I have Can Can. It gets sun from 7am to 2pm. The color stays thru the whole summer. I've had it about 6 yrs now...could be 7, and after 2 yrs, I bought another. I love the leaves and color. I water once a week deeply. If it gets too much shade, you'll lose some of it's beautiful color. Just water deeply and make sure you put it in an area that drains well. Kat

Heirloom tomatoes taste wonderful, and each variety has it's own set of taste complexities. If you love tomatoes, there's nothing like heirloom. A few hybrid varieties that have not had great flavor bred out of them in favor of being pretty with a long shelf life can be found. Among them are Lemon Boy, Sunmaster and Sun Gold. But in general, for flavor, heirlooms rule. You don't find them in the supermarkets because they generally are not perfectly "pretty" and they do not have a long shelf life once picked. They also tend to bruise easily. Hardiness zones (e.g. 8b) generally are based on first and last frost dates. They don't tell the full story. What are your summers like? Here in Southern Arizona, they are very hot with many 100+ degree days and tomatoes don't like it. If summers in East Texas have most days 92+ degrees, with night temps constantly above 72, only heat-loving varieties stand a chance (e.g. Sunmaster hybrid, Super Sioux heirloom.) To have any kind of tomato season where I live, I have to start very early (late January, using plant protectors such as Wall O Waters) and plant short-season varieties that mature in fewer than 72 days. These are just some ideas for you if your summers are very, very hot. Tomato plants will not produce fruit in extremely high temps.

Circuspeanut. . . love your kitchen! Was definitely an inspiration to me as I was planning my own renovation, thank you! I remember you posted a photo of your stove completely disassembled that gave me the courage to take on a project too! Have you moved on to a new kitchen now? I think I remember seeing a post with all sorts of kitchen planning ideas and some great renderings. . . thought it might be you. Francois, it looks to me like your stove is one of the more basic Wedgewoods. From what I have been able to gather, Wedgewood offered a broad range of stoves from single oven apartment size units with simple burners to the full dual oven rigs with 4 and 6 burners with simmer settings. It seems to me that you'd want to decide if the stove is sufficient to meet your needs before deciding to spend money on restoration. At the very least you'd have a basic unit that is more finely made than any basic stove you'd buy today. I started out considering a 40" Wedgewood with a broiler oven on one side and a bake oven on the right but I decided that what I really wanted was a double oven model because my kitchen is on the small side and can't really accommodate wall ovens in addition to a cook top. Would probably have been happy with a 6 burner model but the fact that the one I just found has had only one owner and has been maintained nicely meant more to me. . . plus, the built in griddle looks really cool! I just ordered a newly published book on vintage stoves that is called "Old Stoves are Hot". Looks like it gives a social history on these critters in addition to a discussion on the technical developments that led to the period during which the Wedgewoods and Okeefe and Merritts were at their best: 1948-55. There is also a chapter on the subsequent period of decline in quality where all things were made and designed with planned obsolescence . . .

Thank you for all the comments, I still love hearing from everyone and their opinions. I still am changing my mind everyday about that sink, it’s very useful... as far as everyones comments of it not being big enough (how big are your sinks?!... haha) btw the middle sink isn’t for washing, it is food disposal :) I use the left sink for washing and the right sink for rinsing. I do have some good news I just discovered 10 minutes ago (seriously)...it looks like the upper cabinets are original! Which makes me so happy because they are my favorite! Woohoo,... the doors are newer, I’m guessing to match the newer bottom cabinets. How easy is is it to move the dishwasher over to make room for this sink/or future vintage sink? It bothers me that it’s off center. And since the bottoms aren’t original so I don't mind moving things around. Thank you again to everyone so far !