I understand the feelings that you have trying to do the best for someone whose company you don't especially enjoy. About all you can do is just what you feel comfortable with and forget the rest. Here's one way of doing it. A little tricky, but it can be done. Sell her house. Then she lends that amount of money to you at a certain rate of interest. Put the money in CDs. The amount of money that the CD earns should about offset the amount of interest that you will owe on the "loan". This interest then goes to help pay her bills. Have it set up so that when she dies, the loan is forgiven and you get all the money in the CD. We did this for my aunt when she had to go into a NH and her pension and SS money was not enough. I, as her agent, lent her money to the family business paying "her" a monthly interest payment which was paid to the NH. When it was all over, the principle of the note was intact and was distributed according to the terms of her will. Just a thought as to a possible solution for you.

Saphire, some other thoughts: As Barb mentioned, you need to have a locked, inaccessible (to grandma) cabinet for ALL medications,including your mother's. I know that both Barb & I have had experiences with our parents misusing medications. It's pretty typical for the elderly. Include all over the counter medications too -- just about anything that you can purchase from a drug store. Use the same precautions you'd follow if you had a 2 year old crawling around in the house. Last year I read about an athlete poisoning himself with the over use of Ben Gay. So go through your mom's medicine cabinet carefully and scrutinize everything. Your grandma already has proven that she needs complete supervision with her meds. See if you can install some sort of intercom system between the apartments. That way if your mom needs help, she could much more easily contact either you or your brother's family. Radio Shack might be a source of help. You might want to look into special call buttons and emergency phone services. With her bad back, your mom should not attempt to pick grandma up after a fall. Call 911 and just wait for the help to arrive. To save wear & tear on your mom's back, work out a bathing schedule for grandma that will always have someone else assisting. Do the same for laundry & house cleaning. It could be one of your family members, or you could hire someone to come in for a few hours each week to take care of those needs. Regarding transitioning into the role of caregiver, there's no easy way. With your grandmother, you can always blame the changes on the hospital doctors. Just say that they're the ones who ordered this kind of oversight. You'll probably have to repeat yourself a dozen times each day for a while. For your mom, you'll just have to tell her that the inconveniences to her freedoms are for grandma's sake. Without her cooperation & willingness, grandma would have to be sent to a nursing home. Good luck with all that. It's really hard because most elderly absolutely hate giving up any of their independence. It's understandable but it doesn't make it easy on the caregiver. Check out web sites that carry assistive devices. I'm linking one below. These places carry lots of products that can be most helpful when dealing with mobility challenged individuals. Some of these things could make life a whole lot easier for your mom and the other members of your family while you're taking care of grandma. I have several others websites saved if you need more. Here is a link that might be useful: Dynamic Living

flowerlilies, Often people who work in garden centers don't really understand much about pests, diseases, and chemicals. You should ask first on the GW forum for the particular kind of plant. And don't believe the first poster who responds, because we can make mistakes too. Though, if we let a reply stand without further comments, that's probably a tacit approval. It's really important not to panic and apply a barrage of remedies before you have a good diagnosis. Also, when you post a question, it's important to give a general idea of where you live, because pests and diseases are regional, rainfall and winter damage can play a role, etc. For example, a diagnosis of scale insects on roses would be more likely if you are in Southern California, Hawaii, or Miami. But rose midge, suggested above, doesn't exist in those places. One thing I can say for certain, the purple spots with lighter centers are either cercospora spot or spot anthracnose, both fungal diseases that usually don't require control measures. Also, there may well be some spray damage, because homemade and "organic" sprays are rather likely to damage plants if not used carefully. Large purple smears are often the result of spray damage. What are you saying is wrong with the open mauve flower? If the grayish things are scale, they will scrape off easily with a fingernail.

Thank you for all the comments, very appreciated. This wasn't a bought tree, we actually germinated the seed, that's the main reason why it was indoors, also, because we live in a very heated city (surpassing 120F during summer) and it's also very dry, just a small hand full of plants can actually survive full sunlight here, Since it was so small we were afraid the sun and heat would kill it so we thought of keeping it indoors until summer ended. Lately the temperature's been nice (around 95F max) so I guess it's time to finally take it outside :) Thank you for your advice! To those who asked me about recently moving it, the sapling has always been next to a window but since it has grown a lot during the past weeks I guess now it need more sun power, hehe.