plants that can be raised inside the house can provide a wealth of decorative effects that can serve to make you feel better; at least a little better: aromatic fragrance, a variety of colors and, not the least important, oxygen to help you feel better. But you need to know some of the secrets, tips and hints of the experts when it comes to choosing a house plant.
Foliage
Foliage refers to the plant’s coloring and shapes that are derived from its leaves and overall form. Living on your own means knowing these kinds of things and what you should know is that there are just about as many different types of foliage to look for as there are plants to buy. A popular houseplant is the poisonous but beautiful poinsettia that provides a blast of color as well as leaves large enough to make it the centerpiece for a display. Eschew poinsettia if you have pets or small children who can’t keep from putting everything they see into the mouth. The foliage of cacti means the addition of almost surreal shapes and those sharp needles. Look for plants with eccentrically shaped leaves to give a room an effective conversation piece.
Flowers
Flowering plants may be enough to lift your mood if you find yourself suddenly alone in a house or large apartment. Before you make a final decision on adding flowering plants to your decorative arrangement, make sure you educate yourself on things like complementary colors and the effective mixing of sizes and shapes of plants to achieve the maximum effect. You want to avoid allowing a stunningly beautiful but small plant to get lost amid larger, less attractive vegetation. If you find yourself alone in a loft with a high ceiling, consider the Passion Flower which can rise well above 25 feet high. Tulips are available in shapes besides the common bell shape and you would probably have an easier time coming up with colors that tulips don’t come in than colors that tulips do come in. Decorating a lonely house with a plant called a Tom Thumb, scientifically known as Kalanachoe blossfeldiana, will provide a very dramatic explosion of one of the deepest reds you’ve ever seen. You can’t get enough red in a lonely apartment, but keep it out of the kitchen if you want to lose weight because the color red stimulates the appetite.
Herbs
Stay away from herbs if your lonely habitat is going to be completely empty during meal time. If you like to cook, however, you should find some place in the apartment or house to grow useful houseplants like basil, thyme, rosemary and parsley. Other herbs are equally well-chosen depending on your taste.
Chiles and Peppers
If you prefer your home cooked food to be a little on the hotter side than herbs can provide, then forego sage for habaneros. Chiles and peppers can easily be grown inside your lonely house or apartment as long as you make sure to provide light and water.
Aromatic Plants
Choosing plants to decorate a home or apartment you’ve moved into after, for instance, a break-up or divorce is a tricky affair. You need to keep way up there in the frontal lobe of your brain the realization that down deep in the reptile part of your brain lies the primal association of scent with the memory of emotions that can instantly transport your back in time to a specific place and event. No other sense is capable of bringing to the surface a memory of an emotion like the sense of smell. Therefore, approach fragrant plants with caution or not at all. Popular houseplants for creating a pleasing aroma through the house include hyacinth, daffodils and jasmine. Those herbs, chiles and peppers can also be brought in to accomplish double duty here.