Home Improvement

Steampunk Decor

Last week we wrote about the increasingly popular industrial style decor. Now let us delve into an offshoot of the industrial style called steampunk décor. This dates back to the Victorian Age where England was just starting the Industrial Revolution. So, metals and industrial mechanisms are brought into the home décor.

Steampunk bathroom

The wall colors go back to the factory colors of black, brown, and copper. Tin ceilings and wall coverings with gears and other inner factory mechanisms are part of the steampunk design. Obviously, furniture and other furnishing made from pipe (steam punk-get the pun) is a must. Steamer trunks make great coffee tables. Floors do not have carpet but are painted black, grey, or white. Wall can be darker woods.

Edison lighting

In light fixtures, hanging pendant lights with Edison bulbs like the ones used in the factories at the time. Wall decorations are large gears (which you can adhere mirrors to), overly large clocks, and old distressed wood for cabinets.

House Plants

Growing Carnivorous Plants

If you want a challenge, try growing carnivorous plants. They are attention grabbers and eat insects to boot! If you use a sterile, sandy soil mix which you can buy from a specialty store. Keep the soil moist but have good drainage using rainwater or melted snow warmed to room temperature. I kill some of mine by giving tap water. Avoid any fertilizer. Give filtered light with some direct sun from an east window. They grow best in a terrarium. Keep temperatures above 50 degrees. If you match their climate to growing on a forest floor, they become less challenging.

Sundew

The sundew plant comes in many varieties and sizes. Colors of yellow, red, pink, and purple can be found. At the tip of the leaves is a clump of sappy tentacles and when an insect touches it, it becomes suck and the bristles curls around the insect to slowly digest it.

Pitcher Plant

Pitcher plants have cup-like leaves that fill with liquid coming again in many varieties to vining plants to pitchers coming from the soil itself. The insects crawl into the liquid and are digested with the enzymes in the liquid. The “pitchers” have a lid to keep excess rainwater out. The large ones are from 1 to 2 feet trapping frogs.

Venus Fly Trap

Venus flytrap is the most common carnivorous plant with the spring hinge that catches the insect after they rub the little hairs in the trap.

Butterwort

Butterworts are small plants looking like a succulent with very colorful flowers. They have a sticky substance on their leaves to catch and digest insects.

Aquatic Bladderwort

Bladderworts are floating aquatic plants that have swellings on their leaves that open to attract the insect with a sweet substance. Once inside the insect is consumed. These plants are grown in an aquarium or a bowl with water. They do have yellow flowers. There are terrestrial bladderworts that can be grown like a ground cover. Since they grow in bog conditions, they need to be wet.

Starting seeds indoors

Planting Flower or Garden Seeds

It is getting time to start thinking about planting flower or garden seeds indoors. Certainly, time to clean and get the area ready and order the seeds and stuff you will need for germinating seedlings. Everyone has a little area they can start a few seeds. I use a back room just for this purpose.

Organize your leftover seeds from last year

Why not wait and buy the plants from a greenhouse or nursery? For instance, you can find 50+ varieties in a catalog instead of a couple of dozen in a retail store. Like a tomato, you have a larger selection of colors, sizes, maturity dates, types of heirloom varieties, etc. Other things you can pick from are tomatoes for drying, yellow watermelons, cabbage that will keep until next March, and other qualities of certain vegetables. Did you know there are pink and white eggplants?

PVC light setup

First, you need to get your seeds ordered. Then you will need to get or buy some cheap fluorescent light fixtures. I replace the light tubes with grow lights.

Getting everything ready

Find your germinating containers, either buy the ones for this purpose or recycle cut down milk cartons, cottage cheese containers, small cake pans, etc. Make sure they all have drainage holes. If you used plastic containers from last year, dip them into a 10% solution of bleach then rinse. This removes any disease materials left over.

Get your planting media, do not use soil. I have found the easiest solution for myself is to get regular germinating media. I usually purchase this from a greenhouse supplier in a larger bag instead of getting the smaller more expensive bags you find in retail stores.

Later I will write when it is time to start germinating the seeds after you get everything set up. Even now it is not too early to start onions, geraniums, begonias, and petunias if you’re adventurous.