Ah, yes. I have several varieties of cereus cacti. They grow SOOOO easy from cuttings. They will branch after they've been topped. I've never had one set fruit before. The blooms are HUGE, mostly opening at night, and fading quickly the next morning if the heat is too intense. I've got some new flower buds setting on mine, I'll try to get pics. Maybe I should go out and attempt to pollinate them ;-)

I was going to say that your plumbing quote sounded outrageous too. We will probably end up paying around $3500 for plumbing which includes moving all of the plumbing around except the waste for the toilet (moving one sink, adding a second sink where there was none, moving tub drain and supply, moving shower drain and supply), plumbing a somewhat complex shower, and running brand new supply lines from the basement to the 2nd floor and cutting the remaining lengths of galvanized out of wherever he could find them. I should have a better idea tonight what the final number will be though. That includes having plumber number 2 redo some work done by plumber number one (comparable prices though). I HATE it when contractors think they have you and quote you ridiculous prices. Makes me nuts. We went through that with a couple of boiler install quotes, eventually found someone who was twice as smart and articulate as the others but 30% lower price. If you are not happy with what you are hearing, keep looking. You might want to call your local building inspector and get recommendations. We are friendly with ours but everyone he has sent us to has been fantastic and reasonably priced.

Thank you all so much for the warm welcome! I look forward to becoming a trainee 'Enablers R Us'! I will definitely post pictures, just as soon as the stuff in the Michael's bags currently spread out on my DR table have been wreathed, swagged, ornament basketed, ribboned... you know, basically frou-frou'ed! :-) (Note to self - yes, turns out I do have to wait for the weekend to finish the DR chandelier, because by the time I get home from work it's dark, and since it's the only light in the room those flame bulbs get HOT, and no, I'm not dexterous enough to swag it, ribbon it, etc and not get burned...) Ahem... so, pics targeted towards the weekend. ;-) Karen - you've got me hooked with the thought of Mikasa holiday figurines at thrifts! Jeannespines, I'm now thinking I need some more snowmen! Marlene - scary! I was just thinking I might need to search out a deal on holiday tableware....slippery slope, isn't it?! Really happy to be here, all - thank you again for the warm welcome!

Anna bought me one and two sizes of bags for Christmas. I put some leftover lasagna in one this evening and it worked. I tried it the other day and had to resort to lilliepad's way of doing it. I have another vacuum sealer ( besides my big food saver one ). It has a hand held pump and a tube on it that fits inside regular zip lock freezer bags. It works pretty good. It is in a corner cabinet on the bottom. After our yard sale tomorrow Anna is going to pull everything out of there for me so I can get to the stuff I want in the front part. Linda