Same for me, as much as possible. I still work full time too, but I retired in '06 from the Navy reserve, so at least now I have my weekends. I go out in the mornings and walk around the garden to look at everything while I drink my coffee. In the afternoons, I get outside as quickly as possible so that I'm really dirty by the time DH gets home. I know that if I look really scroungy and sweaty he won't ask me to make dinner. And of course, housecleaning, laundry and dishes are out of the question too. So I'd say about 4-5 hours on the weekdays, 10-12 hours on weekends. I confess, I hired an electrician to run a wire out to the potting shed and install a light and some outlets so I can stay out after dark. I also had electricity run to the greenhouse for the heater and swamp cooler and have 6 extra outlets in there too. I have everything out there now but a KITCHEN and who needs one of those??????!!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH......... Cheryl

Do I have to include DH's junk food? Bags of chips and cookies, and ice cream which he is the only one to eat; he buys, stores, eats, and is totally responsible for them. Okay, that's probably only about $5 a week, but. For years I spent well under $100 per month; now we are both retired: so meals are mostly only for two, but I do use a few convenience foods. Looking at the checkbook tells me the grocery bills for the past year averaged way less than $60 per month. Note that is edible only, paper goods and other non-food are purchased separately. There's no magic used, and I don't mill grains ~ I know, that's a loss of nutrition but I do freeze the flour until it's used. We do have a vegetable garden but it's no longer the primary provider of our food and it has gradually shrunk in both size and variety ~ once you hit 70, it seems like a good idea to let the young folks do the planting & picking, lol. I buy vegs & fruit from the local farmer's market, and can or freeze whatever is in season and available at a reasonable cost. Items purchased from the grocery store are almost always on sale... milk, butter and flour are bought at a warehouse club. (Milk is 3.29 per gallon compared to best grocery price of $3.89) I grew up rural, where if you wanted to eat peaches or green beans in January you canned them the preceding summer. That isn't stockpiling, but a different way of running your pantry: grow it yourself or buy what is available at the normal harvest-time. In other words, one thinks of what will be needed between harvest this year and the harvest next year, and prepares accordingly. I do can/freeze almost everything made with tomatoes (from spaghetti sauce to catsup to juice), make all our jam/jelly, and make most meals from scratch, including bread. It takes very little effort to pre-prepare and can/freeze heat-n-eat meals, which means I don't spend money on TV dinners or other commercially prepared foods. I rotate meals containing beef, pork, or seafood, and alternate each meat-meal with a non-meat meal. Meat-meals rarely have meat as the main ingredient; there will be at least two vegs and a fruit each in servings larger than the meat portion. Quite often meat is used more as an accent or flavoring, such as in chili-mac or a stirfry. I do try to vary recipes so that no meal is repeated more often than once a month. I think it sums up this way: I cook/bake from scratch (no box mixes); most food is grown locally; most foods are purchased either on sale or at a very good price and sufficient is prepared to use for the following year; meats are eaten in small quantities and non-meat meals account for half of the dinners; there are always pre-prepared meals frozen or canned; and there is a lot of variety in recipes so boredom is prevented. Oh, and while I was working, I made a point of rarely spending more than 30 minutes fixing dinner.

"DD's theory is that due to the global financial crisis, fashion has come to a grinding halt. Nothing new. So the trend lag between here and Europe has collapsed and we're seeing the same stuff everywhere. This is from my 16 y.o. fashion analyst! :-)" Out of the mouths of babes... The Italians are over, this week, and are doing all they can to help the American economy. They came with huge lists from their family and friends. It's all Abercrombie & Fitch. That brand has taken Italy by storm, maybe the rest of Europe, too. They used to buy only Polo. I guess the lines at their stores go on forever and the prices are absurd. With the exchange rate...they're in heaven. We had a dinner last night and I forgot to ask what Italian brand was hot now. Last time it was Roberto Cavalli but his things are way too young for me. I'll stick with Armani if I'm still alive to see the dollar reign, once more.

Well, I just did the official count of roses after doing the annual June death march (to make a final judgment of roses that didn't survive the winter), and the present total came out to 1140 roses. I've officially joined the premium level of rose nut, which apparently hits if you have more than 1000 roses. Now as for time spent, I'm sure you're thinking that I either: a) spend every waking minute in the garden and have no other job, or b) hire out most of the rose care to someone. I don't do any of the above, since I have a more than full-time job and family with kids at home, as well as something vaguely resembling "a life". Also, I'd never trust my roses to any outside person, particularly the usual "mow and blow" services. We do our own lawn too. So what are the tips that keep me mostly sane? Well - as sane as anyone with over 1000 roses can be. 1. I don't spray anything. No spray is lazy gardening, and it makes the roses either shape up or ship out. I used to spray Liquid Fence once a year to discourage the bunnies, but I think they're so bewildered by the vast array of choices in my yard that no one plant suffers too much. Besides, my son complained of the Liquid Fence smell, so I don't even do that. Ditto for insecticidal soap - I've gotten a good balance between good and bad bugs and I don't see any rose slugs or aphids any more. 2. I get reasonably regular rains. As several folks mentioned, that is a key for successful gardens and a real time sink if not there. During our dry seasons in August (and this year, June) when we don't get any appreciable rain, I water all the garden beds for an hour a week each with overhead sprinklers. This involves setting the sprinkler on trips from inside A/C at 5 minutes a bed (maybe 1/2 hour total time). As I said, lazy gardening. I also plant all new roses with the Watersorb water crystals, so they have moisture reserves to protect them against dry temperatures. These crystals die down after a year or so, so they learn to survive on their own once established. 3. I don't weed, I mulch. As halloblondie said, there are few garden things that are more effective labor savers than organic mulch. For me, I can weed anything that pops up in my garden beds with two fingers, except dandelions or bindweed. 4. I make garden efforts do double (or triple) duty. For instance, I winter protect with bagged leaves rolled to the edge of the garden bed or stood around the particularly fussy tea roses in one bed. Those filled bags kill the grass at the edge of the beds, meaning I don't have to edge the beds. Then in spring, I spread the leaves around the base of the roses and other garden plants for mulch, and store extra bags for use later in the season. Leaves then break down lightening the soil and substituting for fertilizer by adding a little nitrogen. 5. Bundle gardening tasks, and make the roses mostly fend for themselves. I admire those of you who use the fish fertilizer sprays and things like that regularly, but I never seem to get around to it. I save milk jugs to fill with water when planting roses, and I have jars of fish fertilizer I always intend to use later in the season to perk up the newer planted roses, but I rarely get around to it. I sometimes add a little alfalfa, Ironite and 10-10-10 fertilizer once a year to the established roses, but I missed last year and haven't done so yet this year. If I successfully do the established fertilizer, it's usually bundled with pruning tasks in March/April so I spread the fertilizers around established roses before layering down the mulch. 6. Don't sweat the small stuff - roses are much tougher than you think. Chewed leaves, bugs, blackspot, wilting, lopsided growth - bah, you can handle it! And if not, you don't belong in my yard. 7. Monitor the important things. Canker needs to be dealt with swiftly and brutally in my yard, and Japanese beetles get no mercy and swift and (hopefully) painful death. 8. Enjoy the time you spend, and share the joy with others. Remember why you do this in the first place. You don't HAVE to work in the garden, you CHOOSE to. If it becomes drudgery, downsize and/or simplify. I agree with all of you that gardening is my #1 favorite activity in spring/summer and it's where I most want to be. 9. Take care of your body and listen to it. I have several herniated disks in my back, a hip replacement, rheumatoid and osteoarthritis, I'm in my 50's, and I'm allergic to everything that grows outside (so why am I a gardener??). I take care of my back by careful positioning and movement, stretching out frequently, and having treatments at home that compensate for full long days pushing my limits. I also make sure to stop and literally smell the roses, or hang out on the swing gazing at and appreciating a good day's work. Oh, and one of the two best activities to counteract arthritis?? You got it - GARDENING. The other is light weightlifting - both involve gentle weight bearing movement - and I get my weightlifting in my 50 pound bags of alfalfa... Movement is medicine, and I put it to its test. So how much time to I spend in the garden to maintain 1140 roses? Depends on the time of year: - Most of the summer into the fall, I spend maybe 3-4 hours a week on the weekend deadheading, cane monitoring/trimming, and taking pictures of roses. The latter occupies most of that time by far. I don't deadhead roses individually with so many blooms (like Darlow's Enigma), but chop off sprays when dead if and when I feel like it. Within this 3-4 hours is usually also monitoring and picking fruits and vegetables. - Spring pruning and rose planting season is more like 20 hours a week in the garden, usually long days both Saturday and Sunday. I also prune around 75 roses for our church, which adds another 20 hours I work in somewhere. The 20 hours in March/early April are pruning, inspecting, pulling off protection/mulching, and (maybe) fertilizing. The 20 hours in late April/May are planting and watering as needed (including the vegetable garden). - Late fall I return to 20 hours/week for a few weekends to plant the 1000's of bulbs I do each year, but the roses by then are on their own. After bulb planting is done in early November, I start collecting and placing leaf bags in my usual 3-4 hours a week max. See, it's doable! Not that I recommend this many roses for people who aren't insane, but I still have time for my family and work and church and cooking most of the meals, though I draw the line at cleaning house (that's why God made teenagers). Cynthia