tivoli, I used to live on Long Island, last time I was up there, I did see a few crepe myrtles. It wasn't bloom time, so I don't know how well they bloomed, but if you put them in full sun, they should do ok. Down here in North Georgia, I am still in zone 7 believe it or not. We just have longer hotter summers. I would just think carefully about what you plant on the hill. I have a hill in my yard and I've pretty much let it go wild. I planted pine trees and a few redbuds towards the front. In the very front, where it's level, I put in a butterfly garden. I don't have anything up there that needs watering (except when the trees were first planted) fertilizing or spraying. It's tough to do that on a hill, it's hell on your knees, believe me. You could try to put some stone steps in the hill to help you get up and down, I'm condisering that for my hill. Some cascading roses towards the front over the wall would look fantastic.

The goumi continue to impress. They don't get out of hand. The robins love them and generally get most of them. Since I first posted here I have purchased two others for a shadier spot in the front yard. They are doing well also. The seaberry are another story. They root right underneath the surface of the yard, and have yet to meat a landscape timber or other barrier they couldn't master. Suddenly, one of the plants became very ill. I was totally stumped. The neighbor commented, weeks later, that he had a strange "weed" growing that took him several doses of roundup to kill. Aha! It came back some (it was over 6 feet tall when the roundup was applied) but new growth from the ever-expanding roots is a problem. I may try a large pot (in an attempt to contain the roots) else I'm done with them. Birds love them and they are tasty to me, but the pain of containing them is outrageous.

Just got back to read what's been happening. What gorgeous kitchens! A couple would aaalmost convert me to the furniture look, even though I've always (since childhood probably) loved a built-in look for a kitchen. Which is an awfully important point newbies to their designs probably don't consider right out when it needs to be -- do they really love boxes bolted to the wall (my usual description but wholly inappropriate to some of the works of art here) or built in? Five, your design sounds luscious. I can't wait to see pictures. We dropped the ceiling in a single little hall (budget build), but its contribution is so real (and maintenance-free :) that if I had it to do over there would have been more. Regarding dust-catcher tops, having a shadow line up there can be another simple but significant aesthetic contribution. If we'd done that, I was going to mount a vertical "back" to it, painting it a deeper color if necessary to hide it, so I only had to run a vac hose over the front few inches.

Also on the deck, coming up by the stairs, is 'Reine des Violettes' which continues "blueing" after opening its blooms. Thanks to "tweaking", I captured the color as it is right now on these three-day-old blooms. 'Tamora' opened her first bloom, and a few others are almost opened. But at the moment, she's a bit lost in this. The deep pink blooms belong to another long, arching cane on 'Mme de Sevigne' coming from the right of this pic. The white in the lower right corner is pegged 'Botzaris'. The white against the fence is 'Bubble Bath'. And the purple in the center of the right edge is 'Purple Skyliner. Clematis blooming on the fence, from left to right, are 'Red Star', 'Lasurstern', and 'Blue Light'. Same area as above, but closer to the front. You can see 'Botzaris' pegged in the center, with Dianthus 'Bath's Pink' to its right, and 'Mme Dore' to the right of that, with 'Monsieur Boncenne' behind her. See all the deep pink Bourbon blooms in the upper center of the pic? That's all 'Mme de Sevigne', arching up and over the others. She put out a few fat, tall, arching canes which I held in place with tree branches. This rose is really more of a climber, growing like 'Mme Isaac Pereire', perhaps even more so. But its canes seem rather self-supporting -- until the buds form, which is when I had to prop them up a bit. Near the short path in the bed to the garage window is 'Clotilde Soupert' still slowly opening its blooms. To its right is 'The Prince', which looks like it's going to have a rather stingy first-flush this year, just as it did last year. But then it blooms more often during Summer and into Autumn. Odd, right? When a rose has as many petals as 'Clotilde Soupert' has, it takes a while for them to open. I kept saying "any day now" for over a week. Notice there's no balling -- while we had some rather cool days this Spring, it's been unusually dry. CS balls for me only when cool and wet -- cool and dry, or warm and wet, I don't see balling. And I'll finish up with areas that still need further attention -- and roses. This area gets full-sun during the hottest parts of the day, so I'm going to think about Chinas and Teas which may work in a narrow bed against the neighbors' house. Here's 'Perle d'Or' which is still rather tiny, but came as one rooted twig two years ago. Despite my tweaking, I can't capture its apricot tints. To be continued.... :-) ~Christopher