How do I kill spider mites in my plants?

Spider mites are very small, usually invisible to the naked eye, they look like dust on the back of your leaves.  A large bug that looked like a crab or spider might be this, a crab spider.They are useful to have in your plants, eating the larger bad guys. They come in all colors, including brown. 'White critters' could be white-flies or mealy bugs. both will kill your plants, the mealy bugs will be very hard to get rid of, take them outside to spray them, you may have to use something a little stronger than soap, but try the soap first. Hope this helps!

Those big bugs are probably eating the little ones, which are eating your plants. They will not cure the pest problem, however. The pests are most likely mealy based on the description, and they are very hard to get rid of. I have tried the soap trick numerous times to no avail, unfortunately. If you want to try it though, you must mix a little powder laundry soap with water and spray it on the plant, and let it dry. This will suffocate the bugs. Then, (VERY IMPORTANT) wash the soap off the plant; otherwise it will suffocate the plant. But you must repeat this application once a week to make sure you kill the bugs before they lay eggs because the soap does not kill the eggs. If this fails, then the best thing to do is to use e pesticide, but if (like me) you don't want to do that then you may have better luck pruning the affected parts of the plant and adequately disposing of the infested trimmings. Then, hopefully, the plant will flush out and the bugs won't come back.