Adriane

Posted on January 5, 2021January 6, 2022 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Welcoming January with changes to the Shop!

Shop Updates:

We are doing some upgrades to the shop during the middle of January! We thank you all for your support in helping to make this a reality.

Coming soon: A safe and ADA-accessible entryway, better lighting around the shop, and for Spring, a new outdoor shopping area… and so much more, but we don’t want to spoil it!

With this closure, we bring you...... A SALE!

We have to clear out what’s in the shop to make way for what’s new.

Come by this weekend to enjoy a cool

30% off ALL PURCHASES!

**Sale offered January 6-9, 2022 in store only!**

Shop Hours for January 2022

Suburban Succulents Shop hours by date for January ’22:

January 6-8 Thursday-Saturday 11am-5pm SALE!

Jan 9-Sunday 11am-2pm SALE!

Jan 27-30 Thursday-Sunday 11am-5pm Soft Reopening for Valentines Day

*We will keep our socials and online hours updated, too*

Tickets Now Available for Plant Workshops

Plant workshops are a go!

Join us for Plant Night!

Excited to announce that we have 6 locations around Clark County, including our own place, that our workshops will be hosted at in January. We even have a few more locations to add for February!

This means we are bringing a fun plant experience to a local favorite spot near you!

Tickets are available on our website. You can always contact us to get more information too.

Click the picture of the schedule of classes and you will be directed to January’s class tickets.

Our first workshop takes place this Friday night at The Difference Clothing Boutique in Downtown Vancouver!

Want to join in? We will have a few terrariums available at the door, but please plan ahead and purchase a ticket in advance so I know how many people to prepare for.

Chicken Planning for 2022

We are looking at what number of little chicks we will be raising this year… With that, we are gauging interest in what we should be offering you all… Anyone looking to add chickens to their life, but don’t want to raise them through the chick age? Want a steady supply of eggs? Looking for chicken to stock in your freezer? Let us know how we can help your family!

We thank you all for your continued support of our plant-y mission! Making plants accessible to all who want to learn.

We look forward to seeing you at the shop sale this weekend! It’s starting to empty out in the store… come gather-up what ever items you’ve had your eyes on.

Until next time,

~Adriane

Posted on December 1, 2020 by Adriane — 2 Comments

Gardening… In December! But it’s fricken FREEZING!!

We are definitely still gardening, well, kinda. 🙂 Currently, it’s more quick dashes outside to pull some greens for the animals and to harvest veggies and herbs that we need for our meal rather than planting anything new in the ground. Outside right now, you will find we have lettuce, parsley, kale, chard (barely holding on), carrots, arugula (like crazy), broccoli, and beets (almost gone) that are gracing us with their presence. Back on Halloween, we made 4 new 32 sq ft. garden beds in the yard- there are now 14 garden beds, plans to add 4 more in 2021, and a foolish idea to add cow panels along the entire front of the yard to grow peas which turns into a redesign of how the beds are utilized into the future. December is the time to plan for next season- what are the dream plants to eat next year vs. the reality of what we have space, time, and the climate to grow.

Brett and I have planted our garlic crop for next year and it is already growing! We are both worried that we didn’t plant enough…there is always next year to grow more, but we don’t want to wait that long. We planted a winter-hardy cover crop to keep the beds that are not in production busy over the fall/winter months; planting a cover crop helps with keeping the beds “actively photosynthesizing” and soil being worked by the roots for next seasons use. The beds that we have nothing in now look so sad sitting out there empty… makes us look forward to seeing the ground covered in snow!

Our indoor seedling nursery is FINALLY coming together in a corner of the workshop. I am looking forward to the year that we no longer buy any of our veggies from the store… it’s getting closer.

Topic to Consider: Compost Your Leaves

Do you usually compost your fall leaves or gardening waste? If not, this year is the time to start. You can make a compost pile in almost any space, large or small. All of the leaves in the yard/street/everywhere imaginable are wonderful, not only for jumping in 😉 but also for providing wonderfully nutrient-dense compost for your garden next year. Additionally, you can add your table scraps and any other green waste from your home to recycle the plant matter and provide nutrients to your future gardens.

The Animals

Our three smallest hens are getting used to being outdoors with the rest of the flock and are living full-time in the coop with their sister fri-hens. Now all 9 are running around and having a good time eating bugs and grass and whatever else they find to devour. I think that only 2 or 3 of the hens are actually laying eggs, given it is winter, egg production is known to slow-down so I am not getting too worried about it yet…but, once mid-spring rolls around if they aren’t all laying, then I’ll be charging rent.

Butte absolutely LOVES being outside right now- her fur coat was made for this life- her white coat, however, was not. *Ya Filthy Animal* haha. She has an entire greenhouse covered area as well as an outdoor exposed space to frolic about that we move every couple weeks… shes loving all the scraps from our veggies with the occasional grain mixed treats and shares how much she loves us by digging holes in the yard for us to trip in. The chickens just think the spaces we’ve filled-in are dust bathing holes, so, I guess, depending on how you look at this, it’s just one big happy farm family… 😐

Suburban Succulents Happenings

The inside of Suburban Succulents is almost finished with the conversion from garage to plant shop! ALMOST! Brett and I are installing the new lights soon- by the end of this month is the goal. The houseplants that are growing in the shop are doing very well but will do even better once there is more energy-efficient lighting for them to thrive under.

We’ve finished the touch-up painting and accent wall, mounted the pipe shelving, hung our Diane Madaras calendar art, and now the space really looks like a real shop. Next, we mount the room dividing curtains, which will provide a better aesthetic to the shop that is conveniently shared with the laundry room, and then we replace the backdoor… an infinite work in progress it seems…but there IS progress.

All of the Succulents & Cactus and Orchids are happily growing in the greenhouse- they made it through the first early freeze at the end of October using only 4 sheets precariously hanging from the walls of the greenhouse to protect the babies. I’ll be insulating the bottom of the house with bags filled with leaves (yes, we are the “crazy” people who ask their neighbors for their leaves) and from there we are gonna see what mother nature has in store for us. I’m sure there will be an update of some additional attempts made at freeze-proofing the greenhouse. We’ve mentioned bubble-wrap and it’s not ruled out by any account. 😉

A quick thank you to all of those who continue to support us on this journey of owning and operating our small-scale nursery and eventual farm. We can’t wait for the changes and growth that 2021 promises and being able to share it with all of you. Happy holidays, take care and be safe, Everyone!

~Adriane

Posted on October 20, 2020December 3, 2020 by Adriane — 1 Comment

Are you ready to fall back?

And just like that, we are a month into Fall 2020. I was just informed that we are expecting our first below-freezing night next week. AH! Time to stop watering and start to monitor closely those tender succulents and cactus, Folks! It’s been a while since the last post, so read on to find out where Suburban Succulents is now.

Slowly filling the new greenhouse

October 2020 is going to mark an important milestone for Suburban Succulents in the coming years- It’s the month I took a giant leap; put my notice in at my full-time, stable-income job to focus my efforts fully on Suburban Succulents. It has been many hours of work to prepare mentally and physically to get our shop space ready to invite customers into- and we are almost there! We even have regular open hours on the weekends.

Now that I have gained 50 hours in my week, I’ve been able to get to more on my Trello to-do lists done… the lists are actually getting checked off instead of only adding to! Currently, the plants are flourishing and our collection is growing like crazy. We are working with several local artists to offer unique gifts as well! I’ll post their information on a vendor page on our website soon. My concept of running a plant & gift shop is coming to life and it feels like the perfect time.

Cactus seeds have been started in the workshop, succulents have been propagated in the nursery, houseplant starts are growing too, plans are being made to keep the greenhouse warm this winter, the chickens are now laying eggs, and the ground of the trash piles that we inherited at the house is in sight- almost 10 months later, we have made tremendous progress!!

With winter hanging its cold head over us- we are getting serious about our winterizing plans for this year. Every other year we’ve lived in WA State we have suffered a loss of some inventory due to freezing. I am trying everything (bar bringing every single plant inside) to keep all succulents & cactus alive this year. I have read about using bubble wrap- I think I have enough in storage to wrap the entire greenhouse- if it comes to it, so be it!! 🙂 We have completed our last watering and will only spot water the hardy cacti and succulents from now until Spring.

Adriane feeding some of the chickens an ear of corn we grew!

I am absolutely loving the chickens. In my opinion, they are the best “back-yard pet” ever. They provide us amazing eggs and they are cute as all get out- if we had less space though, I am sure I’d feel differently- dodging all the shit piles is a challenge but certainly keeps life interesting!

We are raising another three chicks that will be added to the rest of the flock in another 2 months or so- currently, they are living in the workshop under their heat lamp and seem overly excited to get out of there. It’s too soon, ladies!! 😉 I take them outside occasionally to see their sister-hens from a distance. I think it is important to introduce new animals to the rest of the family as soon as possible- we don’t need any problems when the time comes to integrate the different age groups.

The front yard garden is still producing fall crops- small bits of broccoli, carrots, and radish with overwhelming amounts of kale and chard. Fava beans are coming in and our cover crops are taking over. We’ve planted 3 different kinds of garlic for next year. Amazingly to me, the wildflower bed is still flowering- my diligent deadheading has indeed helped. Brett and I are even working on an extensive seed catalog for next year to bring to you all!

Fall garden bed

That’s all for now from our garden- even though there is so much more to share! Comment below any questions or maybe ideas of ways to keep the greenhouse warm, or anything else you’d like. Happy Fall and hope to see you in the shop soon!

Posted on April 20, 2020December 29, 2020 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Times have changed.

Hello to you all! It has been a hot minute since our last post- yes, over a year. But, here we are, with exciting news.

We have a permanent space for Suburban Succulents! Our new home in Vancouver, WA boasts a lovely converted garage that will be the store front. We have planned an outdoor area for growing as well as for plant displays and social gatherings. We can’t wait to open this space to the community- we have gathered a wealth of knowledge of many types of plants and look forward to being the local source of all things plants!

We are aiming to open at the end of May when hopefully life as we knew it can resume in a safe fashion.

Currently, Suburban Succulents just got the last of its drywall up and is ready for the first fresh coat of paint in what we assume is 35 years. Upon purchasing our home, we knew that we had a lot of work in front of us- the previous owners were hoarders, lived here for 35 years and left most of their trashed items behind for us to dispose of. With that, we still have copious amounts of trash piled on the side of the house waiting to go to the dump (they have advised us not to go to the dump in Vancouver unless absolutely necessary) and yes, it is necessary to get the old shower off my front yard but not so necessary to risk the health of myself, family and others. So for now, it sits. I should mention we have already taken 7 truck beds full of trash since February. Lately, I have been dreaming of how I can incorporate these leftover items into my plant displays— Brett has had to bring me back to earth a few times. 🙂

Until we see you in person or over the ether- be well!
~Adriane & Brett

Posted on March 27, 2019December 29, 2020 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Upcoming Workshops in Camas

Wow, we are overjoyed with the support we have received from the community! We have three upcoming workshops in the month of April and possibly more on the way.

The first is with the Vancouver Housing Authority- so these tickets will not be available to the public.

Secondly, we will be at The Lacamas Lake Lodge 4/22 at 6pm for a family-friendly, build your own succulent terrarium class. Tickets are available for $30 on our website. This workshop is brought to you in collaboration with Camas Parks & Recreation. https://www.suburbansucculents.com/product/succulent-workshop-lacamas-lake-lodge-4-22/

Lastly, Artful Attic is hosting us at their shop in Camas on 4/27 at 6:30. Tickets are $50 and will include drinks! Here is the link to purchase tickets https://www.meetup.com/Camas-Art-Meetup/events/259700636/

We look forward to seeing you at one of these events!

If you are interested in or have a place in mind to host a succulent event, please let us know! We still have availability in April & May and will work with you to offer the event you desire.

Hope you all are enjoying Spring thus far. The growing season has definitely begun!

Posted on March 20, 2019October 20, 2020 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Spring is Here!

It’s the first day of Spring and tonight you will see the last super moon of 2019 to boot! What are you doing to celebrate?

Our month-long absence has not been in vain- we have been working hard to prepare the succulents for their Spring move back to the greenhouse and outdoors. It is almost that time again to move them outside.

We have BIG plans for the outside this year. We are going to open the yard to customers! We do not have an exact opening date yet, but you will be the first to know… Planning for mid to late April.

Along with that, we are being contacted to host a myriad of workshops around Vancouver & Camas! Come join us at our next one at Artful Attic on April 27. We have tickets available on our home page. Stay tuned for the next dates, to be announced.

If you are interested in having Suburban Succulents join your group for a class to create your own Succulent piece, contact us today. We have many options available for beautiful projects we can guide you in making.

Since Adriane started a full-time job that requires her to work on Friday’s- we have taken a short break from Night Market Vancouver. Her schedule changes to allow an earlier work end time on Friday’s in a couple of months, we will be back as soon as we can!

With that, we have applied for the Salmon Creek Farmer’s Market- taking place on Tuesday’s. We are patiently awaiting the response of if we are in or not.

And finally, the last piece of news for you all, we have taken on our first commercial plant maintenance client- Come check out our plants- a collection of Succulents & Houseplants- at River Maiden Coffee Shop- located off E. Mill Plain Blvd. The shop has partnered with FVHS to have students create & build plant shelving in the windows as well as a hanging fixture in the center of the building. It is going to be our pleasure to supply the plants and maintain them each week! We are over the moon excited for this opportunity.

If you have been thinking of sprucing up your office, store, or home- contact us for all of your succulent or houseplant desires. We have access to any plant options you are interested in and have over 10 years of plant-care experience.

Stay tuned for our next blog post where we will start to share pictures of the succulents as well as what we are up to in the garden.

Until then, Happy Spring! Time to get outside and planting those beautiful gardens. 🙂

Posted on February 7, 2019February 7, 2019 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Light it Up, up, up!

I’m on FIRE!! Is anyone familiar with that song by Fallout Boy? It’s an oldie but somehow stuck in my head when I started this blog post. 🙂

Well, we have not actually set anything on fire, but it is definitely lit up in the garage. The plants are growing substantially. It is amazing with adding 6 LED’s can do to help the plants grow.

Now, with all the lights set up, we can focus on HEAVILY expanding our propagation stations. I can’t imagine what the nursery is going to be looking like this spring. I hope to have succulents popping out of our ears– the plan to expand into Cactus and Air Plants are underway, and our Orchid/Tenufolia/Dendrobium collection is still surviving and thriving (although these are all living in the upstairs office enjoying the warmth of the house). Next week I will get some posts up showing all of the sprouting Cactus which we started from seed only last week. We are using a heat mat and it is producing incredible results.

2/1 Night Market Set-up
Succies are doing Great!
LED light set-up

Above are only a couple of shots we have captured of our new set-up in the garage of the LED lights and of the last night market we attended on 2/1. At this point, I have fallen behind on getting this blog posted, so I’m just trying to get something out to you all!

As always, let us know if you hav questions or comments about what we are up to. We love to keep in touch and teach as much as we can about succulents!

Love to you all! Thank you for the continued support.

Posted on January 18, 2019January 18, 2019 by Adriane — Leave a comment

The Great Organization of 2019

As promised, more so to myself than any particular person, here is an update on our growing situation in the garage and house for this 3rd week of 2019.

We have officially moved 95% of our succulents inside the house due to cold weather conditions. About 75% of these reside in the garage and the rest on our windowsills scattered throughout the house. I can’t wait for spring to get all the plants back outside and growing under less stressful conditions. I find I am spending more time cleaning up after dropped leaves than I ever have before. Has anyone else noticed that their succulents stretch and drop a bunch more leaves when living inside the house?

Slowly but surely, I am organizing all the propagated succulents in trays in the garage, see the pictures below. This attempt to keep all varieties near each other will make it a bit easier to organize later on when the plants are larger. Beyond that, we are planting out new leaves to grow more baby plants, and potting up teenaged succulents into 2″ pots (these will be our succulents to use in the spring & summer). Although we probably have close to 1000 succulents, the number of succulents we have still will not last us very long with our spring/summer markets coming up. We are preparing for this by acquiring more succulents and ramping up the amount of light & fertilizer we are giving.

The succulents that are outside are VERY hardy mother plants; some crassulas types, leather petals, and a few extra-hardy echeverias. We are keeping our eyes on these succulents though as we are facing another cold snap and don’t want to lose these mother plants. How sad that would be!?!

Brett ordered more lights for use in the garage. They are red/blue LEDs that, according to his research, should promote root growth. Our plan is that once spring hits and we temper the succulents to be outside again, the natural exposure to sunlight will make the body of the succulents grow extremely well, especially since we will have focused these past few months on root growth. I’ll keep you posted on this as it progresses.

Beyond organizing and cleaning up the succulents in the garage, we are prepping succulent products for the Night Market coming up on 2/1. Sweater weather pots and red rocks will be used to make the living succulent pots more festive. The 3D printer is employed full time now, it’s busy printing new pots and key chains. I can’t wait for their debut!

We are looking forward to being at the Vancouver Night Market again, this time at the new location, Warehouse 23. Stop by and say hello on 2/1 from 5-10pm.

Thank you to everyone who continues to follow along with our journey. Let us know if you have any comments or questions, we are here to help any way we can. Have a great day!

Basically Empty Now!
TIP: Use Foil on the Sills to reflect more light to the plants
Red & Blue LED lighting
New Editions to the Collection
3D printed pentagon pots!
The Set Up– IT IS SO CROWDED

Posted on January 10, 2019January 10, 2019 by Adriane — Leave a comment

Product Updates for 2019

With the new year rang in, we are rolling out new merchandise! We hear you that keeping succulents alive is tough work (see our previous blog posts for examples of our struggles, they are very real) so in response, we are adding non-living merchandise crafted and sourced by yours truly. We will continue to grow and sell small-batch succulents, of course, but our original business model cannot thrive on selling plants alone, especially in this climate and with the limited space we have available.

So with that, we are introducing the following products! Please let us know what you think in the comments. 🙂

Cards – Adriane is really into puns. She has created greeting cards to include with purchases, or to be purchased on their own. We are working on the printing logistics and ink-friendly options. 🙂
Stickers – We are in the process of designing stickers for branding purposes on our projects and other designs for sale – waffling between bumper stickers and transfer stickers (for windows and other smooth surfaces). Any succ-scribers have an idea for a succulent sticker? Let us know in the comments.
3D printer ideas – Keychains, Earrings, Rings, Stencils, Galore! Brett has set-up the 3D printer and we are finding that what it can make is going to send us to another level of success. We are at the very beginning phases of this, but be on the lookout.
Paper Projects – At the Vancouver Library, we stumbled across a book about making 3D paper plants. Naturally, we had most of the supplies needed to do the craft, so here we are. So far created is a Christmas Cactus. Y’know, it is rather tough to get an Exacto knife to cut exactly how you want it to. Stay tuned to Instagram to see how these turn out.

Aloe You Card
Pricked You Card
Paper Christmas Cactus & 3D printed pink plant pot

We will continue to be at Night Market Vancouver into 2019. With the generous support of our patrons, we can afford the $60 entry fee. Thank you to those of you supporting us!

We have a few new venues in sight for 2019:

Vancouver Farmers Market- hope to be at the weekly Salmon Creek Market starting in May ’19- application in progress.
Wine Fest in May– more details to come as we get them. Going to be a busy May if all things work as planned.
We are preapproved to vend at the Craft Beer & Wine Fest in Vancouver, WA this June. With at least 2500 people expected in attendance, this means BIG things for Suburban Succulents brand exposure. We will keep you updated on this project!

Catch us *monthly* at Night Market!
We will be here June ’19, will you?

Lots of excitment brewing in the world of Suburban Succulents. We will post again in the next couple days to update y’all on the status of the succulents growing in the garage and around the house. *Teaser- more lights are on the way*

As always, let us know what you think! Have a great rest of your day.

Posted on December 30, 2018December 30, 2018 by Adriane — Leave a comment

The Indoor Re-Potting Continues

This process is moving slowly and relatively purposefully– We are in no particular rush to disturb the succulents cause we have no intended purpose with them currently. (Announcement on Patreon Jan 1)

Around Christmas, we were graced with slightly warmer temperatures. I spent a couple afternoons working in the garage replanting succulents and setting up a better grow space. All you need is a light sweater out there with all the lights on. 😉

Long shot of part of the succulent table. This is what was repotted and cleaned up from the greenhouse.
a snapshot of the succulents in the garage on a table
This is our red/blue grow light.
Crassula tetragona growing under LED lights
Grow tray of propagated succulents under LED lights
More succulent displays planted out in the garage. Looking to be moved to their next home to grow on
Here are some echeverias potted up into their new home to hopefully grow into the summer.
The Grapto’s are finally in their own pot! Long live!

The exploration is on for a “best” set-up our space for growing plants in the garage– we have tables to move around and a couple of grow lights that we have yet to plug-in (we still need bulbs). This will increase the grow space significantly for the plants and maybe help knock them out of their winter rest period. We are preparing to pot-up succulents into 2″ pots for spring/summer sales but need to acquire more pots. The struggle is real!

Oh yes, we are still growing succulents in the greenhouse in our backyard. Varieties like Crassula, Sedums, Sempervivum, LARGE echeverias, and elephant bush are thriving and do not seem to be bothered by the cooler temperatures and rain. For now, we plan to leave these outside. The experiment continues… we’ll keep you posted.

That brings us to the inside… Inside the house, or at least downstairs has exploded with succulent arrangements and potted displays. I am starting to understand how the indoor houseplant clubs are such a popular concept in areas with cold weather conditions. Not needing to put on a coat to go outside to hang out with the succulents, what a treat! I must admit, our upstairs space has always been busting with my personal non-succulent house plants- so now, basically every room you enter our house, you can count on a breath of fresh cleaned air. 🙂 I love it!

So many succulents, so few places to store them all!
the succulents have taken over the windowsills
the succulents are happy inside the house!

With that, we hope you’ve enjoyed the photos & content we’ve posted. Let us know in the comments what suggestions you have for us to best utilize our space- inside or out! We love feedback.

If you are interested in learning more about our business goals and supporting these goals in the coming year, check us out on Patreon.

Want to stay social with us? Check out our Instagram or Facebook pages.

Wishing everyone a safe New Year and hope for prosperity to come your way in 2019.