Don’t throw out those holiday potted plants when celebrations are over! You can grow them on to add cheer to your home and garden for years to come.

So many people just chuck out lovely potted plants after the holidays. These same plants can continue to decorate indoors for weeks or even months – or they can add beauty to the garden after the festivities are over. You can even grow them on in containers to spruce up patios and balconies. Here are some tips on caring for those indoor decorative plants.

Poinsettia: If you want to grow your Poinsettia on in a pot after it has finished its holiday bloom, give it a rest for the rest of the winter months by watering less. Continue to give it good light. You can also cut the plant back to shorter stems. Once the Poinsettia sprouts back into active growth in the spring, give it as much light as you can, a mild feeding and start watering it regularly. Do not over-water. The Poinsettia will not fare well as an outdoor plant where temperatures fall below freezing. But you can keep it as an indoor plant to bloom again so long as you encourage it to bloom by playing with its exposure to hours of light and darkness.

Come late summer or early autumn you will want to make the plant think the days are shorter than they really are to initiate flowering early – in time for the holidays. Naturally, these plants will bloom in spring and summer. It is the longer hours of dark that encourages them to set their colorful bracts and bloom. So at the end of August or the beginning of September you can fool them into thinking it is late winter by giving them long nights with no light. The easiest way to do this is to put the plant into a dark closet so it gets a around 14 hours of dark each evening. Bracts should start coloring up nicely by November so your Poinsettia should look perfect for the holidays again next year.

In warm climates, Poinsettias are enthusiastic shrubs for the outdoor garden that like full sun and ample water. Prune them to keep them from growing tall and leggy. They can easily reach five feet tall or more.

Paperwhites: These popular bulbs are easy to move back into the garden. Just wait until they are finished blooming, cut back on watering a little, and allow the foliage to turn yellow and die back. Once the foliage dries out, you can knock out the soil and rescue all the bulbs. Plant them in a sunny part of your garden and let them come up on their own. Chances are they will skip blooming next year since they were forced into an unnatural flowering schedule for the holidays. But they will soon reset their internal clocks and add their white, clustered blossoms to the beauty of your landscape. They are not just holiday potted plants.

Amaryllis: This is another favorite holiday potted plant that can be decorative year round. Most Amaryllis grow leaves first and then flower. The trick is to get the best green growth as possible so when the leaves die back they pour lots of energy back into the bulb for impressive blooming. Potted plants benefit from feeding. I always recommend diluting plant to half the strength suggested on the label of your food. This way you can avoid accidentally over-feeding and burning the roots, and if you prefer you can safely feed a little more often.

The other helpful aspect of successfully growing an Amaryllis is to make sure your plant gets a rest period. This usually takes place after blooming, but in some Amaryllis varieties there is a rest between the die back of the green leaves and the bloom period. When your plant seems to be fading away, water the bulb less frequently. Bulbs can even be stored dry in a cool, dark location during the winter. Most varieties sold for home growth tend to go dormant or partially dormant during the winter. Dormancy is NOT essential for the Amaryllis. But most plants seem to do better with at least a semi-dormant period for 8 to 10 weeks in cooler temperatures (below 60′F but over 45′F). You can also force dormancy by withholding water, dimming light and cooling temperatures. A forced dormancy is useful to get plants to bloom on schedules that are different than the plant’s normal timing (usually in the spring or summer), such as forcing winter blooms for the holiday season. A forced dormancy can sometimes revitalize languishing plants that refuse to bloom, especially if they are given plenty of light and are gently fed when they come back into renewed growth.

The Amaryllis prefers a smaller container so try not to give it a pot larger than twice the diameter of the bulb. Also, never bury the bulb. This is one plant that needs to have at least two thirds of the bulb above ground level. Unless you have a very warm, protected spot outdoors, most varieties of Amaryllis do not  grow successfully in the garden.

Cyclamen:The Cyclamen is showy and decorative most of the year, but it’s a good idea to let your plant die back for a few months allowing the tuber (a type of bulb) to rest before it bursts back colorfully into life. If you do let the tuber drop leaves and go into dormancy, give it less light and water sparingly. The plant will not look particularly pretty during this period so you might want to move it to a location where it won’t attract a lot of attention. As autumn comes and temperatures cool, introduce increased light and water until the first sprouts of green appear. Feed lightly to bring them into active growth. When in growth, keep your plant in a bright window and give it cool temperatures. The Cyclamen prefers temperatures between 40′ and 70′F. Hot homes will cause leaves to yellow and push the plant into dormancy. Allow the soil to dry just on the surface before watering again. Make sure most of the tuberous base is ABOVE the soil. If any of your flowers set seed, clip them off so they don’t drain the plant’s energy.

So long as your soil doesn’t freeze, you can grow your Cyclamen outside in the garden after the holidays. Give it shade and soil with plenty of compost. Plant long-lasting perennials or small shrubs to fill the space around your Cyclamen tubers while the plants are dormant in spring and summer.

With a little extra care, you can enjoy those potted holiday flowers year after year indoors or out.