Many years ago, (30-45) my grandmother raised some rather large African
Violets. their favorite spots happened to be an EAST facing window ( in
her sitting/ironing room), with was shared by some impressive blooming
orchids and christmas cacti, and the WEST facing kitchen window. The
kitchen window was over the sink , which contributed greatly to the
moist atmosphere that the AV's like. Remember back then, people spent
alot of time preparing 3 meals a day from scratch. TV dinners were
considered a lazy womans way of feeding her family, and microwaves were
only being developed, and not for heating food.

When she wanted to start a new plant, all she did was cut a healthy leaf
off the plant (WITH A SHARP KNIFE, She stressed this for so never
explained reason) and poked a hole in the soil (sand and composted
garden soil) with a pencil and stuck the leaf in,(till the base of the
leaf contacted the soil) and very lightly packed the soil down around it.

Moisture in the air, and moist well-drained soil were her biggest factors.

= Chagoi =

Linda W. wrote:
Snip

I don't have a lot of windows -- and the ones I have are either mostly
east or mostly west. I have my two adult African violets in a mostly
west window at present, and they seem to be doing okay. In fact, they
are flowering right now. The window does have a tree in front of it,
so while sun does come in, I think it is at least somewhat filtered by
the tree.

Do you think it's okay to keep the plants in that window? The
windowsill in the kitchen with the mostly eastern exposure is in the
kitchen, and it is not as "easy" a place to have the adult African
violets because it also holds other things.

I had put the rooting leaf in that window that faces mostly east. It
gets early-morning sun. Would this be okay? Would early-morning sun
be all right for the rooting leaf?

Many thanks again for any information/advice! And I do appreciate the
kindness of those who are helping me with this. :-)

Linda W.