I have never been much of a plant person. I love fresh herbs for cooking and can arrange flowers, both real and not, but growing something myself has never, ever been something I’m good at. But we live in an apartment so gardening is out of the question anyway.

However, I couldn’t resist the mini herb garden kit at IKEA on our last visit. Basil, coriander and thyme seeds with the dirt and containers to put them in, all for €3,00.

I had the kit for about a week before I got brave enough to open it. It took me a while to figure out that the little brown discs were actually potting soil that had been compressed. But once I figured out how to un-compress the potting soil, the rest was pretty simple. That was two weeks ago.

This week there has been some amazing progress and I have little baby sprouts of basil, coriander and thyme. I’ve been so excited about my baby plants and have even started to rotate the pots so that they grow straight instead of leaning one direction toward the window.

I’ve watered them a bit every third day and am surprised by how fast the little sprouts grow. I was giddy with excitement when I realized this morning that in addition to the baby sprouts I already have there are even more getting ready to break through the dirt any day now.

Alan says I haven’t been so excited about growing things since I quit playing Farmville on Facebook! He’s right, of course, but I’m still pretty happy with my baby plants!