From a hard fall frost that turns the vegetable garden lifeless and mushy until it’s time to plant peas and early potatoes in spring, my primary puttering with plants centers on houseplants.

As a child, I rated my mother as a queen of houseplants. She nurtured pots of greenery growing in containers on a corner of our oak kitchen table. Most starts came from friends — African violets with their fuzzy leaves, ivies, dieffenbachia, snake plant with mottled leaves, Christmas cactus and ferns. Initially, the plant collection remained manageable.

In time, the folks bought a home and the plant collection grew. A tropical Norfolk Island pine tree that started out as a 3-inch sprout grew so tall it reached from the living room floor to the ceiling — and finally was donated to a library with an open-beamed ceiling. Mom’s plants at home lined window sills and thrived on doily-topped end tables

We visited homes where plant devotees grew vining, large-leafed specimens that wrapped around kitchen windows and cupboards. The macrame craze hit, which expanded the hanging plant collections to the point where carnivorous plants hanging down towards the kitchen table seemed a threat to one’s steak dinner.

Fortunately, our family was spared the extremes. Dad purchased a secondhand greenhouse and installed it in the back yard. Inside the 12-by-12-foot structure, Dad added benches. Initially, Mom moved in overgrown houseplants and laid out flats of potting soil to start flower and vegetable seeds.

The next era of plants — orchids. With these, Dad added grow lights and a misting system. Mom enjoyed the experience of growing the plants — she purchased orchid seedlings fresh from test tubes from orchid growers and babied them along for a few years before they bloomed.

Along with spring pansies and primroses, grocery stores and plant nurseries started to carry phalaenopsis orchids, known as “butterfly” orchids — one of the easier orchids to grow at home.

In time, Mom’s greenhouse bulged with orchid blooms: paphiopedilums, also called lady’s slipper orchid; dendrobiums with bright yellow-and-red blooms; and the flamboyant velvety blooms of cattleyas. The greenhouse orchids gave off a soft fragrance of vanilla and old-fashioned roses.

Years later, the task of repotting and caring for the plants became a challenge for my parents. They donated the orchid collection to a community college greenhouse.

While visiting the folks one week, I spotted Mom as she spooned out a seed from an orange, planted the seed in a small pot, watered it, and placed it on a window sill.

“When I was young,” Mom said, “and couldn’t afford plants, I’d take any seed I’d find in the food, like orange or apple, and watch them grow.” She wasn’t aiming for fruit — just the joy of nurturing some greenery.

While cleaning at home one day, I discovered a turnip in the vegetable crisper which had started to sprout. Inspired by Mom’s story, I cut the top third off the turnip and stuck it in water in a shallow dish. The turnip leafed out and sent up two tall flower stalks. Blossoms the size of pinheads opened to a display of pollen grains. It seemed the heroic turnip tried to keep her ancestral line going.

I took a wisp of a cotton ball to try to pollinate the plant. If another turnip’s pollen was needed, I was out of luck. I scraped off the turnip flesh that turned dark and changed the water frequently. No seeds formed. In time, my favorite turnip died.

Is it still too early to get outside and plant peas and potatoes?