Hi Mike! Thanks, :-) That's Goober. Worlds biggest pain in the butt, spoiled brat, love bug. lol... My process? I guess you could say I'm a organized mess. lol.. I have been sifting a bag of bark twice to make sure to get all that I can use out of it. I make different mixes for the different types of plants and where they are. Inside or out.. I'm mainly using pine bark, and because it's more flat in nature, 3/8" to 1/8" is O.K. for the gritty mix, and 3/8" to dust is O.K. for the 5-1-1. (1/2" to dust can be used for the 5-1-1 too, but I don't like the bigger pieces of bark) If using fir bark, 1/4" would be used for both mixes. The left over bark that does NOT go through becomes mulch. As you know, I tired to break it down for use in the mix in my blender, but that did NOT work so well. lol! I have 3 garden beds, and I like to mulch containers too. We do get hot here. ;-) So none goes to waste. A few pieces have also been thrown in the grill to help get it started, sap wood too ;-). lol. What DOES go through the 3/8" will be sifted over 1/8" to remove all the smallest particles. That is set aside and used in various ways. It's great for seed cover in the garden beds, or added back to the bark for the 5-1-1 instead of peat. After the very small has been removed like mentioned above I will have clean bark ready for different needs. If it's a very small container, like for a succulent, I like to sift it over 1/4"(and use 1/4-1/8")I don't like or want large pieces of bark in a 3" pot, and my plants do fine with it. If it's to be used for the 5-1-1 It will be ready to use, and I would add back in the less than 1/8" pieces, to powder, in place of peat. O.K. , so does this make sense? I haven't had my coffee yet. ;-) I'm glad to hear this has been of some help to some of your friends! JoJocolor>

Nice find Angie, I have four of these plants. A red, yellow, pink and cream. They bloom constantly, year round for me and really don't seem to mind if I forget to water them sometimes. I put them out in the summer and inside in the winter, I've tried east and west windows and they continue to bloom so I'd say they're very easy to grow and bloom. Good Luck with yours.

Doesn't it make you feel good to find something you want/need and to get it at a good price!!! Yes, and I was particularly happy it was a Kenmore and from that particular Sears Store. I noticed a sign on the door where the the store was for sale and found out it was the one woman working there yesterday who had it for sale. I fear those little privately owned stores may someday be run out of business by all the big box stores. She has a large built out microwave "nook" and we had to find the perfect size - yes hers is from Sears too. Kathy lol...but my situation is that my cubby is so small I feared not being able to find one at all that would go in there. I still haven't installed it in the shelf yet, but think and hope there will be about 1/8 to 1/4 of a inch clearance at the top if I measured accurately. hmmmm...I just tried it out (it is just sitting on the box) and it took a lot less time. 1 min 40 sec when I used the one button method for 'beverage' as opposed to 3 min 30 sec when I keyed in the amount of time on my old one. They are both 800 watts, so I guess this new one is a great power improvement over the old 22 year old one. Maybe I'll try a baked potato for breakfast just to see how well that does with the one button method. I'm so pleased to say the least. Sue

Thanks so much for the complients. Wow, two things I do not have - goo be gone and never have peanut butter; don't eat it, never will, won't have it in the house. I will try the soaking them in water with dawn or something like that. Thanks.