The rain has been pretty intense here in Middle GA - everything is growing mildew. It's 1:45 pm and it has not rained yet today and I'm constantly checking the radar... it's supposed to be dry. It's hard to believe. My raised beds have been an enormous benefit - usually they dry out so fast, I spend much of the summer hauling hoses and changing out what got shorted on water so I could water something desperate. This year I'm hearing squooshing sounds when I walk between garden beds. My tomatoes are so sad - lots of disease, tho they are still sort of producing. Hardly any bird damage this year. The okra is pitiful. The peppers are worse and I have no idea what is wrong with the eggplant other than too many flea beetles and too much rain. My beans are growing by leaps and bounds, but almost no flowers on the limas and no pods. The rattlesnakes are growing, but even they are looking sad and are slower than usual. I'm hoping that the predicted dry for a few days will help me get some harvest. My corn mostly collapsed and is growing horizontally. (First year growing it for me.) This is the first year that I have had tarragon actually live tho. And I had a bumper crop of garlic and onions.

Good advice, Bonnie. Here are a few more tips: - use a grass seed mix that is high on the fescues and low on the Kentucky Bluegrass. Bluegrass is a water-hog and very high maintenance. Stick to the deep-rooted fescues. - lay off on the watering. You want the grass seedlings to develop roots that will go deep for water and nutrients. Grass needs no coddling. - lay off on the fertilizer. Again, it's the roots, not the top growth, that matters most when you're getting plants established. Most commercial fertilizers are high nitrogen, so you get a flush of green, and your pampered lazy grass develops a taste for fast food. Ok, metaphors aside, once you get your overseeded areas established, topdress with some quality, weed-free compost and let the grass develop as it should - establish some white clover in your lawn and let the grass go dormant during the hot, dry spell in August. The clover will stay green and, being a legume, will help develop healthy, rich soil. Diversity is good. - stop worrying about weeds. Remember, diversity is good. This spring I had a bumper crop of creeping charlie, blooming for all it was worth. All the early-emerging bees had flowers to visit. Bees are good. All for now. Link below is very good. Here is a link that might be useful: Organic Landscape Alliance Fact Sheets

My Anderson windows got drilled on the bottom sills by my alarm installers. I wasn't warned about a warranty issue either by my GC or by the Alarm Subcontractor. I don't really expect this to be an issue as it is just a small hole and I don't think it would have any impact on the performance of the window. I checked the Anderson warranty and it says the following: "Failures due to product modifications or glass shading devices (e.g., glass tinting, security systems, improper painting or staining, insulated coverings, etc.)." To me this reads that if a failure can be shown to have been caused by the alarm installation then the warranty may be denied. It is not an automatic voiding of warranty. That would be analagous to voiding the entire warranty on an automobile for cutting a hole in the bumper to intall a trailer hitch.

Sue, the Etap hotel is a few steps below a motel 6...quite a few steps in fact. LOL! The rooms were tiny, which were expected but the floor was really grungy and the toilet/shower area were a one piece porta potty plastic unit that had been put into a corner of the room. It was very small and the floor area by the toilet got soaked when you showered. The shower stall area was barely big enough to turn around in. Now I wish I had taken a picture! Patti, I think the house I used to live in was torn down and a new one put in it's place, there were a lot of new homes there. The town was very small, just one street with one tiny restaurant and a coffin maker. That was it...not even a post office. Stacy, yeah, I think I should've learned after our trip out west. Some of it was fun but for the most part they weren't interested in a lot of it. I've downloaded my pictures and will start posting them. Wish I had taken more videos, they are pretty funny because they are so BAD! LOL!