New addition:

Meet Ferndinand, Fern for short.

He's a hanging fern and is the first of what I hope to be a lovely and flourishing plant collection. The end goal is to have a nice setup of plants on the balcony (hopefully a small table and a chair, as well. I'd love to be able to sit outside among some greenery and study as well as having several indoors. It's probably all in my head, but I swear I'm already breathing easier!

I spent a good hour at The Home Depot looking at plants and then looking them up online to make sure they weren't considered toxic to animals. Unfortunately, many plants are, so options were limited. All true ferns are generally "animal friendly", which is good to know. In the coming weeks, I hope to compile a list of plants I like that do well in low light and are animal safe. I figure I'll need to head to an actual garden center (like an Armstrongs) so I can talk with some plant experts.

Fingers crossed I don't kill Fern... I've been known to forget to water plants in the past... This time, however, I hope to have nipped that problem in the bud. Fern has his own "water bulb". As long as I check it to make sure its full, Fern should be able to hydrate at his own pace.

This weekend has been great (date day, birthday party, Fern), but it's time to get back to the real world of life as I know it.