Eight months and not even any Unhelpful Replies. VBG

I don't think there is a single "best" winter squash or pumpkin for a three sisters garden and I've grown all kinds. You should grow whichever one you and your family will enjoy growing and eating. Or, alternatively, you can raise corn and beans you'll enjoy eating and grow a decorative type pumpkin or winter squash for fall decorations. You could use sweet potato if you want, but I wouldn't really consider it a three sisters type of plant. One of the ways in which squash is an important part of the three sisters garden is that its large prickly leaves keep the racoons and other critters out of the corn, and the large leaves also shade the ground and keep it cool. You won't get exactly the same results from smaller sweet potato foliage. If I were growing a Three Sisters garden with kids, I'd probably grow either 'Seminole' or 'Small Sugar Pie Pumkin' because both of them are very disease-resistant and pest-tolerant. Of the two of them, 'Seminole' is the most drought-tolerant. If it is very important to you to grow your Three Sisters Garden using authentic vegetables once grown by Native Americans, you can find wonderful heirloom varieties online at NATIVE Seed/Search, Seeds of Change, Seed Savers Exchange, Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds or Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. If you want to read an interesting and informative book about exactly how the native Americans raised their crops, harvested and preserved them, and how they prepared them and ate them, I recommend the book "Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden", which I think is still available from Seed Savers Exchange or Seeds of Change. As far as gardening books, there are very few written specifically for Oklahoma. Steve Dobbs' "Oklahoma Gardener's Guide" focuses on standard landscape plantings.....lawn, trees, ground covers, perennials, vines, woody shrubs, roses, etc. It is a great book especially with regards to choosing landscape plants that will thrive in Oklahoma. I've never seen a vegetable gardening book written specifically for Oklahoma, but I have found most books written for Texas to work equally well for us here. My favorite vegetable gardening book is an "oldie but a goodie" published by Texas Gardening Press in 1985. It is called "The Vegetable Book" and was written by Texas A&M professor Dr. Sam Cotner, the former head of Horticulture at Texas A&M University. (I've linked the book below.) This book has been my vegetable bible for at least 20 years. There are a couple of other good vegetable gardening books written for a national audience that are useful in conjunction with Dr. Cotner's book. One is "All New Square Foot Gardening" by Mel Bartholomew, which will teach you how to build raised beds, enrich the soil and plant using his square foot methods to maximize your productivity. Another is Ed Smith's book "The Vegetable Bible: Discover Ed's High-Yield W-O-R-D System For all North American Gardening Regions". For general gardening info, any and all of Neil Sperry's books are wonderful. A professional horticulturalist, one-time Texas agriculture extension agent (when I was a kid), author, radio show host, businessman and all-around good guy, Neil Sperry is simply a treasure and his books should be on every Oklahoma gardener's shelf. His annual calendar and his magazine are amazing too. A great magazine that has lots and lots of info on raising veggies in our climate is Texas Gardener magazine. You can find it and subscribe to it by googling. It is my favorite gardening magazine. Don't forget that a great resource for veggie gardeners in Oklahoma is the University of Oklahoma fact sheets written to cover many gardening topics. If you don't know how to access the OSU fact sheets on-line, let me know and I'll link their index for you. Robert and Debra both made comments that are very kind and much appreciated, but I want to emphasize that we have many knowledgable and experienced gardeners here....and I am just one of them. You shouldn't hesitate to ask your questions here....you'll get much useful advice and even a few laughs from our many members. None of us is an expert at everything (or, maybe none of us is expert at anything, LOL) but together we're all experts at dealing with Oklahoma's highly variable (aka wild and crazy) climate/weather and soil. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Dr. Cotner's Book

Hey Gibby -- 6 x 10 bath here [finally demo'd last week!] and I know that my size isn't even that small. I've been on the lookout for 3 or so years and it's been surprisingly difficult to find ideas. Aside from "recess whenever possible," of course! There's the "monochromatic = more spacious" school of thought but IMO there are alternative ways to lead the eye around the room and create interest in a small space. Things to consider: * color / color contrast * the lines of an object (round vs square) * judicious use of oversized scale * having some consistency with eyelines/sightlines of your vertical elements Here are some of the apparently-smaller baths I've found that put at least one of the above into action: We're adapting this built-into-doorway cab for our bath -- ours will be built out from the wall, perpendicular to the sink, and serve as a med cabinet. I'd use a wall-hung if this were a full bath, but I do love this! [Note horizontal cladding] I was involved in this [5 x 8 with TWO doors!] bath: Grabbed space from kitchen to make this 15" cubby: IMO one of the biggest challenges with small baths is to create negative space that serves to set off what IS in the room. In our case, we splurged a bit on a demilune/semicircle vanity instead of a square or rectangular one -- given our bowling alley dimensions, it helps carve out some pleasing curves. However, having lived in a place where the tiny wall-hung sink, toilet, and clawfoot were all accessible from one spot I know negative space is sometimes non-existent! I've enjoyed the book below, which has a mix of sizes and lots of materials in it --"ideas for tiny half-baths, medium-size his-and-hers, and large, luxurious home spas. Specifics on ventilation, waterproofing, faucets, showers, tubs, and more." Here is a link that might be useful: New Bathroom Idea Book (Taunton Press)

Onward and Upward in the Garden by Katherine S. White. It’s the series from the New Yorker magazine of her garden musings. She was the editor there for many years and her take on garden catalogs are SPECTACULAR. She blasts the catalogs for not describing the rose scents. She thinks double dahlias are an abomination. She delights in descriptions of colors. It’s an excellent book. The collection was published in the 1970’s from her writings in the magazine from 1958 and on. Highly recommend.