Hi Veryzer, I'm outside Peoria, is that close by you? I've given DD a third chance; this time as grafted from Pickering. It's still small, it is blooming tho; so we'll see how it fares over the winter. I'm hopeful third time is the charm. I grow over 234 roses; only lost about 6 this past winter and 4 of those were Bucks...HoneySweet, Spanish Rhapsody, Wild Ginger, and Pipe Dreams. I have HTs, Bucks, OGRs, shrubs, floribundas, with lots of daylilies, iris, hostas, clematis, peonies, and other perennials. My most dependable and floriferous of the Bucks is Folksinger; but it is ravaged by JBs and is their favorite target. Polonaise is another Buck that is dependable, healthy, and the red blooms last and last on the bush. I'd welcome a visit to talk rose anytime; send me a private e-mail. I also belong to the Great Peoria Rose Society; we meet on the first Monday of every month and it's a great way to learn about roses, and to meet other rosey friends. Would you be close enough to attend the next meeting in August? Plus the desserts are great! -terry

Oklahoma always has it all -heat, drought, fires you name it. But for the last few years this drought has had a major impact on so many states. A friend of mine is a commerical nurseryman in Southwestern Kansas and she may actually have to close up her business if this drought cycle doesn't break next year. They say hog farmers are having to sell their livestock early because there just hasn't been enough rain (get your cheap bacon while you can). And everyone knows about the cattle ranchers and farmers. I'm so happy someone is getting rain. We got an inch after months of nothing last week, but nothing since and that inch is long gone. Mother nature needs to give us all a break out this way....Maryl

Following up on my reply, above, getting away from the two-story entry (porch or portico) is a HUGE step away from (the idea of) a McMansion. McMansions were never designed to enhance family life. They were created to enhance builders' bottom lines by taking advantage of human nature, the desire to keep up with and then surpass those damn Joneses -- dangling the American Dream, dressed up with some bling, at what seems to be an affordable price, never mind that it's actually OVERpriced for what it is, which is a mass-produced house constructed cheaply with no thought to proper design, with low-quality materials and low-quality craftsmanship. Part of the appeal is the outsize scale, like two-story entries, great rooms rather than more aptly named family or living rooms, and acres of granite and stainless steel in the kitchen. If you hang out in the Remodeling or Home Decorating forums for any length of time, you'll find a steady stream of posters who are trying to deal with wonky McMansion layouts requiring great creativity and often a great deal of cash (window coverings for those giant windows don't come cheap) to turn their McMansions into vaguely liveable homes. Some will call the forum members here purists or professionals, and say that various terms are for experts, and so on. But I continue to be amazed by the number of regular homeowners who come to this forum because they have some sort of nagging, persistent uneasy feeling — backed up by no special education or training whatsoever — that there is something very wrong with their house plans and they have problems pulling the trigger to start construction. That’s because a lot of architecture is actually common sense and involves basic math like the golden mean or golden ratio, which few of us remember from school but which we’re surrounded by, in nature and art as just two examples. Most of us might not be able to define “golden mean” or other architectural terms, but we can understand on a basic, unconscious level the concepts of balance, proportion, rhythm (the repetition of certain elements) and feel much more at ease in a house built with good balance, proportion, and rhythm than in one with little or none. Similarly, while we might marvel and ooh-and-ahh over a majestic-looking entry or an enormous great room, most people will instinctively feel more comfortable in a house built to a more human scale. Just as organizing philosophies from Flylady and Kon Mari to feng shui, “Hoarders”, and the Container Store, tell us that organizing and decluttering our homes will make us happier, calmer, more contented — and most of us can vouch for how much better we feel when our house is in order — humans are also more satisfied (even if we can’t put our finger on it) in a house built with balance and cohesion. (As an aside, it’s also much easier to keep a house orderly and decluttered in a house with thoughtful design, where the house responds to your needs, rather than, as in the case with most tract houses and McMansions, making you respond to your house’s needs).

Claire, so nice to see the snowdrops! I love watching the seasons change, but we haven’t gotten anywhere close to seeing bulbs sprouting yet. Deanna, it is the dog, not necessarily my own motivation that gets me out into the woods and fields regardless of the weather. But once I am out there I really enjoy it. Most days we do three walks as he is fairly high energy, so we are out for more than an hour most days. He has learned to pause when my cell phone camera or my pruners are in use. I don’t usually have my real camera with me. Today our breaks will be quite short with temperatures in the single digits into the teens and 40 mph winds. The dog is too small to retain much body heat, even with a jacket when the wind chills are like this, and in the woods where we typically go when it is breezy, it will be too dangerous with such strong winds bringing down branches.