The Fall and Holiday Seasons are the best time to think about gardening indoors. The choices are plentiful and the lighting indoors is bright but not too hot — perfect for developing window ledge or sill gardens accented by topiaries or standing indoor trees.

Pick a spot in your living room, dining area, family room or kitchen opposite a source of good lighting or against a window. Arrange a plant stand, shelf, sofa table, or cubicles to form a "stage" for your garden.

Next choose plants such as spathiphyllums, crotons, anthuriums, variegated ficuses, African masks, or colorful dracaenas as the "stars" or taller features on your "stage."

Then choose your supporting cast of plants — cascaders such as ivy, grape ivy, pothos, bridal veil, creeping charlie, spider plants or wandering jew.

Colorful additions include African violets, gloxinias, indoor azaleas (topiaries in 6" pots), Christmas cactus, amaryllis, paperwhite narcissus, mums, coleus, rex begonias, kalenchoes. Consider cyclamen and poinsettias at Christmas.

Arrange the plants in colorful groupings (mixing leaf texture and colors). Use your imagination in choosing containers — glazed pots to match your room color or bird nest baskets to match a rustic country decor or stainless steel for an architectural look. Metal trellises, shepherd's hooks, and ornamental plant stakes work well in larger standing plants.

Use a well-draining potting soil such as Kellogg Potting Soil. Fertilize monthly with a liquid fertilizer and water weekly. If you are not one to feed regularly, try the 1 year Nutri-Pak fertilizer that fertilizes when you forget to. Make sure no plant is standing in water; drain well.

Trim and deadhead plants to promote fresh growth. Use organic insecticides, or a systemic such as the Bayer Systemic Rose and Flower, to control pests.

With a little imagination, creativity, and care, your indoor garden can be just as impressive as your outdoor garden.

Use English pea stakes (originally used to support peas) to prevent flowers from being damaged by rough weather.

Cut 2- to 4-foot tall branches with many twigs from shrubs such as Victorian box (pittosporum undulatum). Ideally the branches are straight and strong and the twigs spread out like the ribs of an upside-down umbrella. Remove the leaves.

Shove the bottoms of the sticks into the ground all over flower beds after planting.

Annual and perennial flowers will grow up through the branches, lean on the twigs, and not get knocked down by winter weather. By the time the beds are full-grown the twigs should be largely hidden by foliage and flowers.