Susan, somehow I think that 'Lady Ann Kidwell' has a place in your future, even if you don't know exactly what that place is. Context is all with flowers: a color will be glorious together with one group of plants and sickeningly jarring with others. Yesterday I was gazing amazed at a fiery light orange iris that I had never seen before (sometimes I think strange plants pack their suitcases and move into my garden at midnight), growing right beside the cool old rose pink of 'Bourbon Queen'. Ouch. But just above it is 'Austrian Copper', with a few field poppies scattered about to boot, and putting the iris close to it, what could be a finer, more blazing arrangement? And I have some silver artemisias to place this fall, too! So I'll shift the iris from its current uncomfortable place into the neighborhood of 'Austrian Copper' and all will be well; in fact, it will be magnificent. By the way, how about 'Thisbe' for your tempering intermediate rose? If you want to pursue that plan. harmonyp, I don't know if this will help you, but for a long time I had trouble really liking Rugosas, even while admitting all their virtues, including their undeniable beauty. It was when I stopped thinking of them as roses and mentally recatalogued them as flowering shrubs that they fell into place and I could appreciate and enjoy them. Perhaps you need to reclassify 'Blueberry Hill'. Melissa P.S. Kim, I think it might be a good book, too.

What a fun thread. I'm so glad that it has been bumped up. We are still laughing at some of the names and you have inspired us to try to class-up our little corner of heaven with a name too. Our city repair people "fixed" the street in front of our driveway so that it is quite a bit lower than the driveway and water accumulates there with every rain or snow. My DH teases with the neighbors on our flat street, far from any lake, that they're jealous because we have Lake Front property. So, of course, that leads to the name "Lake Front Place" - nicely pretentious for our unpretentious street. But now DH has come up with, "God's Little Acher" and leaves me to choose my favorite. What a conundrum! Are we entitled to a separate name for the house and the garden? I plan on using "Allee View" for the backyard as it seems to be a source of interest to people driving down the alley peering through the fence.

Sending wishes for four special ladies: Carol, congratulations on the new baby in the family and hope you are feeling better now that your meds have caught up to you. Susie and Anita, prayers for you that you will be better soon. Sassy, I'm hoping the situation with you brother has improved. Take care of yourselves! The sun has been out here the last two days which is helping. We had bad storms the day before that. We have been getting rain regularly since January and I guess we forgot about the problems it brings - my winter sown containers get flooded and then I spend a few days completely taking the tops off in the daytime so they can dry out a bit and recovering them at night. At least I don't seem to have lost anything yet. However, now that I have planted over 100 containers, it is quite a project! Actually, most of the milk jugs seem to be able to handle the rain, it's all my smaller "use anything style" containers that are having the bad problems. I will definitely save the milk jugs to use again next year. Actually, we go through lots of milk at our house but nearly all the milk jugs now are opaque rather than transparent so there are only a few that we can save. Sometimes I cut the whole top off the opaque ones and try to use them, but then the plastic that I put over the top does not hold up well to the heavy rain. I use rubber bands to attach plastic to the top of the container and those seem to snap apart every few days. Maybe eventually I will get just the right set up. However, the plants in the ground are happy as can be and I will have wonderful displays of daffodils and tulips this year. Will have to post pictures soon. Jeanne

Hello ladies and happy every Holiday I missed. To those of you who do know me, I am back and mentally back on track (I think). To those of you who don't, well I was I am a member, love everyone here. Went away to do some great mission work and had some very tragic things happen. Many hours of therapy later, and actually returning to the Dominican I think I have healed, I am not bitter, sad, or frightened to leave my house any more. I am able to talk about it and I feel that I can share with postive feelings now. But enough of that. Am I to late for April? Please tell me that I can play in April? Max is 4 and we just looked at Co-op preschool. HE is a mama's boy and didn't want to go to big boy school yet. Maryanne~ I have a box for you that I need to send, but um lost your address.. So Merry Christmas when it comes. Ahh. I just don't know what to say or who to say it to because I am scared I will leave someone out. I tried to read as many posts as my brain can handle, but I am sure that I will need some help. Babies and ornaments, tornados and ahhh.. I am not in Kansas anymore. Please feel free to email me with any personals that you'd love to share. I apologize for being gone so long. If there is anything that you want to know email me. If I need to re-join let me know if there is room. Mayanne_ my big sis.. I hope all is well, miss you and thanks for all your support thru this, even though I was a bad lil sis and became an introvert. But guess what? I am back and better. Missed you all Laura.... beans