The blue in the 1st pic is centaura cyanus aka annual bachelor button. The tall yet to bloom appears to be cosmos bipinnatus aka annual cosmos. The red vine is lathyrus odoratus an annual sweet pea. The last pic appears to be verbena bonariensis hanging out over the side. You can indeed collect seed from these. Some of them will automatically reseed themselves if had been ground planted.

And is this trunk healthy? I've been doing research and it looks like a lot if dead wood however there are healthy stems growing from it so im confused whether to cut iy all out when i prune it

stephanj - yup, DIY projects will certainly test a marriage! ;) Another decision change here: since those two upper cabs over micro/fridge are on the opposite side of the kitchen and separate from my planned white cabs by the sink/window, I think I'm going to have those stained, too. That way, if I decide to do a full white on that accent wall, the stained cabinets may provide some nice contrast...just more thinking out loud. Re: BS, thankfully, we'd be adding only 12 sq ft by extending it to the top. Does that still qualify it as giant? :) Maybe the space just looks larger in the photo. I did my nerd thing last night, actually. :) Know what? It's a necessary step to take, and I promise it'll make you feel much less overwhelmed -- I know I do. Are you getting new cabinets or just reorganizing where things will go? If the former, here's another super, super helpful thread just on the topic of drawers. Scroll down about halfway, til you get to: This was such an eye opener for me, as up to now, I was applying vertical storage concepts only to pizza pans and cookie sheets. I was up and down out of my chair all night, measuring all my glass baking pans, casseroles, etc. Now I have to go weigh items (that I plan on storing in the same drawer) to see if I'll need to upgrade the drawer hardware -- knowing me, I will, just to be on the safe side. And absolutely LOVING this: Can you smell another DIY around the corner?! Because of the current configuration of my island and the way the downdraft ducting and electrical is set up down there, I'm going to end up with a (get this!) space in the left/front that measures 30" high x 24 wide x 12" deep. Goofy/Wasted space (I think) to put a stack of drawers there (each one would have, what, about 10" front-to-back length of usable space?). I wanna hang one of these across the top of the space (so, sitting just under the granite top), and hang my everyday skilles, pots, etc. off here. I wonder if these hooks are on a sliding rail: how cool would THAT be, to accommodate pans/pots of varying heights?!

This is the second year for my Falstaff, and so far I'm loving it. It's not pink, but deep magenta, fading to purple (and a nice purple, not a sickly one). The flowers are durable in rain, the flowers nod, which I like (and which might help them from collecting water). So far, not much frying in the sun (although smaller flowers with the 90F heat). Biggest disappointment: almost no fragrance, but when detectable, it is old rose. First flush flowers were about 3". Flowers don't flatten out but keep this cupped form. It's starting to put out a second flush now when WS2K is busily frying its first flush in the sun and mildewing. Most remontant roses (i.e. hybrid teas) here put out a nice first flush, then a few miserable looking flowers in the heat if any, then another nice flush in the fall. Falstaff mildewed a bit this year. We don't get blackspot here. Photo bloom color is accurate. In my tough climate, it takes a while for plants to grow. Planted in the spring of last year, it did nothing the rest of the year. This year the bush is very vigorous (like climber vigorous), upright, but not stiff, and the new basals are almost as tall as the bush now. The leaves are matte and nicely formed, very old rose. Here's the first flush. I hope it gets all big and gangly.