Well, they're not heavy duty umbrellas...which in the case of the way in which I use them, is an advantage anyway. Harbor Freight has them on sale for this price quite often through this time of year. Stop by a HF and get on their mailing list then you'll know when they have them on sale. I bought maybe 20-30 of them and though the ones I have left are now pretty ratty looking, they still have their uses...lol..

Just out of curiosity, does anyone know how early I can start tomatoes in Seattle if I use a tunnel cloche (PVC hoops, 3' high, covered to the ground in plastic)? I would be using from hardened-off starts and planting them directly in the ground under the cloche. In the past we found that putting some water bottles under the cloche to absorb heat from sunlight seems to help a bit. I am hoping to put the tomatoes out around May 1. Steve Solomon seems pretty gung ho about this in his book, he even talks about planting tomatoes out under a cloche, before the last frost date, but he is in the Williamette Valley, and in any case he probably has a better cloche than my jury-rigged PVC and plastic job. Granted waiting later might be a better idea, but my home-grown starts are going to be around 10 weeks old at that time, and I don't want them to stay in the pots too long. Can I get away with putting them under the cloche around May 1? Also, we do have Walls'o'water, but I am not sure how much they can extend the season compared with a full cloche.

I've heard some reports that the Asian x American hybrids are reasonable bets (with all of the above disclaimers still applying), so I did plant a hybrid 'Nikita's Gift'TM in my front yard two weeks ago during a bare-root tree-planting frenzy. Wish it luck! It's got an unobstructed southern and western exposure so I'm hoping it bears fruit some day. If not, it's a fun experiment....it's got a pair of paw paws on the opposite side of a wide walkway. This area of the garden may get a name change from "experimental" to "fruitless". Let us know if you give one a try, and how it works out. A link to mine is below. Take care, Grant Here is a link that might be useful: 'Nikita's Gift' hybrid persimmon from Raintree

Thanks for the kind words. I am in awe of her. And I am so relieved to be posting about her recovery. I got word about an hour ago about a woman in our community that just died as a result of her eating disorder. I can't help but worry that it was one of the "girls" in the support group we attended.They are all so courageous. The email talked about a special meeting of the support group, so I am guessing that it was.It is heartbreaking. Magothy River girl- good memory- yes it was a few months after my DD was diagnosed. A week before the semester started her junior year, her sorority sister died suddenly of a pulmonary embolism. The funeral was the first day of classes. Rough times. But hey sleep is way over rated. I hope that posting here may be helpful to some of the parents on the board. There truly is such a thing as recovery from eating disorders, even though some literature says not.