Billy Rae, they grow wherever they can, LOL. I started collecting plants seriously when I lived in Los Angeles between the years of 1985 and 1992. I was able to bring a few here to Florida when we moved here in the summer of 1992. The house we moved into initially and lived in for 11 years was a 1920's Historic Home that had a 240 sq ft sunroom, what is called here a "Florida Room". Almost every house built between 1890-1930's has a Florida Room, which is basically a large screened porch where people would sleep in summer because it was cooler there and there was no air conditioning. The people who we bought the house from had glassed in the screen portions with 8x8 plate glass windows and it was climate controlled. The room had a tiled floor with a drain in the floor and an indoor hose spigot so in the old days they would just wash the sand that blew through the screen out via the floor drain. Of course I immediately started collecting plants once here, LOL and ammassed a huge collection very quickly of orchids, bromeliads, heliconias, and many others that could not stay outdoors in winter and had to be drug into the house and into the Florida Room. We outgrew that house, and in 2002 we moved out to the "country" to a 5 acre property and I was able to build this greenhouse. The Florida Room we have here is very small and gets poor light, but I do keep some houseplants in there year round. Everything else that would have had to be a houseplant, or and "in and out" plant, became a greenhouse plant. I didn't want the artificiality of benches and shelves, the plants that I had did not lend themselves to that anyway, I had 30+ gallon tubs of 15-16 ft tall heliconias and ultratropical gingers that needed to be planted. SO I decided to use the greenhouse in the style of a botanical garden tropical conservatory. It is in its 6th year and I tinker with it constantly. I have collected shells, driftwood, rocks, and all sorts of stuff to use to make it look like a natural setting. I have planted everything I can, mounted as many of the orchids and bromeliads as I can, and tried to minimize the use of containers, but there are still a lot of containers, especially hanging ones, because floorspace is, well, gone now. I can only plant new stuff if I remove other stuff. So I Have had to be creative. I wanted water in there so I have a 20 ft stream and a pond, and am building a drop fall/fountain that goes into a stone basin now. Here are a couple more photos...a prime example of why I can't keep some of this stuff in my house (and its not hardy here)...this is a rare palm called a Salacca magnifica. It is heavily armed...the undersides of the leaves have large rigid spines. Its what is called an "entire leaf" palm...there is basicaly no trunk. The leaves at present time are approaching 10 ft in length, at maturity a single leaf can be 20 ft tall/long. I have only had this palm for a little over 2 years, it is very fast growing. It would be way too dangerous in the house, and I would not be able to move it. So I had to plant it! This is another example...this is a photo from last year about this time when the Jade Vine was in bloom. This is a very highly sought after rare Tropical liana, Strongylodon macrobotrys. Tons of people want this vine, and are willing to spend $50-100 for a plant, thinking that they will be able to keep it in a pot on a trellis and bring it in the house in the winter. But in reality, that can't be done. This vine is a tropical creeper, its name in Phillipines where it comes from is Emerald Creeper. It will engulf everything in its path (I have to prune mine constantly) and won;t bloom until it gets a big woody trunk (usually 3 years after planting). I got mine as a trade when I still lived at the old house, and would never have been able to see it bloom like this as a houseplant: I don't look at my greenhouse as separate from my house. My original dream was to build this kind of place ONTO the house, where you would just open a door and step from the house into the greenhouse, and they would be continuous. We tried to figure out a way to do that when we moved here, but the renovation would have cost over $100,000. It just wasn't doable. So, I consider this my "second Florida Room". I just have to walk a few steps down the driveway, not out a door, LOL.

"If anything I find my tastes are influenced negatively here, not in a bad way really, just differently. I love funky bohemian combined with traditional and modern but don't feel that love from most posters so sometimes I second guess myself. There are some canvas prints at Pier One I am crazy about yet they are cheap. Will I hate them because they look cheap? ($30 each btw) Will they make my decor seem too wild? Cheap? As an artist, most other artists abhor this kind of thing and usually are quite snobbish about having only originals in their house. They would not buy a cheap print from Pier One! So, can I over come this pressure and the pressure here (subtle however) and actually get what I love? I do not like the vast majority of art people choose for their home so I would never ask anyone here "what do you think of this print?" I'm rambling but I guess it's all about keeping myself true to me." Bumblebeez, I feel your pain, really I do. :) Something that would truly *speak* to me, would be a gliclee of Monet's Sunrise. It was a work that was derided by critics in its time and I had the opportunity to see it in the Monet Museum in Paris. It would have much more meaning to me, and to my husband, than something I bought off of Etsy or Ebay. At least you, as an artist, have the pedigree be able to get away with buying what you want (not that you should have to make excuses). It's the same way about furniture. If it's not heirloom or CL, there will always be detractors. I just try to suck it up and decorate to the best of my abilities.

We met people in Italy who had taken cooking classes in Tuscany, but from what they described, I already knew how to make everything that was being taught. I still want to go back to Tuscany (and Rome), however. They may not have gone to the best school, and they may have only been taking beginner classes. I could probably benefit from taking French lessons in France, since I really need to work on my pronunciation, but France is not our list at the moment - and neither is England, although I might add it because flights to London on Norwegian Air are so cheap. I would like to take a Portuguese class, but those are hard to find. I've downloaded a bunch of videos, but I have to discipline myself to watch them. We might go back to Brazil in 2020. Another class I would like to take is sculpting. Already I sculpt Styrofoam at work for furniture parts (as well as clay), but I really want to carve stone - especially alabaster, as it is fairly soft. I think Santa Monica College has classes, but it's a bit of a drive, now that we no longer live in Venice. ETA: I did find this stone carving class in my neighborhood, and so I might look into that. That is only about a ten minute drive from my house, and there would never be much traffic. This class is about 15-20 minutes away, but is one day only and is $95.

Lukki, my DIL's kitchen is the same. She's not a cook but will bake brownies or banana bread once in a while. It makes me crazy to try to cook something for my grandson when I'm babysitting. It's a large, square kitchen with good counter space and storage, but there is no island, so it's like 9 or 10 ft from one side of the kitchen to the other. The work triangle is HUGE, lol. There are 2 lazy susan corner cabinets, kitty corner from each other. The one closest to the stove, where there is a microwave on the counter and a tiny bit of counter space, holds all the baking ingredients and some misc pieces. Kitty corner, on the side where the sink is, where there is one full counter run with nothing but the stand mixer on it, has all the pots and pans. OMG. Totally backwards from the most efficient arrangement. I do all I can to avoid having to cook there. Funny thing is, she'd be totally fine with me suggesting a different arrangement, but I don't want her to feel self conscious or bad that I noticed that.