The thing to remember with most companion planting do's and dont's is that very few, if any, have actually been scientifically tested. The evidence is purely anecdotal and is at worst based on old wives tales at best, peoples experience in their own garden. Not to say that people are wrong, or that they didn't experience what they did, but keep in mind that what works for them may not always work for you and vice versa. That is not to say companion planting is all hogwash and should be tossed, I still follow it as a general guideline when planning my garden. What they used to tell me in the Army though was "a guideline is not a regulation" and so I look at it that way with my garden. The only real problem I could foresee with planting beans cucumbers and tomatoes is that beans and cucumbers are viney climbers and may decide to use your tomato as a trellis and possibly choking it out. I have grown cucumbers and tomatoes together before and neither suffered any bad effects from it. The cukes did sort of start climbing on the tomatoes but not enough to really effect the tomato in any way. The only problem I have had with it is the tomato being so big I couldn't see all the cucumbers hiding in there! I say, all things being equal, go ahead and try it. If it doesn't work then you have learned that, if it does, then you'll be glad you shucked Wikipedia's advice and tried something new.

1 lawn grass going to seed 2 perhaps hawthorn seedling 3 ivy groundcover & Norway maple on left (both invasive in many parts of the country), rose of sharon 4 thistle if prickly, wild lettuce (Lactuca) if not 5 variegated vinca 6 don’t know what it is, but try a hand tool to scratch around and root it up before it gets larger. 7 nightshade, Solanum sp. Will seed around weedily 8 young ash tree 9 vinca 10 virginia creeper and ivy 11 young Norway maple probably (tear leaf and if sap milky, Norway) 12 ash tree seedling 13 P.I. A strong mix of glysophate herbicide used on whole area, reapplied when it has resprouted, and then followed by corrugated cardboard covered by mulch will get rid of most of it. Reapply glysophate ASAP as any new sprouts appear through the mulch. This has the advantage of covering up the old foliage with its still-there urushiol oil and keeping other weeds from sprouting as well as keeping the PI from getting any photosynthesis going. Soak effected clothing in Biz, wash twice with regular detergent. Wash skin with alcohol, soap, alcohol, soap. It is drying to skin, but will remove all PI oil. Wipe down shoes with alcohol. I can get rash again from clothes that weren’t adequately cleaned. Microwave a bowl of oatmeal and smear that on skin when cool for the ultimate relief. 1% cortisone creme works to reduce itch as well. (It took me most of a summer to figure out that our cat was wandering into the PI and then sitting on the furniture and I was getting it all over the back of my legs from Urushiol on the furniture.) 14 Virginia creeper and some more nightshade 15 Hosta (plain green at top) but not sure of viney thing, perhaps more nightshade 16 See comment for 6 17 sedge, a grass-like plant but not grass. Some varieties are ornamental, so if you like it, leave it. 18 not sure what it is, but a weed. It has seeds with fluff attached that will drift around and reseed if you let it get that far 19 Avens - weedy type probably 20 weed, but don’t know name - has tiny pink or white flowers 21 ivy - see note for 3 22 Virginia creeper spreads more than I like in my garden even though it's native 23 wild or black cherry (Prunus) seedling 24 red maple seedling 25 garlic mustard - don’t let it go to seed as it will increase exponentially. Has short tap root, so a narrow weeder or old screwdriver may help if you aren't getting the roots out 26 dandelion 27 If it is fuzzy, it probably isn’t a violet; it somehow doesn't look quite right 28 same as 9 Vinca 29 red oak group seedling - could be red oak, black oak 30 hosta - different variety than at top of 15 31 my sympathies! A suggestion that you start saving the cartons from your folks' move or collecting cartons at the grocery store as well as newspapers. As soon as you get an area cleared, put down cardboard if it is a large area or multiple layers of newspaper, folded as needed if you are working around plants (wet it down so it stays put) and then cover immediately with mulch. This will reduce more weeds sprouting since this whole yard most probably has a huge bank of weed seeds in the soil. The least expensive way to get mulch is by the truck load if there is somewhere you can have it dumped and then wheel-barrow it to where you want it. (Some towns compost yard waste and residents can get mulch free or inexpensively as long as they pick it up.) When things are a bit under control, you can cut in a deep V edge between the lawn and the mulched areas or get some of the plastic edging and dig a slot to bury that along the edge. Once these things are done, you can decide if you want to do some planting, probably next season. Just remember where the PI used to be so that you don't get it from the dead plants and roots. PS - the cookie recipe would be more than welcome to me!

Don't forget to pack that laptop for the stay. We'll keep you in more stitches than Dr.Richard! ***** HA!!!!! No laptop here so I'll be going thru withdrawl from online reading and posting and the various e-mails I get. More than that I'll be missing the Rome, Italy tennis OPen but I will be home in time to see the French Open, tennis nit that I am. I do have my priorities. ( smile) And nope, I won't be tip toeing thru the tomatoes in the near future, if ever again. One of the four quad muscles I tore never came back to function after the repair so that knee buckles all the time, besides which I'll probably have to have surgery sometime for my severe spinal stenosis, but I don't even want to go there. LOL So it looks as though I'll be using this walker for the near future, whatever that means. So I'll just have to enjoy being kept in online stiches after I get home again and can read here and there. Of course Richard will have me in stiches, and I mean more than sutures, b'c he has a wicked sense of humor. LOL Off topic as can be but I'll give you one example. After the left new hip went in last June I lost both bowel and bladder function which has been attributred to my being diabetic and sensitivity to Morphine and similar. When I told him that it took five people to catheterize me, which I'm sure he already knew, he calmly ASAP said: consecutively or simultaneously. LOL Richard is a Master of repartee and I gave him a book on same. One in that book that I remember well was when someone asked Ghandi what he thought of Western Civilization he said he thought it would be a good idea. LOL And so it goes and I'm off now to take a last drive to look at the wildflowers I can see from the car. I know the coltsfoot and Hepatica are out and I have Bloodroot here at home that's out, but I was hoping to see some early Trilliums and possibly some wild Columbine, the latter of which I also have here at home but here it's not out yet. And then to start packing since tomorrow looks very busy indeed. Sigh. Carolyn

Even though this is an old thread (2007), others may find it the same way I did, by searching for unscented feminine pads or something similar. The original poster no doubt solved her issue years ago, but here's some approaches for others who have a similar problem. The member (original poster) said that her itching worsened when she used a pad (Stayfree was the one she mentioned). Before going into all the kinds of whole-body systemic things this might be, it's useful to reduce allergic-type triggers. I can't use dryer sheets or any kind of fabric softener. Not just on panties, but on slacks, pantyhose, etc. In fact, I don't use any on laundry at all, not even blouses or skirts. Also, try changing toilet paper brands. At this time, I can better tolerate Northern than store brand generics or other brands. No colors, no prints, only plain white, of course. And wash your crotch, abdomen and thighs only with plain warm water, thoroughly, but no soap or feminine sprays or anything like that at all. Nothing with fragrance or deodorant, especially from the waist down. Choose only unscented, non-colored laundry detergent. Remember that it will take at least several days to notice any improvements and don't forget that even if this week's and last week's laundry was done with unscented color-free products, anything washed earlier is a hazard. Grabbing the wrong pair of panties from your dresser drawer makes your recent changes wasted work. Probably the original poster isn't hyper-sensitive to absolutely everything but going to complete fragrance avoidance is the best way to figure that out. If her itching eases off, she's on the right track. Maybe after a few months of zero fragrances and thus no itching, she could experiment with adding back only one thing, or changing only one brand, to see if she reacts. That's a slow process, because sensitivity reactions often take a few days to build up to where the itching kicks in, and a few weeks of avoidance again to let it work its way back to normal. My doctor kept testing me for everything under the sun but only after several appointments did she think to mention sensitivities and how to try to avoid triggering them. It fixed the problem, until years later when my toilet paper brand apparently changed something and I had to find a different one. My reaction wasn't about anything which was infectious or systemic, it was entirely from contact with certain materials or fragrances.