Sprouts grow in a jar at Susan Smith-Durisek's home, March 17, 2008, in Lexington, Kentucky. (Susan Smith Durisek/Lexington Herald-Leader/MCT)

Photos by David Perry / Lexington Herald-Leader At left is Salvia hispanica chia, growing on a flower pot bottom, and, at right, a variety of salad mix greens, both grown by the author at her Kentucky home.

Outside, buds are beginning to swell with new life, and grass is growing greener by the day.

But if you're growing weary of waiting on Mother Nature, take matters into your own hands and create a green oasis in your home.

It's easy to grow grass for indoor decor or even for your cooped-up cats to nibble. And if you crave the taste of the freshest leafy greens, sprout some without soil in just a week.

Growing grass

There are all kinds of grasses: the varieties that grow in your lawn, the grains used in cereal, and the fancy-plumed ornamentals and natives. Bringing them indoors adds a breath of fresh air to your home.

At the recent Antiques and Garden show in Nashville, one interior decorator placed a low, rectangular glass container of grass on a table. The lush green was eye-catching.

That inspired me to grow grass for Easter baskets to use as the base of a table centerpiece. I wanted some fairly fine-textured grass, so I commandeered a bit of quick-growing fescue seed from my outdoor lawn renovation project, and I grew it in shallow plastic saucer liners.

Using fresh, sterile seed-starting soil mixed with organic mulch, I top-seeded the little trays pretty thickly, keeping them covered with damp coffee filters, moist but well-drained.

When you're doing this, it's important to use sterile soil to avoid pathogens that could infect your tiny sprouts. With a little faith, patience and occasional watering, they germinated in about five days. I uncovered them, set them near a bright window and watched them grow.

When the blades were up about 3 inches, I trimmed them evenly with scissors to about 2 inches, dropped them into the baskets, then decorated them with holiday surprises. I'll plant them outside later to fill in empty lawn patches.

It's also fun to plant wheat and oats, marketed as "cat grass." Generally a lighter green and more coarse than lawn grasses, they grow quickly, from seed to finish in about 10 days. You can use them not only as indoor ornamentals, but as food. Cats find them amusing and delicious; people extract nutritious juice from the tender young blades.

Grains can be grown using the same process as I did with the fescue, but I'd recommend planting them in a deeper pot. You can find packets of seed marked as "cat grass" in many shops.

As I seeded the grasses, I also experimented with lettuce. Using the same shallow-tray method, I planted a packet of Burpee's mesclun salad mix in a plastic saucer liner filled with organic seed-starter mix, following the package directions. This mesclun is an assortment of lettuces: black-seeded Simpson, arugula rocket and radicchio red Vepona.

They were up in about a week, and I've been snipping the microgreens to sprinkle on salads, at the same time thinning the growing lettuce.

No muss, no fuss, no soil

It takes less than a week for most sprouts to grow indoors from seed to table-ready, no soil required. Although you can produce them year-round, spring is perfect weather for sprouts, because natural light is increasing daily and the moderate temperatures encourage plant growth.

What's your favorite vegetable? The classic alfalfa sprouts have been joined by zingy-hot radishes, spectacularly crimson beets and even flavorful herbs as toppings for salads and hors d'oeuvre embellishments; for stir-fry, try mung and adzuki beans.

Starting with clean equipment is a must. You'll need a clear glass or a plastic jar or tumbler for a container, with a lid that allows air to circulate and water to drain without letting the seeds escape.

Seeds can be found in local garden and food stores as well as online specialty shops. Look for organically grown seeds that haven't been treated with chemicals, and that have a germination rate above 90 percent.

I bought some bulk alfalfa and radish seeds, as well as mung and adzuki beans. Johnny's Selected Seeds (http://www.johnnyseeds.com) has a wide selection, as do the Sproutpeople (http://www.sproutpeople.com), who also supply nutritional information.

First, soak the seeds in water for a few hours or overnight.

Walt Precourt, who supplies sprouts to local restaurants, said adding about an ounce of nonstabilized 3 percent hydrogen peroxide per pint of water helps with germination and kills mold. After soaking, rinse the seeds a few times, then drain well and let them sit somewhere at a temperature of 70 to 80 degrees.

Then you wait. Keep rinsing and draining two or three times a day, and soon sprouts will appear. They're ready to eat when you see the first little leaflets pop up and develop a touch of green. The seed coats will drop off and can be removed. I found that the alfalfa sprouts were the easiest and earliest to grow, and they produced an enormous quantity.

Chia: more than a pet

The idea for those funky Chia Pets evolved from the traditional chia, Salvia hispanica, which originated in Mexico's Central Valley, and was grown by the Aztecs centuries ago.

Because the seeds form a gooey, mucilaginous coating when wet, you can sprout them by sticking them onto damp, porous surfaces like clay pots and sprouting mats.

In their book "Chia: Rediscovering a Forgotten Crop of the Aztecs," agriculturalists Ricardo Ayerza and Wayne Coates write that chia offers the highest omega-3 fatty acid content available in food today. Renewed interest in the seed as a nutritional source has brought it to the dining table. Check out http://www.sproutpeople.com/seed/print/chia.html for more information.