Thanks for the pic. I just bought one on-line and thought I had a baby but it looks about the same size as yours. Now I can hope for blooms. I'm giving mine bright light and keeping it fairly moist. Is that right?

vieja, I wanted to let you know, I buy most of my spices from spicebarn.com. They have hickory smoke powder and salt. We love to grill and bbq and someone told us about this company because you can get really cool stuff from them such as worcestershire powder, hickory powder (or salt), honey powder, beer powder, etc., to make rubs with. Just thought I'd let you know in cast you're interested.

natesgram, thanks, I've actually seen that link before, and it's what really pushed me towards painting. It really has a lot of helpful info too. As much as I would love to get new doors (shaker is my favorite!), I'm going with paint for now. The wallpaper...yes, I don't see what's wrong with it either. I took a really close up shot just to show the blue specks, but it really just looks like textured cream colored walls. I would like to know if the suggestions to remove it are because it's ugly/dated or more for resale purposes where painted walls are the preference for most buyers??? alabamanicole, now that I look at it some more, I agree the track lighting needs to go. It should be easy and inexpensive ($100-150?) to change it out. I love the look of bronze, but would it work with my ss appliances and ss cabinet pulls? Or should I get bronze pulls and faucet...CAN you have a bronze faucet and a stainless steel sink? Confusing! Also, thanks for your kitchen idea. The rest of my house is decorated with warm creams, reds, greens. I love organic stuff like wicker, stone, metal, and I love shaker style, country style, and arts-n-crafts style. I really like cream cabinets, but I already have enough cream with the counter, the tile, and the wall. The breakfast bar opens into the dining room, which is has cream furniture and red and green as the accent colors. The kitchen doesn't have to be matchy-matchy with the adjoining rooms, but it should flow colorwise. I'm going for a sleek, simple, yet casual and warm look with bluish/green cabinets. Below are kitchen looks that I love. Some won't work with my sleek cabinets, but it's just to everyone an idea of the look and feel that I hope to achieve... I love the color on this wall...if I ever take down my wallpaper! lol I love the warmth and casualness of cream cabinets. My dream kitchen...if I could start from scratch! :) Here, I love how the bottom cabinets are darker than the top cabs. Cute chandelier, and the island color is gorgeous! Ok, since I also LOVE the idea of two cabinet colors, what if I paint my top cabs cream and my bottom cabs blue/green? I really can't decide between my two colors below, and painting all the cabs either color will be too much cream in the room, or too much blue/green in the the room...no? I'm also open to sage green. If I go with using two colors, what if I paint the storage wall like the storage wall below (where the top and sides would be the blue/green color)?

Glenda, This is the real recipe from Carnival. The one posted above is just a copy cat recipe. There are loads of CC recipes around for cruise recipes.. but most of the lines put out cookbooks with the authentic recipes. I found it on the cruisecritic.com boards. It's in the Foodies forum. Someone posted that they had the orange sherbet soup recipe, but they never actually posted it. Glad you liked your cruise! Cruises are wonderful. We've taken 6, so far, and have 3 booked for this December. We hope to try Carnival some time. Anyway here is the reecipe for you. Enjoy! Strawberry Bisque 3 c strawberries, washed and hulled 1 ½ c water ¾ c sugar 3 T lemon juice 1 t grated lemon peel 1 ½ c red wine 1 c. sour cream fresh mint leaves Directions: Combine strawberries, ½ c water, and sugar in a blender. Cover and blend the mixture until pureed. Stir in lemon juice, peel, 1 c. water and wine. Stir in sour cream until blended. Chill for several hours before serving and garnish with mint. Silly