Plants that bing colorful flowers to homes in winter: poinsettia and hyacinth

Warm colors for a warm home.

That’s what Poinsettia and hyacinth have to offer. These two plants gift us with an explosion of colors at the heart of winter.

Amazing natural anti-depressants! They’re easy to care for, and last long after end-of-year festivities… Great ornaments for guests and for your own enjoyment, too!

Poinsettia, coming from the sun

Native to Mexico, poinsettia bursts into a multitude of colored bracts, which earns it the name of Christmas star.

No need to wait for the end-of-year holidays to splurge and gift ourselves with one or more, selecting several colors: red, green, white, pink, salmon and purple.

Leaves of poinsettia are what take on such bright colors, since actual flowers are just teeny-tiny yellow balls that appear in the center.

Poinsettia is a fragile plant, it is vulnerable to the cold and to drafts. Ask that it be wrapped well for transporting it outdoors, and don’t select a plant that is set near the store’s entrance door, where the air is drafty.

To keep your poinsettia alive for months, take care to water without overdoing it, only when the soil has dried off, by immersing the pot in a container of lukewarm water – cold water would tend to make the leaves fall off – and then drip-dry it off so that still water doesn’t collect in the saucer. Set it up in a warm room, 60 to 72°F (15 to 22°C), with abundant indirect light.

Here are all the tips on growing poinsettia
More specifically, how to make it red again

Hyacinths, a foretaste of spring

With its superb pink, blue, white, violet, yellow or orange blooms and its fresh fragrance, hyacinth is a concentrate of spring in the middle of winter, just add water!

This bulb, usually sourced from Holland, isn’t very demanding:

a little bit of water every couple days just to keep the soil moist is enough,
and light or dark exposure don’t really matter.

Hyacinth that bloom in December come from forced bulbs, you’ll find them in pots at the florists’ shops, but you can also prepare them yourself in a tall vase with a shoulder. This is a fast-growing experiment that kids love. And you can transfer it outside later on!