Tucked behind the leaves of houseplants at Sleeper Coffee in Astoria, you’ll see signs that read “No need to water — I am taken care of,” accompanied by the Earth in Hand logo.

They’re a way for Kristin Ehrhardt, a plant specialist, to deter overwatering until she makes her next visit to Sleeper, part of the wraparound plant care service she provides for local businesses. After a consultation, she tended to and revived the waterfront coffee shop’s plants.

“I slowly chipped away on all the things that needed work, and now I’m in the mode where I come in and water plants every week,” she said.

Last spring, Ehrhardt opened Earth in Hand, an indoor plant nursery in Seaside. Now, what started as a brick-and-mortar shop has grown into a mobile clinic. “I’m always looking for businesses to work with,” she said.

Instead of asking people to bring their houseplants to her, Ehrhardt drives around Clatsop County, going into homes and commercial spaces for routine maintenance, design assistance and troubleshooting. She takes house calls for repotting and plant sitting.

“Somebody had me come in and repot their great-grandmother’s Christmas cactus,” she recalled. “It was about a 100-year-old cactus.”

Her design consultations tend to look at light and space to determine where different plants will thrive indoors. “Going to the people is what seemed to make the most sense,” she said.

Ehrhardt has also been a vendor at the Astoria Sunday Market and other pop-ups, setting up a stand with a small selection of houseplants. She has joined a few recent holiday events and, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Feb. 1, will take part in a Mini Makers Market at Sleeper.

With a self-taught green thumb, Ehrhardt said she has learned how to give plants their best life over the years through trial and error. “I started simply learning how to regenerate a little avocado seed to grow into a little tree,” she said.

Her journey into houseplants started slowly, with a few here and there. That ramped up with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, she said. At some point, she found herself with so many plants around that she started trimming them to keep up.

“It was a very organic process,” she said. “I never really thought anything of it, and then it just became an obsession, and I was propagating everything I could.”

Propagation — the process of growing new sprouts from a parent plant’s trimming — is another one of Ehrhardt’s specialties. It’s a tool that lets people grow new plants from existing ones.

“I would buy a bunch of different plants and have them in my home and practice with different methods,” she said. “That included taking the same plant and propagating it three different ways to see what would work best.”

She feels she’s gotten a knack for it, so much so that she teaches small workshops on propagation up and down the Oregon Coast.

Ehrhardt has a big future planned for her small but growing plant business. She hopes to expand Earth in Hand’s online offerings, including local plant deliveries, classes about soil and possibly a workshop on terrarium building.

She hopes to expand by listening to people, offering the sorts of activities they’re most interested in to better get to know the world of plants.

Earth in Hand

Indoor plant nursery offering workshops and mobile plant care, 1803 Roosevelt Drive, Seaside.

@earthinhandpnw

www.earthinhandpnw.com