Hello all,

I'm sorry I've been MIA for so long. I don't know exactly why I stopped visiting - getting back on here feels like coming home again. It's good to see so many familiar "faces" in the threads.

We've had some big changes at our home. We put in a new kitchen last summer. It was a long, messy process, but we had a great builder, and it turned out lovely.

I had some health issues through the summer and fall, which derailed me from gardening more than I wanted. It felt strange to not be outside in the dirt as much.

My husband was laid off last November 4, and spent the past couple months job hunting. He just started a new job in Rome, NY, this week. It means we'll be moving later this spring. For the time being, he'll live with his sister near Rome, and come home on the weekends. We'll be putting this house on the market in a month or so, and looking for another (with a BIGGER YARD!!).

We're moving farther NORTH, which we didn't think would happen. When he was laid off, I was so afraid that he'd get a job far away and we'd have to move quickly (before spring), that I dug up many of my favorite daylilies and other plants and plunked them in a holding area in pots and baskets, so I could take them with me no matter what happened. It looks like I'll have some leisure to take things that are special. LOL, I'll have to wait for the daylilies and peonies to bloom so I'll know which plant is which - I didn't label them. I'll get to play "name that flower" for a while.

Funny, though - I realized that only about 1/3 of my daylilies were important enough to me for me to dig them up right away to save. That's one way to cull my collection down to its essentials!

Laurel