Like so many of you, I started with plants when I was very young. I remember my grandmother had the green thumb - she always had petunias that were gorgeous. Of course, many years later, I know the reason they were so gorgeous was that she dead-headed every single day. Yuk! I hate deadheading petunias, they're so sticky! I was in 4-H and there was a "home beautification" project I was in. Mostly just planted flowers - annuals and perennials around the home. But I started learning varieties and care of these. Then my family moved to a hobby farm. My mom and I had some veggies then and, through the soil conservation program, planted trees as windbreaks. We ordered about 200 trees and planted them all. I spent that summer driving around in the truck with a huge watering barrel on it, trying to water all these trees. The next summer, for some reason the ditch company expanded the ditches and over half of my trees were uprooted. In the end it was a good thing. This was back in the '70s and we didn't know much about invasive plants - the majority of the trees we planted were Russian olives! My mom and I still laugh about this - about all the work that led to nothing and ruefully, about how stupid we all were to plant Russian olives. After college, I lived with my brother for a few years while I was in graduate school. He and I had a very successful veggie garden. Then I got married (20 years ago now). We lived in a succession of rental houses - always houses, not apartments, because of dogs. At each house I had a few veggies, mostly tomatoes, and as many flowers as I could jam into the ground without doing major sod removal. I remember one house in particular. The landlord almost never came by the house. One summer day, after we had lived there a few years, he came by. I had tons of impatiens in the front yard. He was stunned. I don't think the house had ever seen flowers before. Eleven years ago we bought our first house here in ND. It was new construction and looked every bit like so many that people post here on the forum, except it didn't even have the requisite meatball shrubs because I asked for a blank slate. We "hired" the local nursery designer to help out. This was one of those deals where you get the plan for free if you buy your trees from them. No problem, we needed trees. I did not like the designer, he didn't listen to my requests (and put the soon-to-be-outlawed lythrum in the plan against my wishes), but he still had some ideas we liked and incorporated. I spent seven years with that house, and learned a lot (for example, I will never again put orange and pink together). It was not a knock-out landscaping, but I think it was pretty good for someone who knew nothing about design. We moved to our current home four years ago. Some of you may remember my first post to this forum. My first reaction was "oh my gosh, I get to landscape 20 acres, this is going to be SO fun", dreams of magazine-worthy gardens, garden tours, etc filled my head. I immediately began planning all the things I wanted - a 3 acre native prairie, 12 acres of native, but enhanced woods, huge veggie garden, flowing perennial beds, etc. Within two years I was panicked. My thoughts now were "oh my gosh, I HAVE to landscape 20 acres, I have no clue what to do!" Now I've slowed down. We are taking it a step at a time. Last year, and continuing to this year, we are concentrating only on the front yard. We hire out jobs that we don't have the expertise or equipment for. You all have provided an enormous amount of help. Ideas from threads, not just my own threads, pictures, philosophy, etc. I have begun to learn to think differently about the landscaping. I have become more observant. I am starting to think about how everything fits together. It's fun again because we have learned to only do what we can. We don't have to do it all in one year. Or even in five years (which was my original intent). Thank you all for the help. Sorry for the long saga. The short answer is that I have been growing veggies and flowers for about 35 years. I have been trying to fit them into a design for about 10 years. I have learned to appreciate that landscape design is far more than putting a few perennials along the foundation of the house in the last two years! Maybe in another 10 years or so I will be able to say I know something about landscaping. Thanks to all. Ann (complete amateur)

I have Popcorn, montana Aureomarginata, Blue Angel, Climax, and Dawn's Early Light growing in similar light. I was just at at a nursery and saw Diana Remembered in afternoon sun and it was burnt up -- very ugly! I've had Cheatin Heart and Invincible in full sun all day for two years with no problems. Ripple Effect and Ann Kulpa sat on my deck in hot sun for two weeks. Ripple Effect was fine, but the white on Ann Kulpa melted. I'm sure part of Ann Kulpa's problem was that it was root-bound in the pot.

I have3 grown a chile for 9 yrs. I have seen tepins in Mexico that were at least 20 years old. All chiles are perennial.

Yea i got them when i bot the snake plant and the donkeys tail .i will post them monday ok