Got mine today too! Walked down the street to the mailbox in the snow and ice for it lol I saw carolinaflowerlover got seeds and i had to check!! SO many things, i really wanted from my list so thank you for the thoughtfulness put into this Sassy! And in my madness, i ripped alot of gifts open without putting names to them but thank you everyone for the gift ones too!! I started off with so little to try this year and I have so much to revitalize alot of the old gardens!! I can't wait to share pics with everyone later this year! Since I didn't really keep everything seperated to thank everyone individually for the gifts (i'm sorries :( ), here's some of my favorite things that I thought I wouldn't get or that I'm looking forward to trying the most: Lavender Hyssop....never really thought about it till i looked it up and it attracts bees and butterflies...well thats a keeper for sure! :) Docmom, i was looking at an old post about your malva and i was so impressed with the deep purple and i really wanted it so I saw you had it on your list and searched in vain yesterday, to find something to impress you lol well I guess someone heard my prayers on that one! Daylily! (poisondartfrog) - really didn't expect to get any daylily seeds to try this year and i can't wait. all i have is the wild orange ones and stella de orro lol Trumpet Lilies....love lilies! :) Zinnias! (yes i said zinnias!), again i was looking at old pics by people and i saw someone who had a bed of these and they looked so pretty! so i will attempt to make a bed of these, just as nice! lol so many more, in fact, i could probably keep listing all of them but really i am so happy with my seeds!! thank you and i hope this swap will take place again! :) Happy winter sowing everybody!! :) ~Michael

Hi ellenrr, Sassy would see your post better if you would post to her swap thread...linked below. Sue The swap thread itself is on the 'Exchange Side" of the Winter Sowing Forum. Here is a link that might be useful: RE: WANTED: ~*~ Welcome to WinterSwap 2013! ~*~

I hate to do this but I feel that I should warn all of the other great and fair traders of the garden web about Suzannes devious seed trading habits. As some of you know, I host a Commercial seed swap each year. This swap was started by flwers4ever but I have been hosting it for 3 or 4 years now. All of the seeds that come into the swap are, of course supposed to be commercial seed. I have suspected in past years that Suzanne has been sending in seeds that are garden collected. I had noticed that sometimes where she said she purchased the seeds didn't even carry that seed that year or there were tiny bits of chaffe in the packaging. I always thought, "it couldn't be", it must be a mistake in her packaging and passed the seeds along to the other players in the swap. This year, through a series of odd events. I noticed that one of the packets sent in by Suzanne had two different handwritings. The first was one that I recognized due to having dozens of traded packets from her was gw member Sandygarden. I checked it against several packets from Sandy that I had here and then emailed Sandy to confirm that it was in fact her writing. I WAS FLOORED when I got her response. It is posted below with her permission"it's actually the second email because I asked her twice> ----Original Message----- From: sketchmark To: Lisa Sent: Thu, Feb 20, 2014 9:47 am Subject: Re: columbine seeds @aol.com> Beleive me it's my handwriting. Sandy then told me that she keeps very detailed records of seeds sent out so that she doesn't send players duplicate seeds in the many swaps she plays in [how sweet ]. The only swap these seeds were sent out in was the winterswap 2012 which Suzanne played in as well. I finally was able to call Suzanne out on her bad seed trading habits. I emailed Suzanne to express how upset I was with her deception and to let her know ALL her seeds would be returned to her. I have yet to hear back from her. I've added a pic of two packets of seeds, I have a 3rd were Suzanne wrote columbine Mckanna giants and Swallowtail 2012 also. The top packet that says echinacea is all Suzannes writing(for comparison), the bottom seed packet is Sandy's writing, well ,columbine mix and perennial is Sandys, Suzanne added in swallowtail 2012, made a second packet labeled columbine giants, packed them up and sent them off to me to be swapped for other players commercial seeds. This is just wrong in every possible way and I felt the need to warn anyone who may consider trading with her in the future. Lisa/ishare March,1st......I have just been notified that Suzanne has come on to claim that the seeds she marked were commercial from another player in another swap, do you see anything that indicates they are commercial? I have an email from Suzanne stating that her swapped seeds got mixed up with her commercial seeds. She is grasping at straws now that she has been caught. I DO NOT have any rule stating that you cannot send in seeds that were gifted/traded from another member. 2014 commercial seed swap rules are copied and pasted below. o 2014 commercial seed swap. clip this post email this post what is this? see most clipped and recent clippings NEW! Edit Post Posted by ishareflowers 6a. MA. (My Page) on Sat, Jan 4, 14 at 12:19 Welcome to the 2014 Commercial Seed Swap...Please read all the rules carefully as some have changed from last year. I know there are a lot of rules but it helps to make this a nice swap. Here are the rules: 1. COMMERCIAL SEEDS only (seeds that were purchased, not collected) 2. They must be seeds from 2012, 2013 or 2014 3. They cannot be dollar store type seeds (.29-.59.or .99 cent packages) 3a. There are no mixes allowed, zinnia, cosmos, bachelors buttons, marigolds and so on..... 4. In the original package is best but if that's not possible, please label where they were purchased, what year they are from and your screen name. 5..Please do not send seeds that are known to have a short shelf life. 5. There will be a 25 pack limit on VEGETABLE seeds this year. NO LIMIT ON FLOWER seeds. (I am doing this because I do not have a large personal stash of veggie seeds to fill in and make a great package for the veggie gardener) 6. No more than 3 packs of the same type of seed (please don't make 3 packets of the same seed with 5 seeds in each package) I have purchased seeds that come with only 10 seeds to a package and shared only 5 seeds of that, However, I have also had seeds sent in with 3 packages of 10 mixed marigold seeds. This is not fair. 7. If you send in all vegetable seeds, you will get back all vegetable seeds. I had a member send in all veggie seeds and request only flower seeds in return, this I cannot do. the same goes for flowers. I mark what each member sent so if you send in 25 veggies and 10 flowers, you will get back 25 veggies and 10 flowers. 8. Seed amounts, this is always a challenge. If you ordered a package of seeds and it came with a thousand seeds, chances are it is meant to be planted in masses. Please keep that in mind when sending some to your fellow gardener. 8a. These are commercial seeds so know that you will not always get a full gw trade amount "25 seeds>. It could be you only get 5 seeds of a perennial geranium because it was purchased with 10 seeds to begin with. 9. I will be posting a separate thread titled Commercial seed swap wish lists only. I ask that you put your seed wish list here for easier matching up for me. MAILING RULES: Seeds must reach me by March,1st Please put in a return mailing label along with your postage for the ride home. Postage should be what it cost you to send plus a little extra. This can be cash or stamps. I prefer cash because I mail from the Post Office and can pay exact amount due. When I have stamps, I have to put an extra stamp on for .20 cents due. I don't like paying them extra....lol Any excess $$$ will be returned! I do send seeds from my garden IF they are on your wish list. This is a gift and not counted towards my contribution to the swap. I'm not sure why that copied that way but the thread may be seen by sarching for 2014 commercial seed swap. She did email me a day or so after confronting her, here is what she said about the columbine seeds. Lisa I am sorry but I did not try to deceive anyone some of my seed trades must have gotten mixed up. As to the Columbine seeds, they come back to me in my swap package. Just Keep the seeds for newbies, Keep themoney and I’m very hurt and out of here! She emailed again the next day to say that she wanted all her seeds back (I was returning anyway She offered receipts for the seeds that she told me got "mixed up" on Feb,24th. I have yet to see one. TRADERS BEWARE! This post was edited by ishareflowers on Sun, Mar 2, 14 at 8:25

Wendy was great in hosting a Wintersowing Swap. You can tell she put in extra care and effort in matching up seeds with wants from our lists. Couldn't be happier with this trade and with how wonderful she was in making it all happen. You know that old saying about the post office "neither snow nor rain,,," well Wendy got it all done in one of the worst winters I can remember.