mis, It seems you are well informed about your plants and particular enough to want separate programs for each group. I think your current set up is fine but since you don't prefer Rainbird. Find a 4 program controller and your there. Think about staying with two controller because if one goes down you aren't at a big loss(time and money). What about getting rid of the lawn(water hog) and go fully zero-scape? Aloha

The concept of a "winterizer" fertilizer is really a misnomer because not very long ago the synthetic fertilizer manufacturers and sellers were advising people that used them to not fertilize later than Labor Day. What feeding the Soil food Web now will do is give the plants a food to store so those plants are ready to grow when spring soil temperatures tell them it is time. About now you should be feeding your lawn with a good source of organic plant food. keeping in mind that soil temperatures lag behind air temperatures by quite a bit and the Soil Food Web will still be busy in a good, healthy lawn long after the air temperatures drop below freezing.

Thanks everyone. I did try to disable the programs Owbist recommended from the startup. It suggested I reboot - which I did, but it also said that access was denied and I might have to log in as the system administrator to make some of those changes. I have no idea how to log in as system administrator. This is my computer and I'm the only one who uses it, but a computer tech guy did set it up for me a year ago - and I don't know if he set me up as administrator or not. How can I check this out. [This is a separate question, but may be related. I think I need to log on as system administrator and secure my network - and find out my network's name and password. Again, I don't remember setting this up - but perhaps the tech guy did and asked me to pick a password and name - I think I would know which password I would have picked if he asked me. He might have had me type it in. I'm having trouble keeping my new laptop connected - and it is asking me the name of the network and other information. Sorry - I probably shouldn't ask this here, but I think it's related to logging on as system administrator]. Anyway, now when I start the computer, I have to go through a series of prompts to acknowledge that this is not the default start up. So this isn't saving time to get up and running. I'm sure there's another way to do this. I don't think I use real player - but how would I know what I use if I'm on a site like Amazon or Youtube and listen to a clip/video. If I'm not using realplayer, is there a default windows media player (I vaguely recall this) that gets used. Which is the best default music player to have? Is there any reason I would want to keep realplayer? Can I always get it later for free if I realize later I want it? Ravencajun - I do have revouninstaller and got a list of programs on the pc. But I don't know how to view what starts at boot up? When i tried to press "Hunter" mode, it just exists revo uninstaller. I was able to click on the programs and see that there are other probably useless ones - like netzero, earthlink set up files, - but when I click the link to google them, many sites state it's crapware and should be removed, but yahoo answers said best to leave it and be sure. So I don't know and haven't yet figured out how to get revo uninstaller to make suggestions. If I have revo uninstaller, would the WinPatrol still be good to run in addition? Can you tell me what you mean by disbling some of the startup programs in services rather than in msconfig? Not sure how to do that. Thanks. Lynn.

as a guest, I wouldn’t feel comfortable going through a kid's bedroom to use the facilities. As a household member, I wouldn’t want my parent's friends going through my room. I have a very very strong bias against bathrooms with 2 doors. I absolutely des jack and jill bathrooms. I’d leave the guest bath where is is. The kids can still share it and it’s available to guests. As for the kitchen, I’d rethink that. The counters near the window should be your cleanup area with a large sink (double or single, depending on personal preference of whoever does the dishes). The sink on the island is in the cooking zone and doesn’t need to be as large—just large enough to wash vegetables and wash hands while cooking. It appears that you have room for a larger island and I would recommend that.