This week, I wanted to focus my column on doing a follow-up on my plants. I’m not sure how many people read my last column about them, so I will briefly summarize my journey with these plants.

So my journey with plants started over a semester ago. My roommates and I started out with just four plants: two succulents and two pothos; now we have over 30. We have a large variety of different succulents, more pothos and tons of different foliage plants. We even bought some tulips to put on our patio recently!

Out of my roommates, I am the main caretaker of the plants and I think I appreciate and love them the most. I quite literally refer to them as my plant children sometimes — not to be confused with my betta fish who is a my fish child.

As I stated in my last column about my plants, my roommate Madison has a cat and his name is Ajax. I love my roommate and I love this cat. He is a beautiful little man, but he and I used to have an issue where he thought my plants were fun to eat and I very much disagreed with him.

In my last column I explained different possible techniques I would be using to keep the cat away from my plants and deter him from eating them. The first technique involved spraying the plants and their surroundings with diluted lemon juice because cats supposedly hate the smell of citrus.

So I have been lightly misting my plants and their surroundings about twice a week since that column and I have good news: the cat has had less negative interactions with my plants than before.

Sure we still have the odd leaf ripped off or the odd plant knocked over (this is now more common because he wants to get outside to the patio and the only window looking out on the patio is filled with the plants, so not really intentional damage), but overall he interacts with them less because he finds the citrus to be repulsive.

Overall I think this has improved the relationship between me and the cat. Is he still a nightmare sometimes? Yes, he loves to bite and sneak attack but he is still young and is an animal so that’s expected. However, overall I believe us to be better acquainted and I find his company to now be more pleasing rather than annoying.

Basically, Ajax is just another roommate in our apartment. He is another living creature and just like my other two roommates there are things that bring me joy about living with him and there are things that are annoying, it’s just life.

OK, enough about the cat because I have some other plant news!

My spider plant is producing new babies (after some of the others dropped, which I have now planted and they are also doing well!) and it has even bloomed! I didn’t even know that was possible for a spider plant!

I received a large aloe vera plant and a Venus flytrap from my grandparents for Easter and both are settling in nicely with the rest of the plant family.

I have invested in some grow lights for some of my plants who aren’t in direct sunlight. Those plants are now thriving, especially my ivy.

Finally, I purchased a garden sage plant for my roommate Sage for her birthday, and both are happy and healthy.

Once again I want to emphasize how amazing plants are to have. They can make you happy, reduce your stress and help reduce toxins in your home all at the same time!