Hi Joni, I'll have to take a photo of the IML 1598 and hoya griffithii to show for comparison. The leaves on 1598 are rather thick and succulent and are also pubescent on the backside. Hoya griffithii leaves are long and narrow with no fuzz and are not as fleshy as those of IML 1598. Griffithii seems to be quite the slow grower where as the sp. India IML 1598 is a rather fast grower. http://www.hoyor.net/en/showspecies.php?id=183 if the link I provided actually works ,take a look at the flower of the TRUE hoya griffithii and compare it with the one I posted above from the hoya that was sold to me as H. griffithii,they look nothing alike. Really there just shouldn't be any mix ups with these 2 as they look nothing alike. They differ so much in appearance that they shouldn't even me mistaken for one another when not in bloom.

Ladonna and Jaymielo, Thank you for the nice comments. Both your houses are beautiful. LaDonna, your doors are gorgeous and what great porches. Jaymie, love the gables and the beam accent trim. The stone and paint color on your siding really complement each other. We went back and forth on colors, we did the soffits and trim before we settled on house color so decided to match up to the roof and hoped for the best. We weren't sure about having roof trim different than the main house trim, but are happy with the results. We may leave the cedar shingles natural with a clear coat or do a semi-transparent mahogany stain. Heck, I'm just glad to get the last of the Tyvek covered over! Jill

Hey lindy...I talked to my best friend today about tables and she said (with disdain) that I am NOT allowed to look at pub tables for my DR...no matter how casual we are! Sigh. You know what? We found a dark, distressed table (regular height) at World Market that I really liked and I think we might just go with that for now. As for the sofas...still haven't decided anything but this Sunday's paper had a flyer from RTG with one of the sofas I'd been considering. This time it was pictured in a beige room and the rich gold tones just seemed to POP from the sofa! Seeing that made me think it might work...but I'd still like to find a plain, comfy sofa and just decorate with pillows. You know what? After we put the girls to bed tonight, I may sneak to the computer and try to scan & post the Rooms To Go sofa to show it in a different setting!

SJHockey, your tale had me LOL. The main thing that is driving me nuts is wall to wall carpet in our bedroom areas. We replaced carpet with new 7 years ago and shortly thereafter it started to pull away from the tack strips leaving us with crumpled carpet. When I was renovating the kitchen I had the LR carpet ripped out to continue the hardwood in the kitchen/breakfast area into the living room but we were leaving the carpet in the bedrooms. I asked our flooring man to have a crew come out to re-stretch the carpet. DH insisted that they didn't have to send a special crew out so the stretching didn't get done. Now all it would have taken was another phone call but did I? No..... it's been almost 2 years and we still have the crumpled carpet. I'm so disgusted with the carpet that I decided we are having it ripped out and installing hardwood instead. Our downstairs bathroom that DH uses is a nightmare. When we had it completed our handy man used the cheapest fixtures he could find. I promised myself that I would promptly have everything replaced but it's 19 years later and the only change is my DSIL put a Pergo floor in for DH. If we ever sell I will have to have the whole thing ripped out and redone because it's an embarrassment. =-qwa