Tropical Goodness

I have been drinking Calamansi lime water for around a month. I drink it almost everyday. Only 1 Calamansi lime at a time. Slow and steady effort. I add plain water in a mug, and then I squeeze the lime juice from a Calamansi lime.  I did it for health, and for taste. Sometimes I don't like the after taste of the food I ate for lunch so I decided to drink Calamansi water to cover the after taste. It works everytime. And I also love the taste of lime juice.  After squeezing the lime, there will be the remaining lime juice on your fingers and in the lime peels. This, I did not throw away easily.  The remaining juice in the peel, I apply it on my skin as serum or face mask. It helps the skin to become smoother and brighter. And it works for me. Let it stay on your skin for 15 to 30 minutes and rinse it clean.  But before applying the juice, we must test a small amount of it on the sensitive and small area on our skin. It is because the lime juice is acidic and can cause...

Brazilian Spinach, or Sissoo Spinach, or Poor Man's Spinach is the name of a shiny crunchy small shrub plant which is also edible. I got this plant cuttings last year. In the beginning I did not have any idea what it is. I was looking at my aunt's plants when I noticed a pot of shiny shrub. They are so cute because they grow like a small bush with shiny green leaves. They look edible. I asked my aunt about the plant. And my aunt said it is Brazilian Spinach. It can be eaten raw or cooked. My cousin bought the spinach from fresh market and my aunt regrow the stems. Brazilian Spinach seedlings. I grew them in my container garden. They survived thank to God. Now I have 5 pots of it and I don't know where to plant them anymore. I put some in my DIY square container and some more in pots. They grow well. Even though sometimes I forgot to water them. Brazilian Spinach loves rich soil. Below are some tips to grow Brazilian Spinach from my experience. Love Rich Soil ...

This post is written on 2018 and transferred here.   Last week I went to my small backyard garden to spray my homemade pesticide to my plants. There are a big colony of ants and white aphid in my garden which I always fight with... They stay in the soil and on the plants, behind the leaves and on the stems. I mixed 1/4 teaspoon of dish soap, a few drops of cooking oil and 2 cups of pipe water. Then I spray to the area  where the ants and aphids are. Of course there are still half of them left but the damage they cause to my garden can be reduced. Some people spray them daily to ensure they did not disturb the plants, especially on chili plants. After spraying the plants with pesticide, I noticed that my lemon basil has turned from one small plant to a small bush which is about 1.2 feet height. I then trimmed it to less 1 feet height to promote more leaves growth. I then regrow some of the stem into my cherry tomato, mulberry, chili and lemongrass pots. The remaini...

Hi. I am CK. I am a plant lover and I love gardening. Because by gardening we can be calm, and fresh. Gardening may be a beneficial hobby both for your health and pocket. By gardening we get to exercise and get fresh foods. We also can save money.   I love fresh herbs and vegetables. The green view is refreshing and distressing. Watching the plants grow give me a kind of satisfaction. Plus if it is in the morning or after the rain. It is a refreshing experience.  However,gardening in a limited space is sure a challenging activity. Especially when you just feel like growing every plants around your house. I need to consider what plant to grow and their number , and how much space they will take along their lifetime . This depends on some factors such as the purpose of growing them , the maintenance , types of plants and the amount of water and sun they need , the airflow and humidity .  I also have to plan prior to growing to ensure the optimum use of space...

Compost is an important ingredient in a garden. Applying and feeding compost to the plants really helps them grow and produce well, God willing. Compost can be bought from nearby nursery or sometimes hypermarket and it also can be made at home.  I read many  articles about composting before, comprising on how to compost and what to put in the compost mix. To me, it is basically mixing the waste comprising carbon and waste comprising nitrogen. Nitrogen containing waste usually comes from wet kitchen waste and carbon containing waste come from browned materials such as dried leaves, paper and burnt materials.  Too much one of the waste type results in bad smell and longer composting time. Temperature, humidity and aeration also play important role in composting as it help and affect the composting process. Good compost does not smell, I think.  However I did not have enough space to make compost. What I did just, I put 1/2 pot of potting soil into an empty pot...

Last week I went to my mini garden at the backyard. I was going to water my Brazilian spinach with rice water that I got from my rice face mask residue. It is like fermented rice water with sweet and sour smell. I think the plant will love it.  When I went outside I noticed that two pumpkin plants had gone wild, out from their pots. According to my mom the pumpkin wont yield fruit because it lacked of space and nutrients. Pumpkin needs big space and lots of soil to bear fruits. It does flower, but all it has are male flowers only. Not only pumpkin, the sweet potato plant also gone wild. This made my mini garden looked terrible. Today I aimed to trim and clean my mini garden at the backyard. Pumpkin plants have been turned into compost pile and wild Brazilian spinach also got trimmed. I then trimmed the basil, pandan, sweet leaf and chives.  One of my my sweet leaf plant is not doing well. It looks like having a kind of disease. The other one i...

Last two weeks I went to see my small garden, after I've been lying sick for about two weeks. My cherry tomato plant seems sick, but the tomatoes start to ripen. Lemongrass grow larger, and pandan also. Basil plants start to flower and I noticed my bird eye chili plant has some young chilies on it. Actually I want to clear the water spinach container that has deceased water spinach in it. After doing so I decided to visit butterfly pea plant and to my surprise there are lots of flower even though I plant it in container.  For that day I had a cup of butterfly pea tea, very dark blue in color. = ) Garden produces. Chives, a cherry tomato, Brazilian spinach from trimmings, some chilies and butterfly pea flowers.  My butterfly pea plant. The spots on the leaves are caused by an unknown insect. It sprinkles a kind of liquid from its body and when the liquid touch the leaves it bleached the color and produce spots.  This is a picture from two years ago. The...