Learning from the bottom

For some reason, Ive always had this inability to keep plants alive. I swear, I buy a plant, take it home, and once it passes through my door.. it wilts.  Ive joked with friends and family that I can take good care of my son, nurse him back to health when he's sick, keep him fed and well-nourished... but I just cannot seem to keep a plant alive... so... I have decided to challenge myself and have been trying to grow a "green thumb".. (consequently, my sister made a joke about this and said; "I dont think you can "grow a green thumb", I think you're born with it". She joked because she's witnessed first-hand the wilted, dried up plants that Ive thrown into my garbage can...) so now Im challenging her and myself. :-)


Over the summer, I bought a pretty nice looking plant.. this was 3 months ago. Surprisingly, it's STILL alive! (mind you, I left town for about 8 weeks, and left it to my sister and her boyfriend... so i dont know if I should be taking any credit yet for it being alive 3 months later..)


Since then, Ive purchased a couple of smaller plants that are sitting on my windowsill. So far, it looks promising. They've managed to live through 1 whole week in my apartment! but I felt that this wasnt challenging enough, so I decided that if I really want to challenge myself, Im going to go for something big, and something that requires real care.. so I went and bought myself a 4 foot lemon geranium plant. After reading an article in the site Ehow, I realized that these plants are apparently pretty touchy with how often they're meant to be watered and require quite abit of sun (something we dont get much of up here). The website says; "Lemon geranium is particular about water, as the plant rots in soggy soil and doesn't thrive in overly dry soil. Watering in-ground or potted lemon geranium is similar, as the plant needs generous watering, but only when the top of the potting mix or garden soil feels dry. Water at the base of the plant to keep the foliage dry and prevent fungal problems. Water in-ground plants thoroughly to wet the root zone. Water potted lemon geranium until water drips through the drainage hole, then allow the potting mixture to drain. Feed lemon geranium a balanced liquid or granular fertilizer regularly. Apply fertilizer according to the directions on the package". So far, it's not looking so good... the leaves have been turning yellow, and I have yet to figure out a type of fertilizer, where to buy it from, how often I should be feeding it... It may just be a plant, but Im thinking I may have my work cut out for me. I realized that I dont even know the basics to recognizing when a plant starts to look dry, and knowing my history with killing plants, Im pretty sure (or I hope) that Ive either been under-watering my plants, or over-watering my plants, so I decided to check out a video. It looks pretty straight-forward, but again, with my luck.. you never know... Here is the video to what should be so simple to recognize..

                                                     

This is what my lemon geranium
plant looks like..



        

This is what a healthy lemon geranium
plant should look like...

 Unfortunately, a few leaves have already wilted and fallen off. I dont know if this is what normally should happen (I highly doubt so), but Im debating looking for one of those plant light thingys (I have yet to learn the proper terms for plants and plant supplies) Im starting from the bottom here. Ive attached a picture of my lemon geranium plant so that you'll be able to watch the outcome of this plants fate over the next 3 weeks. 

Wish me luck, Im sure my plants will need it.