Spalding -- It sounds like you betta is "flaring." It's a sign of aggression. I would separate the two bettas immediately, or you'll probably have a dead fish in your tank. Male bettas should NEVER be together in the same aquarium. In the wild, males will fight viciously over territory; the losing male is driven away. In all but the largest aquariums, there simply isn't room for males to establish separate territories. They will literally tear each other apart. One or both of your bettas will die. A male and a female betta should not be together in the same aquarium unless for breeding purposes. Even then, there is a great deal of preparation required before putting them together. Males are often very aggressive toward females and can serious injure or kill a female. Putting females bettas together requires a heavily planted tank and at least 3 females (a good set-up is a 10-20 gallon with 6-10 females). Female bettas will bully each other to establish a hierarchy. If there aren't enough hiding spots for separate fish, the "omega" bettas will be harassed and killed. Sometimes, even the best betta sorority will have issues. Certain females are just too aggressive to be kept with other fish and have to be removed. Success in putting females together really depends on the set-up and the personalities of the individual fish.

Hi everyone, Well, I'm happy to report this (ripoff) problem has been resolved! DH called the flooring manager today and spoke with him. We own a business also, and dh is a good negotiator, so I "let" him call. LOL! He explained the situation. The man immediately said they could not accept "special order" tile back. Blah, blah, blah. DH had a long conversation with the manager, and even mentioned that his salesman had offered me the tile from another source for less. Of course the manager didn't believe us and thought he meant because they have more than one supplier to stock their store. DH didn't argue, but of course that's NOT what the salesman said when he whispered to me over the desk and said I'd have to trust him since I'd be paying him. Ick.... still makes my skin crawl. Anyhoo, the manager was not going to take the tile back. DH told him we had more to order today, but needed to resolve this first, and said "did you notice the total sale on our tile was almost $17,000.?! And the manager said he did. Then DH pulled out the big guns (many of you suggested it... wish I would have logged on and read this first to get dh straight to it... LOL). He said "well, we're building an 11,000 square foot house, and my wife had thought to furnish much of our home from your large showroom, but obviously we won't be shopping in your store again. That got him! Suddenly he had a call to make and wanted to do something to help us out. First we were basically liars and his salesman was they best they had, and I was mistaken and wrong, and suddenly when they see dollar signs they're going to work with us. Made me really disappointed that it took that, but at this point I didn't want to give in to the slimy salesman. He obviously does things like this to other people. I can't believe that I am the first!! The manager called dh back after some time, and said they'll take it back for 20% restocking fee and $60.00 shipping fee. They "found one of their vendors who would take it back". Hmmm. Supposedly they couldn't take it back under any condition. Wonder why the rules changed?! :o~ LOL! So we decided to just go with their pathetic offer. We don't want this tile sitting in our garage. It is not my favorite tile, so I would not want to save it for another project like a future guest house or whatever (believe me, dh tried to talk me into that... LOL). OUr wonderful tile guy loaded all of the extra up with his helpers and took it over to their store, and picked up the remaining tile we need for our hallway tiling. He had a nice discussion with the manager about how his clients really liked their furniture store and intended to go back for some large purchases..... until today! The manager felt bad and apologized for the misunderstanding. They do have a sign posted that there are no returns on special orders. But tile man stuck up for me and said that of course when his client was in there shopping, she was not looking at little bitty signs on the desk but looking around at tile and designing her spaces. And that when their salesman suggested an extra 10% tile to my tile order, because of course we could return whatever we didn't use, it became "their problem". The manager agreed. Our tile man also advised the manager that he refers about a million dollars in tile sales to that area of that state each year, and it would be a shame if he had to say "except for XXXXX store. They'll rip you off, so avoid them! The manager about choked on that comment and was super apologetic! A few of the tiles were broken when he returned them today. I actually received broken tiles in my order, so when the manager said "oh, you've got a few broken tiles in here" my tile man said "yes, and that's how we received them. They are yours now". And the manager just gave up and accepted them. Brother!! I still don't think they realize they have a weasel working for them. I won't be the one to point it out. But maybe when about 10 other attractive female customers report that he's offering them lower prices if they buy thru him, they'll realize he is not a good representative for their company. Sorry if they didn't want to hear it today. So all's well. I would have preferred ALL my money back since the salesman said that, but sometimes you just give a little to "get" what you need. And I needed that tile out of my garage. :o) Thanks for your great advice. I'm relieved this is over. On to the next saga...... LOL!

I am new here, but I found this site after one of my items was removed from my ArtFire shop. After doing some research and reading their patent, these are the e-mails I sent and received from Taggies. From: Kristina Steffen [mailto:kaotickrafter@hotmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 2010 10:55 PM To: Cristi Navickas; mid@artfire.com Subject: RE: Intellectual Properety Infringment Notice from Taggies Inc. Ms. Navickas, I apologize for any harm I may have caused. I had no prior knowledge of this patent. I have a question. If my item does not have loops, is that considered an infringement? I read through the patent but I did not see any reference to un-looped ribbons. If you could please let me know, I would greatly appreciate it. Sincerely, Kristina http://www.kaotickrafter.blogspot.com http://www.jetisteffen.blogspot.com http://www.kaotickrafter.artfire.com http://www.craft4emma.etsy.com RE: Intellectual Properety Infringment Notice from Taggies Inc.â From: Cristi Navickas (cnavickas@taggies.com) Sent: Thu 3/04/10 8:11 AM To: Kristina Steffen (kaotickrafter@hotmail.com) Attachments: 1 attachment image001.png (7.7 KB) If there are no loops there is no infringement. Thank you, Cristi Navickas cnavickas@taggies.com If anyone would like to see the entire e-mail thread, or would like the patent, feel free to e-mail me kaotickrafter@hotmail.com Here is a link that might be useful: KaoticKrafter

This is a great thread and I've read it with lots of interest. I'm not as interested in IKEA vs. the rest as I am in frameless vs. framed. I grew up in Europe with frameless cabinets and have now lived in the US for nearly 30 years with various framed cabinets. I still like frameless better from what appears to me be a usability factor, but maybe that is all in my head, but the things that I'd like more information on is to figure out if this is just in my head. What is the inside dimension of a drawer for a say a 30" cabinet for the different brands, or use the 36" or an 18" as an example. The same goes for how much space is wasted in say in the 171" direction and the 143" direction due to the framed parts? It might not be much, but having gone from a large kitchen where I had plenty of storage and the frame was smaller to a smaller kitchen with framed cabinets that has more frame (I assume to save money on the doors) this is something that is really pushing me towards frameless feeling like it has less wasted space and be more comparable across lines of frameless cabinets vs. framed ones where that seems to vary by the manufacturer. One thing that to this day annoys me with the framed cabinets is the lip on the bottom shelf. I love it when I visit my mom and friends in Europe how easy it is to slide out a stack of plates from the bottom shelf and not have to go through the lift motion first.