I have been picking up loads of old produce from a nearby stand for almost 2 years, about once every 2 weeks. I have looked into this and supposedly after you compost the stuff you don't need to worry about what it was sprayed with, it will break down. Remember these things are supposed to be edible in the first place. There is a danger from some kind of herbicide or pesticide in grass clippings, something that doesn't break down in composting, but produce should be safe. I do get tired of taking the little plastic stickers off oranges and other fruits, I wish they would make them all from paper. This year I didn't have many leaves stored, so especially when it rained a lot my compost smelled awful for a while. I am thinking about starting some huge compost piles in chicken wire or some kind of fencing and layering produce with wood chips, and letting it just sit for a long time. Marcia

Sara, I have struggled with the weeds ever since moving to Oklahoma in 1999, and have finally determined that mulching is MORE IMPORTANT in the veggie garden than anything else I do, you know? I see a lot of people in our area who till up the ground and plant a garden in the spring--say about April. The garden looks great as you are driving by. All that lovely brown or reddish-brown soil and all those tiny green shoots in rows. It looks great by mid-May. By early June you see weeds creeping in. By late June the gardens have as much weed and bermuda grass visable as row crops. By July the weeds and grass have won and the veggies are virtually abandoned by the homeowners. Then the same thing happens all over again next year. I can't understand people doing all the work each year to start a garden and then letting the weeds take over. So, every year in my garden I mulch and hand-pull weeds, and every year the weeds are less and less of a problem. Mulching is definitely the key. Now, if I could just "transplant" my weed control success from the veg garden to the rest of my landscape! Susan, I wish the swap were in late June or early July so I could bring bushels of tomatoes and corn and beans! Since the swap is in April, though, about all I can bring is a few letover tomato plants that I didn't have space to plant. If I had planned ahead and planted a lot of cool season crops, I might have had some to share. But I save almost all my space for warm-season stuff, and those plants aren't producing yet. Love-lies-bleeding is very slow to germinate. I always soak the tiny seed in water and sprout it in pots to get it started. I transplant it while it is tiny. I haven't planted any the last couple of years because it usually reseeds itself nowadays. The problem is that I grow 15 or 20 kinds of amaranths/celosias/cockscombs, so I never know for sure just what has reseeded until they get a foot or so tall. Until then they all look alike...well, all the red-flowered ones look pretty much alike...and all the green-flowered ones look pretty much alike, etc., etc. I do love the double blue Japanese morning glory with the picotee edge. I planted it two years ago and it was gorgeous. I haven't tried it since. Simply a space problem. And I do love Grandpa Ott's. It is so beautiful. I noticed that even Wal-Mart has seeds of it now, so guess it it one heirloom that has won full acceptance and has, thus, been successfully saved from extinction. I am waiting for that first ripe tomato. Every day I go and look at the 2 plants that have one fairly large tomato each. I stare at them and try to will those tomatoes to grow faster and ripen sooner. Those big fat green tomatoes stare back at me as if to say "we'll get ripe when we're good and ready and not before". I guess I don't have to tell you that the day they are finally ripe we will have BLTs for lunch AND dinner! Dawn

Beyond the drain hole question. Even though your containers look reasonable -- are they 5-gallon size? -- your plants in first 3 images ran short of water somewhere along the way. Most look short of nitrogen. Even if 5-gallon size, that's small for the huge watermelon. Needs lots of water for the fruit. Plus you have the complication that the containers are on a concrete surface which heats up considerably and reflects *lots* of heat onto the sides of the containers. As a result, roots die on the sunny side. And if the water immediately runs oust of the containers, the potting mix -- I assume you used potting mix -- dried out and has pulled away from the sides. If so, set in a tub of deep water to rehydrate. MAXIMUM 20 minutes, or you'll drown your treasures. Here is a link that might be useful: your images

OMG. None of those except for the Cheerios would make it in the door at my house. We get stuff like Barbara's and Kashi. The best way, IMO, to make grilled cheese: 1. bread, sliced thin cheese or shredded cheese, and butter. These are the essential ingredients. I like to jazz it up if it's just me eating it and add things like: Rosemary Sourdough bread, goat cheese, havarti cheese, tomato, arugula, prosciutto, etc... Anyway, the basic method is this: Butter both slices of bread, one side only. In a non-stick skillet on medium high place the bread butter-side down until it's melted and the bread is golden toasty and buttery. Turn the bread over, immediately add the cheese and top with the other slice. Both buttered sides are now on the inside of the sandwich (and melting the cheese). Lower the heat on your pan and get a lid that just fits over the top of the sandwich, creating a little tent. Put the lid over it for 30 seconds, flip the sandwich, repeat. Remove the lid. This helps to flash-melt the cheese. Take some more butter, pick the sandwich up with the spatula, and place the pat of butter in the pan and put the sandwich on top of the butter. Move the sandwich around, cook until that side is golden brown. Flip, repeat, serve. I like to add thin sliced tomato after when I'm cooking a basic sandwich. I don't like cooked tomato. But you can add your other ingredients at any time. The basic idea, for me, is to avoid soggy bread and have thoroughly melted cheese. The mayo, when I use it, is used on the outside of the bread in the first step, flipped to the inside. So the cheese is on the cooked mayo side when the sandwich is finished and the outside is buttered. My DH hates cooked mayo, but I think it really adds good flavor. You don't need a lot, just a very thin layer, enough to turn golden on the bread. Serve with really good mustard or ketsup or tomato soup.