yes...more simply put I was asking if you had a roll bar of sorts on your mower or if the grass naturally leans over. I did get my height down to around 1.5in before overseeding but the rest of the turf has really taken off from all the watering I've done. I'd rather wait as long as possible considering that I checked the new seedlings and although they are roughly 1-2in tall, they pull right up when I applied just a slight amount of "tug" to them. As for the rest of the lawn (the original sod was laid last spring), the blades are nearing 4in. I did purchase a reel mower which I've read helps reduce damage to seedlings but the reel mower did not come with a bag attachment and the longer I wait, the more thatch I could create with the clippings. The mower I bought also only adjusted to a max 2.25in. (the only one I could find was a "task force" reel mower and I actually plan on returning it once I'm done as I've heard these aren't the best long term) Just feels as though I'm in a catch 22 here. How do you post pics on this forum? I tried with my initial thread but typing out the image brackets b/w my url but it didn't work ( [img][/img] )

You'd be best off to dig the live sycamore while it's dormant in the earliest part of spring, when the soil is workable. You do need to fix the roots. It's really that simple. Get a tarp to work on, shake off and remove as much soil from the rootball with your hands, and then loosen all the roots. Any that are so messed up that you cannot straighten out, or, that are "J" shaped and head back into the inner of the rooball, clip them off with your pruners. Once you have all the untangling complete, build a cone in the middle of your planting hole so when you rest the tree on it, it's at the level you want the tree to be after you backfill the soil. With your hands, hold the roots in place straight (do each one individually if necessary) and pack soil against (it/them) to hold them in place while continuing to do so until all the roots are headed in the right direction. Believe me, this is the only way to plant a woody-plant. Then mulch, & water it very deeply once or twice a week for the remainder of the year and during year two, continue to do so. Year three it should be ok, but if no rain for 2-3 weeks, water it deeply. Year 4, it's on its' own unless you don't see rain for 3-4 weeks. I hope this information helps. Dax

I added some pictures to the link above. Tomme, I hear ya! I'm so glad we finally got some sunshine today. I hope it holds for a while! Wooderlander, WHOA! How terrifying (and infuriating in the case of the driver of your car, LOL). I'm so glad you escaped unscathed - every week we read about someone in the area who ended up in an irrigation canal or something and died. I have even gotten a little paranoid about it and have been trying to figure out how I would get the kids out of my van if we ever ended up in water. I really don't know and it is such a horrid thought. And wow, that tree!! It's a miracle no one was hurt and no houses or cars were crushed. pauline, thanks for the well wishes! bunglogirl, I *hate* power outages. How did you get through 3 days of it? Thankfully, we never lost power. I can understand how your dh feels - I get annoyed with anything that disrupts my routine, but then you get some perspective when you think about hurricane victims or the miners' families. pecanpie, what a sweet thing to say! It really cheered me up to read how you found this area beautiful. You can come visit whenever you want :) Bill, thanks for the prayers. We get this kind of thing periodically and hey, it's California. If you don't have a flood year there are plenty of other disastrous possibilities :) I do hope the prediction is wrong, but from what I've read of the scientific experts' comments, I'm afraid Sylvia Brown is probably right. proudmama, thank you for your thoughts! We're all just fine and quite lucky to actually be able to enjoy the spectacle in comfort. jerzeegirl, those waves are amazing, and even more amazing is that the surfers have been flocking to them. That's nuts!!! Well, it is to me, anyway. I appreciate everyone's comments very much and hope you are all safe and dry. I feel overly dramatic posting pictures of our little flood when so many others have experienced events of a magnitude I can't even imagine.

Just shooting from the hip here, going line by line through your post: The pillows that came with the couch ARE pretty, but I'd still change them, or add to them. The smallest ones are too small. The rug is too small and pale for this floor and your furniture. If you're really committed to it, pull the couches forward so their front legs are on the rugs, and then adjust the recliners to suit.This may also help both couches share a coffee table or ottoman. Or you may not need one at all. (I'd prefer not to have one in your arrangement. As for family pics on canvas, I want those, too! What scale and where to put them I can't say because I can't see the walls of the room. Can you take a shot of each wall? Big vases where? I tried corner lamps in my living room (similar layout, as we've said) It didn't look right. And at night, I didn't like having lamps on next to the TV. Also, and this is a "me" thing, I didn't like having all the "electronic stuff" on one wall. Too much like a wall-sized entertainment center. A sofa table could work, but I'm so into balance, I'd need one behind each couch. You have a built-in ~what~ with nothing in it? And where is it? Is the pass-through of this room behind the recliners? How much space is there from behind the recliners to the next wall or piece of furniture? Each recliner should share a side table with the couch next to it, and the tables should be round, not square. I'm big into plants, so I'd make sure to put some in front of those windows. I love your floor and am exceedingly jealous. Here are some pics of the pool. I took pictures from the beginning to the end of the process, but I'm assuming you want to see the pool and not the process. This is a picture of the pool the day it finished filling, which is why the water looks green, no chemicals yet. Hardly any landscaping is done. And notice how the close edge of the photo shows the deck meeting the dirt that used to be grass. This shows the pool and deck in relation the the back of the house. See how the water is finally blue? And you see a peek of the brick patio I put down after my hubby graded the dirt for me. I'm very proud of that! And this shows the other side, how the ground slopes away, and how much yard we still have left over. I'm just starting to work on landscaping. See the finished patio? Also, the iron fence-work and three brick columns are done, but none of these pictures show it. Same sorta angle, but from an upstairs window. This view is from standing in the ~other~ back corner of the yard. It's beautiful, but not done (like everything else) We still need to paint the trim and door of the screened porch, finish landscaping the dirt slope, and build steps where you can see the grass ends at the patio. My husband wasn't open to a pool at all, either. I started jokingly telling him, "I'm not broke, and I'm not asking," and "Great. I'll use MY half of OUR money to pay for it." Finally, I put an ugly pop-up pool in the yard, and kept it there for two years, then replaced it with the same thing when it wore out. By the time that one died two years later, he was sold on a real pool. I did all the maintenance for the pop up, and I do all maintenance for this pool. But that meant I could design and build exactly what I wanted. I even created the shape myself! Here's the eyesore that caused him to give in.