Hello ALL, I am so looking forward to meeting you all. I am not the best gardener in the world but I try. I have built a 44 foot diameter labyrinth in my back yard, a wooded lot but still half of it has good sun. I am trying to collect hostasfor the past couple of years to surround the perimeter, but I have a long way to go. So anyone with extra hostas, I can't collect enough of them for this project! I am also looking for day lillies, especially the yellow ones but any color will be helpful. I am also looking for the herbs: costmary, comfrey, Lady's mantle and sweet woodruff I have a very limited perenial garden so I am open to any extras that you might be able to share. What I have to share: the herb southernwood. It is a green feathery like plant. It is suppose to repel insects. I was told to take the greens and wood stems in early spring and put them around my echinecia plants to keep them from being attacked by bugs and it has worked for me! It is not evasive at all. It more or less stays right in the same place you plant it. I make snippings and root them for new plants. So if people are interested please let me know so I know how much to bring. Rose campion. It is has beautiful 18 inch silver grey stem with brilliant scarlet red small blooms. I have to say this plant is beautiful but it will spread seeds and within a few years you will have a lot. The plant isn't evasive per se it just seeds a lot. So I have given it, its own perenial garden so the garden just seeds itself and the wave of red blooms are stunning. I get so many compliments on it. It blooms in summer through fall. It is an old fashion cottage type perenial that would look great in any garden, but if you put it in with other flowers, just take note that you will have to cut the seed head before they are released or you will have to dig up the seedlings the following spring and put them where you want them. Again, if anyone is interested let me know. I don't want to dig up any more than people will take. Egyptian Onion. I love it. It comes out with the chives each spring, You can use it like thick chives or use the small shallot like onions that grow on the top. A pretty plant that is one of the first to welcome spring. I don't know what my spring soups would taste like with out my Eqyptian onions. Chives, I guess everyone knows about them Feverfew. A herb that is also an insect repellent. It grow aboyt 12 to 18 inches with a lot of greenery and beautiful small white Daisey like flowers. This does spread its seed through the yard but I would not call it evasive. When I do see a seedling growing in another part of the yard , I just dig it up and replant it with the rest of the feverfew. They are very beautiful in the summer and last quite a long time. Sun drops. Someone told me they were evening primrose sun drops. I don't know about evening primrose becasue they have bright yellow flowers that bloom during the day. They bloom the same time as the Rose campion and they compliment each other very well, color wise. Of the flowers that I have, I think these are the most evasive and WILL take over your garden if you don't give it its own spot. But they are very pretty. Echinecia. I have a few purple coneflowers that I could share, but I don't have too many of them. Cat Nip. My cats love it. I grow it by my kitchen door so I know where the cats are most o fteh time! Spearmint. Who can live without it! I am looking for pepermint if anyone has it. Purple Siberian Iris Lily of the Vally Red Dahlias I think that is about it I am cleaning out my bookshelves and will try to bring some gardening books. And I will try to get my husband to make apple knubby cake. You can e mail me directly at blaketaylore@yahoo.com if you want any of these plants or have any questions about them. Looking forward to the swap! Blake

Marlene, Cindy, Kathy, It was my pleasure to host the swap and we will do it again next year as well. I can't believe that the weather turned out to be the way it did, nor rain, sun and a few clouds, but I could have done with out all the humidity. And to think, at 6:30AM this morning I was sitting here trying to decide who to scream at first for pushing me to go with today for the swap. It was storming for the 4th time since 1AM this morning and the weather maps where showing a wall of rain and storms heading in. Who would have thought we would luck out the way we did. Glad you had a good time, we do have a wonderful group of gardeners that come every year to the swap and keep adding and adding to the selection of plants and seedlings every year. Marlene, I will email you if I find any more pots that Michelle could use, and you should tell her to start checking out the yard sales whenever she can. She will be amazed at the pots she can find that way and the prices are really a steal. Kathy, I checked some of the pics in the link and those flowers still didn't look like the one you gave me last year and I got seeds from. Happy planting to all of you and happy gardening. How about some pics of the plants and seedlings when they bloom and thrive in their "new homes'. Hint, Hint Kathy, "new homes". Fran

I will be bringing: 4 or 5 black feather grass plants (most are blooming or seeding or whatever you want to call it) One large miscanthus sinensis and two babies Two white coneflowers A gomphrena baby Numerous cuttings (some rooted, some not) of my wax begonias, and two or three splits off of the big plants -- they were too big to overwinter at their warm-weather size; these are quite nice! I have bronze-leaf (double pink blooms), variegated (very free-blooming), an angelwing (also very free-blooming, but in orange -- lovely plant), as well as a plain leafed one with pink blooms that pretty much blooms continously. All are very vigorous and have over-wintered very well for several years. A double-pink Impatien (I had two, but I only want to have to overwinter one) A stem of a pink and white blooming geranium; lovely, but looks pretty sad at the moment! Needs a Geranium guru! Cuttings from rose scented and gray lady pelargoniums - May give one of the big ones away entirely. Some seeds - barnyard red hollyhock, maybe some white cleome, white penstemon (digitalis foxglove), and a really nice black-stemmed, Black Eyed susan. Jeff, I have your Rasberry Delight salvia -- looks a bit sulky at the moment (too much rain and the pot doesn't have enough drainage), but it bloomed all summer after I rooted it. See y'all soon. I'm bringing Broccoli Casserole (per usual) for lunch.

I know how ya'll are...................pictures will be following in a few weeks. I'm going to finish the fence, then two more flower bed borders around the new patio (which is complete!!), first. May even make ya'll wait for the waterfall ---- yeah, that's it, ya'll will have to wait for the waterfall, too! : - ) J.D.