Hi Jim, Here is Easter Basket blooming this year--about a month ago, I believe. In response to your question, I should first point out that most of the roses in my gardens are not doing quite as well as last year. This past winter was brutal and most of the roses had to be pruned back severely. While they are growing and blooming, they are still too short and not as full and floriferous as they should be. Easter Basket suffered the same conditions as the other roses, but is recovering better than some of them. It has had two bloom cycles so far this year, but it still isn't as tall and wide as it was last year. However, when it blooms, they look as lovely as usual--just not as many as usual. It has had a touch of BS--again I attribute that to it not being fully recovered from the brutal winter. However, I don't think I actually sprayed it when I sprayed the HTs a couple times in the spring. I guess I'm going to have to wait until next year before I make a definitive statement, but I have no plans to replace this rose and believe it should snap out of its brutal winter blues by then--at least I sure hope so. It will be interesting to see how it blooms this fall--whether it has recovered by then or not. Thanks for asking. Kate

sue, i'll be turbo grading on monday and tuesday, final papers as they write their final exams and then the exams as they come in, then the greenhouse on wed, then thursday my lit papers are due so a final batch of turbo grading, greenhouse friday sat and sunday, and grades are due monday so somewhere before then i have to add up all of those numbers. that will probably be my friday night, sitting on the couch, watching the thursday night tv shows online, and cursing at the calculator. i have done nothing in my garden un a long time, no transplanting of seedling yet. don't even have a plot dug up. rain rain rain. after next week, though, if no one else signs up for my 102 comp class (which would be BAD. if you know anyone desperate enough to pass comp 2 that they will come to waynesburg to do it, let me know LOL) i will only be working at the greenhouse until the last week of june, when i do my week long nature lit class. hopefully i can get everything planted out before the heat of july kicks in!!

You are welcome. I like figuring out there names too. I don't like how my apricot one is aging after only a few days. Most of these grocery store minis have blooms that look great on the bush for an incredibly long time. The lavender one looks very nice still, so I don't regret buying the basket. But I will give the apricot one away. The rose I want to find next is Renata. Here's a link to Dan's photos of his: Dan's Renata. I've seen it in person and regret not buying it. It was a medium shell pink and there is a note on Help Me Find that the blooms last a long time. I'm waiting for the Vons floral manager to call me when it comes in. The hunt is half the fun :-)

We don't celebrate easter, but we do celebrate spring with a basket of goodies, and this year my freshman in college is getting dark chocolate and caramels, a bag of pistachios (tradition), a small bag of jelly belly jellybeans (another tradition), a pair of bright, springy leggings, a "resist" t-shirt, several "resist" stickers for her laptop (they are all about the laptop stickers at her college), a book on her idol, Ruth Bader Ginsberg (who graduated from the same college my DD attends and is a member of the sorority my DD just joined), a pair of earbuds and a new charger (yeah, her too). Thanks to this thread I'm going to add some fun socks, Tide to go pen and a Dunkin Donuts gift card, great ideas here, thanks, all.