I need very specific help.

If anyone out there has grown a Maple tree (I believe it’s a Norway maple) indoors, starting with the helicopter seed pod thingies, please email me at triciamcmillian42@yahoo.com

Here’s what I know about growing plants:

Nothing.

I am not a gardener.

A) I have a lot of allergies, both skin irritation and the sneezy coughy itchy eye types of allergies. 

B) I like communing with nature. I enjoy trees, flowers, the occasional topiary…but I’m more of an observer/enjoyer than a pruner/gardener.

My vision of a perfect garden is one where nature has taken its own course. I appreciate a well-designed, cultivated garden, I appreciate the work and planning…but I like nature for the nature’s sake.

So houseplants have never really been my thing.

And then my mother put my parent’s house on the market.

And the Maple tree that held my tree swing and tree house…is going to be sold with the house.

And the Maple tree I climbed and hid in because I was sad my gran died and I couldn’t handle all the funeral planning going on in the house…is going to be sold with the house.

It’s the same tree where, a few years later, the neighbor’s dog chased a matted, shaking kitten up to the highest branches and my dad coaxed it far enough down to scoop him into an apple basket taped to a rake, and we nursed the kitten to health and became a family pet…is going to be sold with the house.

And the Maple tree rescued when it was a three inch sprout and begged my dad not to mow over and then survived one of the worst Winters in Michigan history as a five inch sprout and went on to become an enormous tree…is going to be sold with the house.

And suddenly I care about gardening.

I have a bunch of the helicopter seed pod thingies. If I plant them in a pot will they sprout? (I think they will, that’s the whole premise behind greenhouses, right?)

Do I plant the helicopter seed pod thingies when they’re green, or should I dry them and plant the brown dried pods?

Is regular old potting soil I can buy at Walgreens sufficient?

Should I use a small, cozy-sized pot or start it in a large pot so it has room to grow and won’t have to be transplanted?

And then what? Will the sprouts die? If they don’t die, will they go through seasonal changes as if they were outdoors? Will the tree grow to a certain size and then die?

What about light? I can provide East, South or Western light.

Watering? Water every day?

Plant food?

I know I’m foolish for trying this, and that’s advice I need, too. If the best advice is: “Don’t do it,” I appreciate that help.