Celeste- Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! You have a beautiful family and beautiful roses :)

I hope this year brings you joy, as well as the many challenges you have ahead of you. You are so wonderful to care for your parents, but don't forget that it is okay to have help, to ask for it when you need it and to accept it when it is offered.

Congratulations on the new grandchild, too!

Great pictures, especially the one of your family with the incredible background scene.
By the way, you look way too young to have a grandbaby. I had to read that twice to make sure I read it correctly.

Randy

Celeste, that's a good title for your post and some very beautiful photos of roses and family. Is that Mount Washington in the background? I was just googling it yesterday after I remembered going for "a little walk" on that mountain with my family when I was about 8 yrs old. Great timing.

Sherry

Your family is just lovely and your backdrop is so beautiful.Best of wishes to you and your family in this New Year. Your roses look cold, really cold!! Lesley

Celeste--so nice to hear from you---the rose pictures are gorgeous---
Your family is beautiful-----you look great even with all your responsibilities----

Congrats on the new grandbaby---what a joy for you.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Florence

Thank you for your kind remarks, each of you.
Your words of friendship mean so much.

Sherry, the mountain in the family picture is Mt. Chocorua. (Mount Washington is further north). We can see Mt. Washington even so far off because it is so huge,
and it looks beautiful all robed in snow.

Randy, thanks for the compliment! (BTW, my son made
me wait til I'll be 50 for that grandbaby...I was ready
long before he was...lol.)

Some of you may have seen this picture already but I wanted to post this of my parents, both 86, this past
summer at my niece's wedding. A couple of years ago I did a thread on here about my dad's amazing vegetable garden that some of you may recall. Even this past summer Dad had a garden, but I fear it was his last. It brings tears to my eyes, but I have been blessed. Dad was, is, and always will be my hero.

Celeste

{{gwi:302814}}

Don't worry about having to wait til you were 50 to have that grandbaby-cuz look look like you are 30, and imagine all the fun you'll have correcting people when they think that you are the mom of that baby!

Celeste, that is such a lovely photo of your parents and yourself. Also the one of the younger part of your family and yourself. You certainly don't look 50.
God bless you in the comming year with your parents and your comming grandchild. How excitting you will have a future little darling friend to share the beauty of your garden with.
I am addicted to comming here every day too. It is going to be a great early 2010 here for my roses as so far we have had 86 mls of rain and it is still really rainning.
Your frozen photos are all excellent. Thanks for posting them.

Celeste, those roses in the snow are very romantic. And beautiful. I hope that your roses get through the winter well. Having this late bloom may be recompense for the lousy spring that you had, and all of those ruined flowers. Please let us know how the roses look next spring and how well they bloom.

I love your posts. Your affection for the roses, and for family and life, comes through so well. Thanks for sharing the pix of your family. I remember the photo of you with your mother and dad, and enjoyed seeing them again. So sorry that your dad is starting to slip away, too. That is hard. I don't know how you can take care of two ill parents and a grandbaby. You promised to take care of the baby, but sometimes reality intrudes, and you simply can't do everything that you planned to do.

Please find time to post on this forum now and then, and to keep checking in. I stop in here most days, too, and am always sorry when there aren't new postings and threads.
Anita

The only problem with late blooms may be that if the sudden onset of cold is too intense the canes won't be prepared for it. That's how I lost my White Rose of York a few winters ago. Hopefully the snow will give your roses good insulation against that!

As always, Celeste, your photos are wonderful!

Thanks everyone for your thoughtful comments.

I'm afraid there is going to be some major cane loss this winter. The temps really dropped off last night, and right now the wind is howling....its way below zero windchills. We lost much of the snow with the rain the other day and yesterday's snowfall only amounted to less than 3". At my elevation the wind plays a huge factor in winter damage, and the poor roses never really went into normal dormancy. We've had these below zero windchills a little while ago, then it 'warmed' up some, now back into the deep freezer. I have learned not to panic if I have to cut everything back to nearly the ground come spring...especially with the modern roses. I used to go through great pains to winter-protect, but once your rose count gets into the hundreds you have to let it slide. Roses are more resilient than some
people think, and will grow fast and bloom if well-nourished. I always get a chuckle when people ask how I can possibly grow hundreds of roses in my zone, that roses don't grow here. My roses never got the memo.
Celeste

Celestial rose,

My gosh are you immortal? I kept looking at the photo to see someone of an age to be a grandmother and thought "Nah, that can't be her!" Congratulations on your first grandchild, your immortal good looks and your lovely roses. I am particularly impressed with the photo of your Vigerosa.
Merry holidays to you,
Lux.

such gorgeous roses! Thankyou for sharing. we get no snow here, so color me jealous.

Congratulations! Beautiful pics.

You and I seem to be in the same weather pattern, it got really cold here too the other night and all our snow melted. I am hoping this storm that is coming this weekend is not as terrible as some are predicting!