guilt schmilt ... GET RID OF THEM .... for me.. it would ONLY involve guilt .. if you were to go net negative on mother earth .... in other words.. rip them up and put in a parking lot .. as joni said once ... otherwise.. you will be planting a plethora of new plants to offset the removal ... the happiest day in the life of my first house.. was getting rid of the last overgrown ugly never pruned 20 foot tall weed shrubs the prior owner left behind ... my only problem , was that it took me 5 years to come to the conclusion that removal was the only option .... be done with them .... renovation projects are for the back 3 acres.. not the front of the house .... good luck ken

Yes, I remember you! Congratulations - it sounds like you have had a whirlwind year, but happy! A few reseeding annuals that I can think of are four o'clocks, nicotiana, marigolds, and borage. All reseeded pretty heavily in my beds. The nicotiana will take a little shade, but I think generally it likes full sun, especially as you're farther north of me. As for perennials, I am in a totally different zone, so I will mostly leave that to the others. The only one I can think of that would definitely be cold-hardy enough for you that I grow is columbine, and it will probably want more shade than you have. But hey, you can always sow more trees to go with that catalpa (love those)!

Carol, I'm glad you enjoyed your trip to Ardmore.....we did arrange that one cool day just for you....LOL! Be glad you are not here today....it is currently 102 with a heat index of 108 and I have the hose running in the lily pond because it is down about 6" since the beginning of the week. We just came back from Ardmore few minutes ago, and there was little six-point buck in the driveway, making his way toward the garden. I guess he was going to eat anything growing out through the fence. The half-inch of rain we got wasn't much, but our fire dept. hasn't been paged out to a fire today, so it must have helped a little. People here do not pay directly for fire protection, but the county gives each dept. some money every year--it isn't even enough to pay our annual gasoline bill, but every little bit helps. We do lots and lots of fundraisers and it is never-ending, you know. Our citizens are VERY good about supporting Love County's 14 volunteer fire departments, though, and we always appreciate that. Dawna, It broke my heart to stop watering, but I swore I wasn't going to run up an outrageous $350-per-month water bill like I did during the 2005-006 drought....remembering that all that water didn't even keep the garden alive then, so what's the point in doing it this year? Only a little over 16" of rain here this year, and I think less than 3" combined for June, July and August so far. Combine the drought with the long string of days over 100 degrees (it's been as high as 106 to 108 here with heat indexes up to 116 degrees), and the garden (and the gardener) just can't take it. We've had lots of the usual hayfield fires started during either cutting, raking or baling, but its so dry that they have been burning lots and lots of acres per fire, instead of only a few. Lots of fires along the highways too, of unknown origin, but probably started by cigarettes thrown out of windows. I've spent as much as 10 hours at fires in one day, but usually only 2, 3 or 4 hours or so on most days. I'm just too tired. Between the drought, the heat, and the fires, the garden's just sitting there withering up and dying. It's OK, though, surely next year will be better. : ) Right? Moni, I bet Montana was wonderful! Well, I'm not giving up on gardening permanently, just giving up on keeping the veggie garden alive this year. Love County is in what the U. S. Drought Monitor terms a "moderate drought" and I believe our rainfall has been "below average", and sometimes severely below average, for 11 of the last 12 months. Our rainfall is roughly 10" below what it should be at this time of year. Even when rain does fall, we normally have severe drought conditions in July and August anyway, so without the "usual" rain, we are really hurting. The garden has been very productive thus far....tons of big, huge, softball-sized onions, a lot of potatoes, zillions of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, a moderate amount of beans (less than most years) and I'm still geting okra, melons and pumpkins, although the plants look pretty bad at this point. Both our freezers are full and I have lots of onions and potatoes in the cellar. I'm still getting ripe tomatoes because the plants had tons of tons of green ones when I quit watering. At this point, I don't have much time to garden. Fires are happening with a frightening regularity....mostly grassfires and a few of the larger wildfires, a couple of car fires, and one major structure fire (over 10 hours long) at a wooden pallet factory earlier this week. I've been gone to fires so long, or in town on fire business, or running to Sam's and Costco to get food and drinks for the 14 fire department's firefighters, that I wouldn't have time to work in the garden even if I were inclined to try to water and keep it alive. I've also been on-line designing and ordering custom safety vests, hats, and t-shirts for our fire dept., so lately its been all about the fire department. That's OK. The work the VFDs do is very important and I don't mind diverting "gardening time" to "fire department time" every now and then. I just hope it all settles down by next spring (we need rain and a lot of it between now and then) so I can start over with fresh plants in a new season. : ) What about y'all, Moni? Did you sell the house yet? Did you move? Somewhere in the madness of trying to survive the heat and drought, I lost track of what's going on with y'all. Let me know! Dawn

Mary 1956, whoever said that there is something wrong with you because it bothers you that your husband's ex-wife is included in his family in a way you aren't has obviously never experienced this kind of hurtful treatment. I have! I am not sure why people act as they do, but a friend of mine told me that many people just don't have the ability to think about other people's feelings like "we" do. I am not sure I agree, but I do see it on a daily basis. Why your husband's ex-wife doesn't see how inappropriate her attendance at his family functions is eludes me. My guess is that she doesn't give a rat's a__ about your husband or you. She must not have any pride. Maybe she does it to hurt your husband and you. Even if your husband says something to his family, it may not help. I am in almost the identical situation, and although my husband and I haven't been married for as long as you, his ex-wife attends many of his families events. To make matters worse, she had an affair that ended their relationship about 15 years ago, and his family seems to not care. She has driven a wedge between him and his kids, and they don't seem to care about that either. And she has done everything she can to prevent me from having a relationship with his adult kids, and for some reason these kids just allow themselves to be manipulated. I hate to say this, but there is probably not much you can do about the situation unless your husband can influence his family. In my mind, they shouldn't have to understand why it bother's you, they should just accept that it does, that YOU are part of the family, and that they should make things comfortable for YOU. Good luck and let us know how things work out!