Thank you! That picture is very, very helpful! Mine looks far from ready then, although some of the pods on the one I picked were starting to darken on the outside...I'll keep checking them daily or every other day. I'm really hoping I can get them at the right time. Not so sure the knee-hi thing works here...last year our strong winds blew them all off and away. Nice if a neighbor needs a spare pair of knee-hi's Linda

It's so hard to tell. It looks perhaps like it could be either Ipomopsis aggregata or Ipomopsis rubra. I found a source for seeds of Ipomopsis rubra and purchased them. I'm going to look for a source of Ipomopsis aggregata too. ha ha. The red liatris looks gorgeous, but the flower does not seem to have the individual tubular flowers as this has. Danielle, yes, this is my friends garden. His yard is STUNNING. He moved this past summer so I can't wait to see his new place. He's a perfectionist so everything is so neat and orderly. Mary Jane, this year we will be going to Iowa again. I wish you were much closer you would be welcome to come along. We have so much fun that I can not even describe our outings. We laugh and then we cry, one of my friends when she laughs hard she snorts and then we all laugh harder which makes one of the older gals...um...leak a little...which makes us break out into fits of giggling again. We've been doing this for the past 11 years and I'm worried it may be ending. One of the girls moved to MN and one of them found out she had cancer. I sure hope not. I need these mental health trips. ha ha. Thanks all for trying to figure out what the name of this plant is. I so want to get this one growing in my gardens. Hopefully, if I see my friend this summer he will have some seeds available. But I still would like to know what it is. ~Tj~

Hi there, I just wanted to respond to this post since I emailed someone that didn't necessarily have their email address on gardenweb. Sometimes when I search for certain things, like "white cabinets," a ton of posts with pictures of kitchens that do not necessarily appear in finished kitchens blog show up. Many times these are pictures off of photobucket. In one particular instance, I went back to find those photobucket pictures to show my husband, and I simply searched in google "GW's screen name kitchen" His or her email came up on google, and I emailed them asking if they minded sharing where they got their cabinets since they are local to Chicago, where I live. I would not be offended if someone emailed me asking me that, and so I didn't think anyone else would be offended either. Anyway, I just wanted to share how it is I came upon getting someone's email...actually quite unintendedly. hth, Pebbles81

In my family, in the Pacific Northwest of the United States the Thanksgiving meal always included: A big plate of crudites with onion dip. a crystal platter with black olives, enough for every child to slide a big black olive over each of her fingers. a big roast Turkey, when Grandma was alive it would be a 24 pound bird. with stuffing made with toasted bread cubes, onions, celery and sage and other herbs and chicken broth. gravy made with giblets. Mashed white potatoes made with butter and cream. Sweet potato sliced and baked with lots of butter and with small marshmallows baked on top. Cranberry sauce. One puts this on the turkey. I saw a movie set in England where someone very kindly tried to reproduce a Thanksgiving meal for his American wife and he served raspberry jam with the turkey. a heartfelt sentiment which is more important than food. If I were in England and couldn't find cranberries I'd look for lingonbery jam, for they are a bit closer to cranberries in taste, though the berries are smaller. Brussels Sprouts Rolls or biscuits and butter. and for dessert pumpkin pie with whipped cream on top. Now that I've lived in California for 30 years I've seen many Thanksgivings that had all of the above foods but also had in addition to pumpkin pie, a very rich pie made of pecans. Most of , no- all of the African Americans I've known always have sweet potato pie in lieu of pumpkin pie and in my opinion it is a far superior pie. Nowadays we usually start with a big salad often a Caesar salad as it is simple and the rest of the food is so rich. I love Thanksgiving, it is such a heartwarming holiday with none of the commercial stress of Christmas when one is rushing around trying to find a parking space and then the right gift for every one. Although it takes a large effort to cook a large Thanksgiving meal. I often feel closer to God on Thanksgiving for God is Love, and love is a familiar feeling on that day along with gratitude. Most Thanksgivings I've been at have always had one or two persons who were invited at the last minute when someone found out they had no family locally to go to . I have been that person myself several times when new to an area. Thanks for asking, Lux.