In order to get a picture of the difference between soluble fertilizers and organic fertilizers, imagine cell membranes as the fabric chain link fences are made of. Soluble fertilizers moving through cell walls might be considered something like you pushing ping pong balls through the holes in the fence, while organic molecules are more like trying to push basketballs through. The basketballs would have to be broken down into smaller pieces before they would fit. If there is no one standing by to break the basketballs down (if there are reduced populations of soil biota to break down the large organic molecules) no basketball parts get through. MG houseplant fertilizer is probably not a good choice. I believe the % of NPK is 8-7-6, or very close to that. Plants actually use about 6x more N than P and about 1.5x more N than K. If you choose a soluble fertilizer, you would be better served with something in a 3:1:2 ratio. 24-8-16, 12-4-8, and 9-3-6 are all very popular 3:1:2 ratio soluble fertilizers. Dyna-Gro makes 9-3-6 Foliage-Pro soluble. It's not easy to find, but it's the best I've seen because it also includes Ca and Mg (usually lacking in commonly found soluble blends like MG, Peters, Schultz .....), and it contains all the essential elements in the ratio plants need for normal growth and in a very favorable ratio to each other, also an important consideration. Al

If you love the look of "the spiral" (couldn't resist), there are a lot of pieces made for multiple 4" and 6" pots. Search "plant stands" on any good engine. An added bonus to these is that they can be moved outside if you have even a teeny balcony. Galium odoratum (sweet woodruff) would be another good idea. The flowers are used for May Wine and smell like heaven. One starter plant will fill out a pot in no time. Rosa chinensis (angel roses) might be dicey but worth a try. Ditto recommending Profusion chives. It's a gottahave. Martie

Dynamic lifter is a good fertilizer but before you do anything you need to see what the soil is like. Fertilizer won't improve soil and is a waste of money if your plants are struggling in soil that's too light or too heavy, or full of roots from competing trees. I would salvage what I could from those gardens - perennials herbs etc, weed out the rest (saving the sunflower seeds for the birds :-) ) and dig it over. What you need is good soil to grow veggies. Too sandy will need compost added to bulk it up and reduce water loss. Too old and heavy may just need breaking up, watering, compost and working over. You may even need to bring in some better soil to work into what you've got. So, I'd go for compost and soil improvement first. That might also involve adding some organic fertilizers. If you are on a budget, you should also start setting up your own compost area so you can recycle your "good" kitchen scraps and "good" weeds. I notice a number of skinny things on top of the soil that I would normally call "catkins" and suspect come from a pine tree or similar - do you have any overhanging trees like that?

Where do you live? (state, zone?) Is this a recent photo -i.e., are these growing now? I enlarged each picture a lot. Reading top row, L to R: 1, 2, could well be alyssum but the foliage does not seem quite right to me) but 6 definitely is alyssum (which actually IS an herb - Google it!). I agree with the consensus on #3; looks like grass but if you pluck some of the leaves & smells & tastes like an onion, it is chives. I believe #4 is a petunia (also may be considered an herb due to some ways petunias have been used; e.g., as a tisane- yuck - and the leaves as a pest repellent). Row 2, L to R: Number 5 is haunting me; I should know it, but I think it is something generally sold up where I live as an annual in a hanging basket (like a verbena). Number 7 is thyme; w/o being able to smell it cannot say which cultivar, but it looks like English/French/winter or whatever "ordinary" culinary thyme is, depending on what nursery sells it & what they name it. The last one certainly is a rosemary.