Woohoo, I finally got some good rain! At least 1.5 inches of nice slow steady rain thanks to Andrea. We were on the edge and got just the right amount of rain with no wind. :) My dahlias are lovin' it! They are going to grow like crazy this coming week with the fully saturated soil and nice moderate temps in the mid 70s. HighlanderNorth, here's what I did to overwinter one 4x16 foot bed of dahlias last winter. The bed is a raised bed constructed two concrete blocks high, 16 inches. (See the picture.) So the dahlia tubers are all above grade and will not sit in saturated ground over winter no matter how much it rains or snows. I mulched the bed in late November with about 8-10 inches of dry leaves. Lastly I covered the whole bed with a 4x16 foot sheet of clear 4mil sheet plastic and weighted it down with bricks all around the edges so it wouldn't blow away on a windy day. The plastic sheds water which keeps the soil from becoming saturated and keeps the leaves dry which maintains their insulating value. I used clear plastic because that allow some sun to penetrate and helps warm the leaves and soil on sunny winter days. Along about early April I simply removed the plastic and part of the leaves and let the dahlias do their thing. All of the dahlias survived and most of the plants are huge already but a few looked weak and one i replaced. I don't know what was different about those that weren't strong right out of the gate. It worked so well that I'm going to do the same thing with the other 3 raised beds that I planted with dahlias this spring. I will leave the clumps I overwintered this past winter for a 2nd winter. I'm curious to see how much bigger the clumps get in their 3rd season (2014.) I'm hoping they don't get much bigger but instead stabalize at what would be their natural maximum size as a tropical perennial. I think one could accomplish the same thing, keeping the tuber clump above grade, with mounded raised beds. The thing I don't like about mounded raised beds is that they tend to become rounded instead of flat on top and shed much needed water during summer thunderstorms. You could also use a simpler construction method and build simple raised bed walls using treated 2x12s filled with good well draining soil. HighlanderNorth, you should give this a try next winter i think it would work well for you too.

Use this winter to read up on hardy palms. Lots of information on this site and others. Plan on starting with an affordable needle palm as they are the cold hardiest. Just realize in your zone that any palm will have to be winter protected indefinitely. Also this winter, study you garden spaces and try to locate the best micro climate. Usually the south facing wall is optimal. Will other plants need to be moved? Will the soil need to be improved? Better drainage? You can get started on that stuff before planting season. While some people caution against buying blue pot palms at Home Depot or Lowes, I've had great success with them, with few exceptions. I'm also in a much milder coastal location, so I have a slight advantage on the basic cold hardy palms. Just realize they are notoriously less hardy the first year or two. The real advantage is price. You can afford to lose a $40 palm, but not a $400 one. Plus get one that is large enough to sustain winters (with protection), but manageable enough to figure out how to protect it. You might do some research as to where needle palms are being sold next spring. After a successful first palm, you can think about more needles or experimenting with the next step on the hardy palm scale (sabal minors/dwarf palmetto). Again, Jim Hardy does amazing things with winter life support in his Iowa location.

Thanks millymoo and oldhousegal. When I re-read my post this morning, I almost regreted writing it. After a good night's sleep and reviewing our accomplishments, it seemed silly to be whining. Still, so far it has been alot of work. Like you said, oldhousegal, there is something "special" about the feeling only an old house offers. Next summer, we'll remove the 5 !!!! layers of shingles on the roof, straighten the roof line and re-frame etc the 2nd floor. And best of all, install the new roof. I'll post occasionally, hopefully with a better frame of mind, to keep you updated. It is truly a labor of love and we are fortunate to be able to do it. Thanks for the kind words of support when I so needed them. Danvirsse

These are great comments, thanks. I'm going to talk to a remediation specialist tomorrow and see what he thinks. The lady is fine with me having anyone come to the property and check it out. It really might be nuts to attempt two projects at once... however there are some snags / red tape with our larger property (building rights and stuff) that may take a couple of months to sort out. The GC thinks we could knock this renovation on the tiny house out relatively quickly, within 6 weeks; even replacing drywall. We're still pricing everything out though, so that might be the deciding factor. I'm torn between wanting to save money on rent while building and not wanting to get involved with a project that might end up being a nightmare. So hard to know. I'd be willing to take it on if a) the red tape with the county really does sap up another 3 months of prime building time, and b) if the amount invested would still save us a bundle on rent, and we'd be able to get something out of it at the end. Tearing it down is definitely an option. The land is priced so that even if you tore down the house and did nothing, the price per acre is still fabulous. And it has 3 water rights which are worth their weight in gold. This is part of why I feel bad about taking advantage. If she had this listed anywhere (we found her by accident, touring our property) it'd be gone in a hot minute, smokey house and all, just for the land. One option might be to tear it down and rebuild on the existing foundation. The footprint is much smaller than our house plans, but the GC still thought there was value there, the electrical, septic, and gas are all in, and the foundation (crawl space) could be altered to accept our home. The last kicker is this piece butts up to the north side of our property! We'd be adding ten more acres to our existing land. It could definitely function as a guest house, housing for a farmhand...