Nature will put leaves and debris over crowns, and they will survive well. So I mow leaves over it to give it a finer texture making it more difficult for slugs to hide under. In areas close to the house I will distribute available bought mulches over all plantings including hostas. But I have a large H.'Blue Umbrellas' with the crown somewhat above the ground, exposed by winter rains, and it survives winter nicely. I lost hostas due to crown rot over winter, but they were located in low spots with water collecting above them. Bernd

Lynn, I know these past weeks have been rough for you and all your family. So glad your friends will be with you for Thanksgiving. I'm impressed by all of you who can start decorating for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving--I'm too tired and still to full for that so will wait for Dec. 1st. ;o) Enjoy your day and your Thanksgiving dinner. Jane, I know your family has been through some rough times this year too--and you can't help but miss the way things used to be. Since you've been so busy with the kids lately, maybe you and your DH will really enjoy a little peace and quiet and just a nice cozy Thanksgiving for two. Hugs to you. ;o) Frou, I'm so sorry to hear you have to work today and Friday too. Good that you have thought it through and are just thankful you are employed. That's what I call a good attitude--but hard especially knowing all those guests are coming! Know it will all work out fine and everyone will have a good time. Happy Thanksgiving. Hostarhodo, sounds like you have some fun things going on. How nice that you are catering the meal for your group. Have lots of fun and enjoy yourself. Old Crafty, more power to you if you can make it up that early to shop! My SIL and niece have done that for years too and they always have a ball. We will want to hear all about it, and maybe you will have some pics to share of some of your great finds. Have fun! Luvs

Thanks for thinking of us, NanaKaren, and here's wishing you a wonderful day too. It's so nice to have you joining in here with us. ;o) Luvs

Kim, That was a long drive. I hope the ice in west Texas doesn't make it terribly hard for you to make it back home again. I enjoyed a quiet, lazy day around the house, and being all nice and dry inside while the rain came down outside.It was a very relaxing Thanksgiving, though I missed seeing my family members. We'll be together a lot in December though, health and weather permitting. I might work on my Tomato Grow List today, although it may be challenging since the dogs and cats are bored and underfoot since they're stuck indoors and their solution is to come and try to sit in my lap, which makes it hard for me to use my laptop computer. There's only so much that a woman can hold on her lap at one time, and my limit appears to be 1 laptop computer and 1 purring cat who keeps trying to sit on top of the computer. I think things are looking up for us. They had raised the Red River flood projections a lot yesterday afternoon and evening, and now they have scaled them way, way back. At one point they thought the Red River would crest at the Gainesville Bridge at 34' or so, and now they are way down to 27' or 28'. That's nothing compared to what we had in May and June, so we're happy about that. Only 3" of rain here so far, but there's up to 5" more expected for our area. I'd be perfectly happy if no more rain fell, but it is so widespread that I don't think it all will miss us. None of it appears to be soaking in though, so there's tons of standing water everywhere, including some large puddling on some rural roadways. It doesn't look as bad this morning as it did yesterday when the rain was falling, so at least some of it has run off into the creeks and maybe that will keep the roads more clear of water during the next bands of heavy rain. It is a good day to stay home and stay indoors. After I fed the chickens, I let them out because they are used to free-ranging and get antsy if they cannot roam. I'm hoping they'll get their free-ranging out of their system and go back into their coops before the next band of rain arrives. Probably they will sit on the porch railing and stay mostly dry like they did yesterday. Having a porch rail filled with chickens certainly adds to the rural flavor around here. I am watching The Weather Channel as I type this and just saw the news of a high water rescue in Tarrant County around 3 a.m. They managed to find and save a deputy who was swept away while trying to rescue someone, but haven't yet found the person she was trying to save. I didn't realize how high the water had gotten down there just one county south of where you are---it looked worse there than it looks here. I think they said that was happening around 3 a.m. so perhaps they got a lot of rain overnight. Our rain tapered off overnight and we only got 0.75" so our rainfall total didn't climb significantly. They also showed a road under water in Grayson County, and it was under several feet of water. See there? More confirmation it is a great day to be indoors. Had I bothered going out shopping on Black Friday, which I haven't done in several years now, I likely would have gone to Sherman----the flooding was in a rural area, but who knows what it looks like there around the shopping centers. I can either go online and finish my Christmas shopping or work on my grow list for 2016 or both. Or, I have a stack of seed catalogs to look through. I am increasingly concerned about how much the ice storm conditions seem to be creeping ever further into central OK. It doesn't take a lot of ice to make a big mess of things. I cannot believe we are having to even have a conversation about snow, sleet, freezing rain and a wintery mix of all the above in November. It makes you wonder what's coming in December. Since we don't know when the El Nino water faucet will turn off in spring, I'll probably select 3 to 6 tomato varieties bred specifically for disease tolerance this year, which means hybrids. I am not overly fond of hybrids, preferring the flavor and texture of heirlooms, but in order to ensure the plants produce enough tomatoes to fulfill my canning needs, I think the 2016 tomato grow list has to be a mix of both. Since I am cutting back on how many plants I plant/grow, I need for at least some of them to be as bulletproof as possible. A rainy spring will mean a lot of disease, and I dread that. Dawn