Vera, do you have any pics of your mini wee-be-little pumpkins? I'd like to see them sometime. I'm going to live vicariously through you since my winter squash didn't make it :) pm2: If I remember correctly, those bigger tomatoes are early girl from a big plant my dad gave me ... the only tomatoes not WS. The little toms are WS Super Sweet 100. The orange squash is winter squash sunshine, and the light green is Italian Vining Zucchini (Zucchetta Rampicante), which I think may be considered a winter squash, but it is usally eaten young like zucchini. My squash sunhsine was not ripe unforunately. It was still partially green inside, I just had to harvest them since the plants were dying. I planted the squash sometime in May, and this pic was taken in July. This was pretty fast, so I figured it was worth a try to try and replant squash sunshine. The seedling is really small, so it may be too late, but I'll give it a try.

slo garden, I agree that the Russian varieties do well here (between SF and San Jose). I got a lot of tomatoes from Black Krim last year, but it acted like a determinate: lots of tomatoes in July and early August, then it stopped producing. Many of the larger tomatoes behave that way here. BK was one of my favorites last year, but it produced so much that I gave a lot of them away!! It has thin skin and doesn't keep well. But toward the end of its season, I discovered it's also rich and luscious as a cooked tomato. I tried Caspian Pink a few years ago, and the squirrels got almost all the tomatoes (bit into each one before it was ripe!), so I planted cherry tomatoes and mostly colors other than red/pink for a few years. The one I got to try was creamy and wonderful, so I'm trying it again this year. I've also grown Stupice, but though it produced a lot and the flavor was ok, it wasn't spectacular enough for a repeat, given the hundreds of others I still want to try. I didn't find seedlings of other Russian varieties I wanted to try, but I did get a Russian 117 (an oxheart), which I'm eager to try. I was tempted by Marianna's Peace, but since I already had 20 or so plants, I didn't think I'd have room for it. I cleared some more space in the garden today, though, so if the nursery still has one tomorrow, I may cave in.

Thanks Jay. I look at it this way, whatever going to make it through this winter will probably not going to die anytime soon and this kind of freak weather probably won't occur for another 10 years so there's no where to go but up from here. I'm not too bum about it. I noticed your imbe, their looking good. I also have one too. It is quite cool tolerant. Read somewhere that it is graft compatible with a mangosteen but haven't been able to confirm it yet. Also what is the name of the pineapple your growing there? Red, have you tasted the capulin cherry before? I had some before and wasn't really pleased by it.

Love the pots Nancy, I didn't do much with pots or containers this year after last summer's heat trying to keep all of them watered and looking decent was a bit much soooo, nothing much new here other than the new hydrangeas I bought last year, still very small but 'Miss Saori' is going to pop a few flowers. The mop head should look like this when fully open. This one has burgundy tinted leaves. The other new hydrangea I planted last fall 'Golden Crane' it's in full bloom now. This one is slightly scented :). I did plant up some coleus cuttings from a friend of one of our boys. I snitched a few cuttings last summer and managed to keep them alive through the winter, don't know the variety name but it was oh so pretty, top of leaves were a bright lime green bottom a rich velvety plum purple, very striking combination. Annette