I have an Oreck hand held, and a one gal shop vac. The soft brush attachments for both are interchangeable, the shop vac brand attachments available at most hardware stores. And both have vacuum bags to collect dust so I use them often on throw pillows, upholstered furniture. My former house had a whole house air cleaner, this one does not and I assume as much dust collects on upholstered furniture as on the table tops, arms and backs of leather furniture ;-)

itltrot, I love your drawer for hair appliances. Do you have the hairdryer plugged in somewhere in the vanity, or do you use the outlet I see above the counter? How deep is your counter? Ours will be pretty narrow, about 18 inches; I don't know if that should affect my decision or not. Finally, I see the full run of the countertop is the same height. May I ask how high the counter is? I feel like 30 inches is a typical table/desk height, but most vanities are about 35 inches high. Did you make that counter 30 inches or so high? I'd prefer to have one long counter and not break it up into 2 levels, so the vanity will be low enough to sit at comfortably.

Hobby, you got it exactly right :) The larger the pot, the larger the holes should be. I imagine the bottom of my pots having holes that are many and also almost half of the area of the bottom should be the drilled holes. With potting soil that I use, I have to have that ratio for drainage holes, otherwise my plants will be in trouble in the winter months. Also if the bottom of the pot has "peaks and valleys", if you look inside the pot and see "valleys" you have to make more holes there, becase the water gets trapped in those areas and its very bad for the roots in the winter time (see the strategically placed holes in my blue bucket in the picture I posted above :))

I use sharps for piecing, too. I only use universal for the rare times I sew knits, and only if I don't have a ball point handy. If I do free-motion on the sit-down machine I switch to a quilting needle, and I use embroidery needles on my machine that embroiders. The shafts and eyes are shaped differently on each type to make them perform better for that type of sewing. I use Organ brand on my Juki (the one on the frame) and they are big, but I don't remember what size. The large needle has a sturdy shaft that can hold up to the high speeds and moving the machine around. Donna