Yeah, my neigbhors asked me how I was able to achieve that many plants. They saw me working on the garden around early March. They were curious about the garden beds I was making. They saw the milk jugs. I explained to them what it was and also gave them the Wintersown site. I actually watched their reactions when they saw it. They didn't pay much attention to it kinda like "oh, ok". However, when plants started to come out/bloom, they went back to me and asked, "was that from the tiny greenhouse". :) I'm going to make more beds maybe by fall once my knee gets better. :D Thanks mnwsgal! :)

Ok, time for updates! I'm not having too great of luck with this! I was amazed and excited when the above batch calloused so easily on the first try. I potted them up in clear cups with regular potting soil and put them in a greenhouse tray with a tall clear dome over it. Left the tray on my back porch. One by one they turned black and died. I'm pretty sure I know why tho. They were fairly long cuttings and I didn't stick them down all the way in the cups, and a couple of them were too tall for even the taller dome I used. So, the dome was not sitting flush over the tray. There was about 2" of air space, so I think the cold air got in and dried the stems out. I didn't mist them either. I did the second batch of florist rose cuttings and after the 2 week wait, they had not calloused, but were mostly still green. I cut off the black ends and potted these up into a special indoor potting medium we sell at Ace that's used by pot growers. Mostly peat moss, perlite and lime I believe, with the mycorhizzae also. I only kept the cuttings that had swollen budeyes. I put them in the greenhouse tray and added a layer of clay pebbles soaked in water. Made sure the clear dome was flush over the tray. I got a 2-light fluorescent light fixture and put 40w full spectrum lights in, and put a heating pad under the tray. I set the light timer to come on around 4:00pm and go off about 1:00am. Then I put a chunk of my shade cloth over the whole table and light set-up to cut down on the brightness of the light at night (it lights up most of my backyard) and to also maybe add a little warmth. So far, after a week or more, the cuttings are staying green and budeyes are still swollen. No need to mist, as the wet clay pebbles and the heating pad create a nice moist atmosphere under the dome. I also buried the stems all the way into the cups. I did have one stem last week that got a bit of mold on the tip above the top budeye, and I snipped it off. So far, so good. Now today I upwrapped another batch a day early, and was very disappointed. There were several stems that turned black, and almost every one had turned black at the base. The rest of the stems were green with swollen budeyes, so I decided to go ahead and pot them up like I did the previous batch. Now with this batch, I'm kinda thinkin' I might not've gotten all the excess water out of the newpaper, and it was a bit lesser quality newspaper also. Not that that might make a difference, but who knows? I'm also thinking maybe when I diluted the Dip'n'grow, I might not've dilute it as much as I should have. I mean there's just so many different factors and variables to consider. I'm just hoping that these cuttings will root anyway in the potting medium and the greenhouse trays. I still have about 4 more batches of florist roses all rolled up, waiting for the 2 week period. We'll see what happens with those. I'm gonna keep trying, that's for sure. Eventually something will work!

That's great news. I am happy for you especially since your son is military. No matter how any of us feel about the war, we appreciate our military people. We spent many holidays alone. Because of the parents and step parents issue, I decided what ever day my children could be with us was "the" holiday. The Christmas my oldest granddaughter was four, they were stationed in Abeline. We lived in San Antonio and my son's father lived in Kingsvile and my DIL's mother lived in Robstown. The kids had their Christmas at home and then drove to SA. The next day we had our Christmas. The day after they drove to Robstown and had Christmans at my DIL's mother's house. They went to my ex's on Christmas morning and had Christmas. Soooooo,my granddaughter got up the day after Christmas expecting it all to happen again. She was a tad disappointed.

Everything is gorgeous and so special! I love supporting local artists, and I espeically love the carving board. I would definitely use it because it seems to practical, and it was meant to be functional art. The same with the napkins, although I would reserve those for specially occasions. I'm a bit confused about the scale of the items because you said the napkins were oversized. How large is the cream pitcher? For some reason, it looks a bit like a water pitcher to me. I love the colors! Lars