If you are fortunate enough to locate the out-of-print book "The Art of the Chrysanthemum", by Tameji Nakajima, try to acquire it. It is an excellent reference & contains a wealth of info on mum (particularly bonsai) culture. A few things I have found: - They will require your vigilance & attention. It's easy for the plant to "get away" from you if you're not attentive to pinching, and fertilizing. Potting up is a regular requirement as well. - It is best to decide on the form you wish to develop when the plant is a cutting. "Looking for the tree" in the plant will probably leave you unsatisfied with the results. - Aphids will find your plant, so be prepared. - A good source for information is King's Mums, see link below. Their site has lots of growing tips for general culture. Pay particular attention to the "gnomes". They're what you'll want for bonsai. Choose style according to plant habit. You can also order a print-out of several pages with Ken's suggestions for improved success with bonsai culture. - Best results will be had with plants that are from late summer or Fall cuttings, wintered in a greenhouse, trained to bonsai in a single growth cycle and displayed the following Fall. - Be happy if the plants overwinter for you w/o extensive die-back. Good luck Al Here is a link that might be useful: If you click on me, I'll take you straight to King's site.

Wow, popi, it's surprisingly hard to toot one's own horn! I've had this on my mind for days. Something good I do as a "mum" (I like that) is to pass on a love of books to my kids. We're getting ready for the Harry Potter releases, movie and book. So we started reading book 5 again. I had all 4 kids sprawled on my bed (king size ;o) ) listening to me read to them. Couple weeks ago we took a long road trip and listened to book 6 on cd as we drove. I will take them all to the midnight release of book 7. If I maintained a scrapbook, (yeah right) there would be a few pages dedicated to our family enjoyment of HP. I am always reading a book and will sit on the bench in our front yard after dinner. DD comes out and sits with me with her own book. She's only 7, so it's very cute to me. DS, 13, is a very good reader for his age. He was required to do a lot of independent reading this past school year and I always challenged him by giving him quality reading material. Last spring we read "Night" by Elie Wiesel together. I gave him "Of Mice and Men" and when he was finished he came and said "Can we talk about this book?" I about cried! That is the sort of moment that I looked forward to most when I became a mother! I've also enjoyed sharing less serious reading material with him, too. He likes the humor of Douglas Adams' science fiction. I've always read to my kids, and not because some magazine article or parenting book told me I should. I have always loved reading so it was the most natural thing for me to share that with my kids. Now that 3 of the 4 are literate, I can share it with them in a whole new way. One more to go, by the end of the year my youngest will likely be reading on his own, too. Seeing them learn to read is the most satisfying milestone for me as a parent.

Sheriz, I have just finished "Death comes to Pemberley". I don't normally read P&P inspired books but I thought I would try this one, not having much time to choose a library book and this one was handily displayed on the new books shelf! Such a respected author, too! I thought I was going to enjoy it at first, with the tongue in cheek description of what the gossips thought about Lizzie's calculated pursuit of Darcy. As the book progressed, however, I got quite annoyed. Too much of the author's modern thoughts were creeping into it. Phrases that didn't seem right for the period and silly mistakes aggravated me. I finished it in a hurry to discover the mystery. No more Austen fan fiction, ever! What did your group think?

how about you just walk on by.. and by them closer to bloom time for yours ... im thinking these are disposable impulse buys.. meant to bloom immediately.. and basically be done.. in a month or 2 ... not really plants that you are going to force into matching your garden plants ... or.. even better ... buy a couple.. leave one to do its thing ... cut another back.. like you would prune your own right now.. for fall bloom..e tc ... back when i learned.. i didnt have a WWW .. i just experimented ... and get this.. 30 years later.. i remember my own experiments... but i dont always remember random things i read in books ... or on my gizmo .. they are small.. presumably cheap.. wing it ...lol ken