I am not sure about orchid bark. Normally bark has the tendency to absorb lots of nitrogen - that's why the orchid fertilizer has the numbers like 30:1:1 with the heavy on N. I would stick to AV soil, vermiculite and perlite - heavy on perlite - and if you can get some coarse perlite - even better - and i always put a half inch layer of coarse perlite on the bottom to increase the air intake. By the way - your violets will benefit if you add some perlite to their soil too. No - you do not need to repot just yet. Do not forget to let the streps dry between the waterings. Bunch of happy plants you have there Irina

I am on facebook, that is someone listed my name there and I had to sign up to read that there was nothing for me. Now I get those monthly Email messages from FB that all my friends want to talk to me, baloney! Since I have no data there about myself, I can not get messages from Nigeria and China that I won lotteries, or they have great business deals for me. I use Excel and have a file with separate work sheets listing the hostas I have in a detailed table, those I want to have, my work plan, the chemicals I am using and made a map of my property with a fine grid listing abbreviations of hosta in this grid. That helps a lot, and is all I need. Should I lose markers again, i will know from the map which hosta is in that space. Have a good one! Bernd

I think it depends on a couple of things: (1) Are your cabinets framed, frameless, or inset? and (2) Are the pullouts "filler pullouts" or actual cabinets? This is my take on it.... If you have framed or inset cabinets, filler pullouts have the same OR more room, width-wise than the same size and bigger cabinets. With framed cabinets, you are constrained by the actual size of the cabinet opening. E.g., if you have cabinets w/1-1/2" face frames around the opening, then a 6" cabinet will only have a 3" opening and the pullout will need to be The 9" cabinet pullout from Rev-A-Shelf has a pullout width of 5". However, Rev-A-Shelf's 6" filler pullout's width is 6" and is designed for a 6" opening...b/c it's mounted b/w two cabinets and there are no face frames and cabinet walls to reduce the opening size. In another thread (see link below), Alku05 measured her 3" filler pullouts and determined that bottles up to a 2-1/4" diameter fit, so the opening b/w the shelf railings is probably 2-1/4". That means, I think, that the railings take up approximately 3/8" on each side. So, a 6" filler pullout would most likely have a 5-1/4" [(2-1/4" + 3") OR (6" - 6/8") = 5-1/4"] distance b/w the rails. Now, the pullout for the 9" cabinet is 5" wide and if you account for the 3/8" railing on each side, that leaves 4-1/4" b/w the railings in the 9" cabinet. If my analysis is correct, then the 6" filler pullout has 1/2" more usable space than the 9" cabinet. Again, this is for framed or inset cabinets. However, even with frameless cabinets, you have to account for the cabinet walls. If they're 3/4", then you will still lose 1-1/2" of opening width. What am I saying? I'm saying that if you have between 6" & 9" to work with, I would get the filler pullouts rather than cabinets. Base filler pullouts (at Rev-A-Shelf) come in 3", 6", and 9" Filler Pull-Outs - Base I may have over-analyzed this, but that's a byproduct of my occupation. :-) However, it came in very handy when I went through something similar and it helped me realize that even if I'm forced to reduce my two 9" cabinets to 6" each, I will not lose cabinet space. HTH!

Thank you for all the good wishes! He'll be here for another week or so--we'll have to make the most of it! Well, we've been without internet again--it's been intermittent at best, and really not worth the trouble. I think I've mentioned that I've been using internet for only a little over a year, and I'm still timid when it comes to technical issues. We've had three (3!) telephone company repairmen here six times in various combinations, sometimes alone, sometimes two together. Of course, they are here during the day, when my husband is at work, so imagine these poor guys asking me questions, and instructing me to check the modem--a week ago I had no idea where the modem was, let alone that it had lights that tell what it's doing. So, all these guys couldn't figure out the 'intermittent' problems. It seemed to be working when they were here, and all the 'physical' components seemed to be in order, but we would have service for only a short time, then it would quit. We'd re-boot the modem for a few minutes (a couple of hours, if we were lucky) of service, then it was off again. The phone co sent a new modem which didn't solve the problem, and we even unplugged the new remote phone, thinking that it might be the cause. We've had our son here for two weeks, my BIL and his boys haven been around a lot, my younger DD has been here a couple of times, and all their various friends have been coming and going, too, at all hours of the day and night. Except for yesterday: DH, BIL and all the boys went whitewater rafting, DD went to Cleveland with a friend, and I was here on my own (except for 2 yr old grandson) for most of the day. The phone guys checked lines in the early afternoon, and gave me the 'everything's working now' line, so I settled in to try and catch up on email and gardenweb :) My son-in-law called to say that he was coming to pick up grandson later in the evening, and when I returned to the computer, the internet was out. I re-booted the modem, and had no problems for an hour or so, then DH called to say that everyone survived the rafting trip, and they were on the way home. When I returned to the computer, the internet was out again. I re-booted, then shortly my daughter inadvertently slammed the back door, which is beside the telephone. The internet immediately went out AGAIN. And something clicked in my brain--we've had a lot of traffic in and out of that door, and more people have been here using the phone--maybe there was a connection?!! I told DH my theory, he picked up a new phone this AM, ran home to install it, found a FRIED WIRE, held down by a LOOSE SCREW, evidently damage from the LIGHTNING STRIKE. He replaced the wire, installed the new phone, and here I am typing to you all, with no problems so far. We've tried the phone, answered phone calls, slammed the door, plugged in the remote phone, no problems. Evidently whenever we answered the phone, or closed the door hard enough to 'disconnect' the line, we were losing internet service. So why didn't THREE phone guys and my computer-savvy DH think to check the phone that I told them 'popped' when the lightning hit?!! LOL, do I have to do EVERYTHING around here?!! Sorry for the long, rambling post, but can it be that simple?!!