Yes, Katamari is the rolling stuff up game. Its really addictive for such a simple game, and theres three of them. The part I like the most is the amazing effort they put into the music. I found some of it on youtube and it ranges from techno to jazzy lounge music, swing music, Im pretty sure someone even snuck a gospel peice or two in there. While Iw as writing yesterday I stumbled across someone who had done an orchestral version of one of the themse that made my jaw drop. Video game music is constantly impressing me with every passing year. But anyway, back to gardening... Part of my problem with the space issue is theres a movement out here for the "Grow Biointensive" system. While I'm interested that they've managed to do so much with such small topsoil space, I've noticed all the beds dealing with the system need at least two feet of soil, dug down or in raised beds, and thats not what I have. My mum has been trying to push me in that direction, but I dont feel confident with it at this time since I wanted to get more of a feel for the general gardening situation since its my first time and all. Some plants still got pushed closer together than I would've liked but then none of us had seen some of these plants actually growing before. The cukes are doign better than I expected for being about 6 inches closer to each toher plant than I really wanted them to be, but we had such a huge amount of plants to deal with that I did the best I could. I think the funniest part about all this is while it is my first time growing a real garden, I've been growing virtual gardens since I was abotu 19, playing an online game called "Final Fantasy 11", which had a really complicated planting/gardening system most people didnt know about. That game system is actually what got me really focused on the seasons, when to plant, where to plant, when to fertilize, what plants grew better in what geological areas, and I even had a little notebook for a long time where I'd record the weekly cycle of my virtual plants in relation to the moon phase and exact time I made any modifications to the planting space. Even the gamers thought I was nuts, but I loved it! They'd even die off or give terrible results if I neglected them for too long, or give off better results if I got proper gardening tools, workbenches, and diffrent planters had diffrent effects too. Im getting better results with a real garden than I was in my virtual gardens though... Except for that one time I accidentally harvested 122 virtual onions. I can tell you, the cooks sure were happy with me.

I love the trellis, and the stained glass is a nice touch. I don't think copper will quickly weather naturally to that verdigris finish without a little help. I've wanted to make a copper trellis for some time now and in my research you need to sand the copper pipe with steel wool or clean it to remove the factory coating and grease, then apply some sort of acid mixture to get that color. Here's one recipe referred to by GW member. Here is a link that might be useful: copper patina

BKO, you really need to go to a furniture store and give the "butt test" to some sectionals with chaises to see if they will work for you. Being short, plump, arthritic, and not getting any younger ;-) I found the chaise part quite awkward to get up from, especially on a very deep/squooshy sectional as so many are, so they were eliminated from consideration almost immediately. Other people think they're the greatest thing since sliced bread so you really have to try it and decide for yourself. Even if a PB store near you doesn't have the right model, they're made by Mitchell Gold so you could look for a retailer selling MG, or just look for something with similar dimensions and proportions. Personally, I think that a regular style sectional would be better for sleepovers. This is the one we picked out: Flexsteel Jennings but envision one side with three cushions, not counting the corner, instead of two. It came out to something like 90x110-ish, luckily DH isn't overly tall so we both have room to stretch out. I really liked the cut-back arms for reducing the visual mass (but there's still enough arm to rest a head on comfortably! LOL) and having all square cushions means they can be shifted around in hopes that they'll wear more evenly.

Got The ODE To Klinger done!!!! Took Slow's advice and decided that I would use my stained glass tools on this heart, it is a 1/4inch thick x 2 inch heart, so I wrapped it with 1/4inch wide copper foil, then soldered and added hooks(wire)! Loribee2: There is a stained glass factory in Oregon called Uroboros Glass. I toured Spectrum Glass and Tacoma Glass Museum.