PHC, Myco, Soil Secrets LLC, and EctoMycoRUs all have a product to sell. Soil health is where the focus needs to be. I have to think that unless the soil has been sterilized (which folks do and then do go on to produce various crops), then the soil an individual is considering growing a plant in, is acceptable as a starting point, with numerous beneficial microbes contained within it. You could inoculate with earthworms too but after a few years of focused soil correction (balancing nutrition and OM) the earthworms come all by themselves. I don't fully trust any company that stands to make a profit by selling an inoculant that goes in the ground. I do trust the research that shows if you balance your soil's nutrients and contribute a smart ratio of green and brown manures, all the microbes take care of themselves and the soil benefits... If we are all now citing our comments, look to any one of Albrecht's Volume's (I prefer Vol. 7 "Albrecht on Soil Balancing", since he was a little less prone to run on sentences by then) and Hand's On Agronomy by Neal Kinsey. Acres USA website is a good jump off point since they've been working with Neal and Dr. Albrecht for a very long time and coordinated the development of Brookside Laboratories in New Bremen, OH. A company that represents no fertilizers, amendments, or any other products other than knowledge.

Terene, Your columbine origami mixed color seeds will bloom the first year from seed. I planted mine a few years ago in mid March and they bloomed in June through the end of July. They have a long bloom period, rebloom actually and you don't need to dead head them. A friend of mine sowed some of my origami blue seeds last spring, in mid April and they bloomed for her all of the month of July. Since your's are mixed colors, you don't know what each plant will bloom in color till the bloom. You might want to plant each seedling as an individual until it blooms. Once you know which seedling is which color, when they finish blooming, you can move the plants into clumps of like colors to have larger plants for next year. If you don't care if they bloom mixed together than just plant them as clumps. I sowed mine, but they where all individual colors in cottage cheese containers, with about 15 seeds together in each container sort of scattered in the center of the container. then I planted the seedlings as one clump. If you purchase the plants in the nurseries, it is usually in a large container that has at least 10 plants in it. That's how a friend of mine that owns a farm and greenhouse in the area I live in sows seeds, and told me how to sow the seeds. They are worth the time to sow and the expense, they are a beautiful long term bloomer and stay nice and bushy, not to tall, not to short. Fran

I agree with the previous poster: you really can't estimate these things very accurately because your skill level increases with the more you do, plus with old houses you never know what you'll find ..... (OHJ's famous "Mushroom Factor"!) But I'll take a crack at it. 1. Window scrape and prep: Well, I wouldn't do the inside w/o having done the outside before or doing it at the same time, since if the outside needed repair, most likely new putty and re-glazing (which can be a bear) it would be necessary to take the glass out and necessitate re-painting the interior, again.... So, remove sash 10 min to 40 min depending on how lucky I am and whether it's painted in. If it was necessary to replace the new putty then one could spend anywhere from 1 hr to 3 hours per sash getting the remaining putty safely out. Cleaning the lights (glass) 15 min to 1 hour per sash. This might not be necessary, depending on the age of the glass and how much haziness there is. Scraping the sash including muntins: 15 min to 30 per sash. That assumes it's scrapable and I'm in the mood to deal with the lead paint chips and dust. If not, then twice as long to get it off with heat or chemicals. Prime sash. (20-25 min per sash) (This assumes nothing needs tidying up or retruing, repegging etc. first) Let it dry. Reglaze sash: 20 min (2 lights) to 90 min (8 lights) per sash. Let it skim over. First top coat (Here's where it would get sticky because I would want to start two different paint paths, one with exterior paint and one with interior paint. I'd put inerior on the inside and on the sides of the rails, and tops and bottoms but on the exterior, I'd be using exterior first coat. Each would have to dry or at least mostly so before I could do the other surface. Figure 15 -30 min for the outside, and 25 to 40 for the inside, depending, again on the number of lights. Let it dry. Lightly sand it (10 min per sash). Now, to the frame, again assuming no major structural repairs are necessary and that I didn't break the parting bead when I got the upper sash out. Scraping inner trim and jamb. probably using a heat plate and gun, 30 min to 1 1/2 hours, depending on the complexity of the molding and how intact the under paint was, and whether I was in a particularly determined de-leading mood. Prime the frame (if necessary) 25-40 min. Let it dry. Sand the prime coat on frame lightly. 15 min tops. Paint first coat on frame 25-40 min. Reinstall both the sashes and install parting bead and reattach trim: 10 min to as much as 25 min -if I broke the parting bead and have to trim up a new one (which would have to be primed ....) Lightly sand the the first coat on the interior of the frame and molding (15 min). Do top coat on sashes and frame, indoors and out: 1 to 1 1/2 hours depending on how many lights. If you had as many as 16 lights, I'd expect to add another half hour. Now, of course many of these jobs would be happening almost simultaneously and you would probably be doing cerveral of the same things to multiple windows, so your time would be less as you would carry on without having to start and stop so much, but, then again, on the first one it might take you as much as twice as long. And no allowance was made for filling any little dings with wood putty, or for installing bronze spring weatherstripping, both of which I'd expect to do with any windows I worked on. Also no allowance dealing with the exterior trim, either, which also need some caulking. Depending on the state of the interior trim, I might do a bit of caulking there, too. 3. Wallpaper could take you anywhere from an hour to a truly miserable couple of days depending on the number of layers. 4. I wouldn't tape a crack in plaster but a small repair might take only 5 -10 min, a couple of times with a light sanding in between. Larger cracks require cleaning out, so it's harder to say. Mixing the various plasters takes me an enormous amount of time. Larger holes require several special (and different coats) plus time to tie in some mesh lath. 8. Tearing out a 12 foot section of a plaster wall, I think would take me (including the clean-up) the better part of a day. Plus you have to figure out how to keep the ceiling plaster up - assuming you weren't tearing it out too. Re-plastering would be my only choice and that takes only a phone call to a plasterer. I have never attempted three-coat plaster of a whole wall. 9. Refinishing a mantle would depend on what you were going to wind up with, and what you started with. If it was simply stripping a natural finish and putting a clear one back on, it might only take 2 or 3 hours on each of a couple of days. But if you were dealing with layers of paint and you wanted to do a faux-painted marbelized finish, it could take 20-40 hours. 10. I can paint a 12 X 12 room, including skirting board, and window and door casing in a hard-pushed nine-ish hour day. Trim, including a couple of door surfaces 3-3 1/2 hours; ceiling 1- 1 1/2 hours; the walls take the rest. But this assumes that the room is ready to be painted. I generally figure that it takes at least twice as long to get the room prepped for painting, even if there are no major dings to deal with, simply washing, minor patching, sanding, tacking, etc. And that's when you have all the paint ready, stirred, equipment, drop cloths on hand etc. 13. Laying subfloor, would take a variable amount of time depending on how much shimmin' and trimmim' was necessary. But I would allow the better part of day, at least. It would go faster with additonal laborers to cut and carry. 14. Installing a replacement window is not something I would ever do. (Though I have watched crews at other people's houses do one in only a couple of hours, with an experienced team of three.) Rebuilding a window is something I would expect a finish carpenter that I hired a day to install. To make the components, including building the sash etc. I would expect take him another day, or two, in his shop. 15. Repairing a window could take 15 mintues or a day or more depending on why it didn't work, and then you'd need to repaint, probably! HTH Molly~

if you want to spend more money, you could have a symmetrical bookcase type wall unit built on both sides of the fireplace, maybe with a bridge over it, that would completely block out the window on the left. Leave a large space for a mirror above the fireplace. if you went this route I'd do it in a color to match the wall or similar light color. It looks like you have other windows off to the right side. You might have to add a little more lighting at that end of the room to make up for lost of the window. A cheaper solution would be to put drapery completely covering the window on the left and a matching one on the right side of the fireplace just covering the wall but the whole thing in a symmetrical arrangement. you could have the drapery rods at the same level as that uncased opening on the right.