IÂve been in listening mode as well (can you hear me listening..?) Woohoo  Deanne, you do everything with flair! I bet Doug was scared to death  and you gave yourself a shiner? how terrible  adding insult to injury w/ the flu  I do hope you take it easy and rest  youÂve got a lot of entertaining to do soon w/ your Idyll guests! I do love that butterfly  and leave it to Marie to know what kind, etc., it was. Your party sounds like a wonderful way to break up the winter doldrums  Im planning to go to the Phila. Flower Show in early March  so thatÂs what Im using as a "break-out" of winter event. V- glad to hear youÂre feeling better and cannot be held responsible except via Âweb to have passed that flu along to Deanne  I hear you about the coughing though  I had severe flu about 20 years ago and coughed and popped a pelvic artery  landed in the hospital (it was a close call). . . .for Xmas because of it (they didnt know what was wrong til they operated). So I must confess I am extremely paranoid about hard coughing of any sort now & have been ever since that happened  weird things do happen. I confess on the health front I continue to be totally puzzled by all the conflicting reports  low fat, high protein, no protein, high fat  whatÂs a person to believe any more? I think your attitude is probably the correct one, Marie  celebrate with food  after all if we donÂt have fun with it, whatÂs the point? Honey, I meant to tell you that I truly love the red also (I in fact love all bright & deep colors) and am amazed that you pulled that all together because of wrong furniture fabric! One would Never know  youÂre an artiste. Mary, I imagine youÂre starting to count the days til the big trip  it sounds glorious  you and your entire family will have a blast  a trip to paradise, how neat is that? I imagine the children will remember it forever  and it will be a nice memory to make for Annie to put next to the loss of her dear friend  a good memory to overtake the bad one in this year. Michelle, - I ordered the Cl. Laura also  it looks gorgeous doesnÂt it? For some reason I ordered mostly Type IIs this year  Im probably crazy to do so  but my others have been doing so well that I am getting bolder I guess. Of course, if this is a failure and they all croak this summer or get horrible wilt, IÂll be going back to sticking w/ the IIIs I guess  but I wont know until IÂve tried. I ordered a total of 6 clematis this year (altho my list was much longer, but I tried to restrain myself & limit to a budget $$). I know thereÂs other stuff to comment on but I better get to work. Im hearing that 4-letter word in our forecast this weakened (S***)  ugh  of course, Im planning to drive to Phila. to check on the parents  it never fails  IÂll probably wimp out if it really says itÂs gonna happen  I donÂt know how you do so much intrepid driving, Martie, with your...

Barbara, I will try to read or at least skim over that book (have difficulty concentrating for too long now) and next time I'm at the hardware store will get a respirator then, oh with glasses, goggles and that, it is not going to be easy. They are a little more helpful and knowledgeable generally than big box stores. I stuffed a bandanna into the masks, know from reading about other things small particulate especially liquid still can get through, but I'm old and if one thing doesn't get me it's going to be another, none pretty. I feel I'm ok for now, feel sorry for people who do that for a living. I know for fact the young guy who I FINALLY got to come in years ago and spray for cockroaches and fleas got some pneumonia-like affliction, and we both agreed it was probably from his work with chemicals. He used no protection other than pants and long shirt IIRC and did it all day, every day, inside and out, much of the year. I've always hated any sprays in my house for anything, one reason I like to stay independent because you have no choice in almost all community living situations. They spray on a regular basis; it's mandatory, and I'm not real confident they have but minimal concern for the occupants or people who do it, just so things "look" nice. Sometimes there is no other way. But it seems they spray routinely as a preventive. In spite of taking so many precautions and doing my homework as best I could w/new equipment and things I've never attempted before, I ran into several little problems. The spray itself once you get it going is easy enough, but anything can go wrong at any time. It's just faith that the dial actually delivers the correct dilution. I'll only mention a couple of things but there were more, that is nasty stuff to work with and hard to clean. I need some longer rubber gloves as found one unused pair left of surgical gloves, and by the time I was done, my hands felt slimy, could be from sweat, but I think some got in, washed several times with soap and water. The other thing was maybe stupid on my part but the way they tell you to clean the dial container. I could work at the faucet with that because there's bare ground, but you have to unscrew it while the spray part is still on the hose, rinse out as well as you can, on the other side of the two-way diverter I have there, and it takes several rinsings to get it out. NEVER unscrew the dial part from the hose connection until you've got it as clean as you can, why later. Then you screw it back on and clear out the spray part and uptake tube, says two short bursts (and even rinsed those other parts under running water, don't think instructions said. I did five bursts and maybe shouldn't have. But either way, when you finally think you are done, turn off the water, start to unscrew at the hose connection, the pressure left in the hose squirts water. And I noticed in spite of my care, there was still slight evidence of milky liquid in the container, much diluted but still there. Being alone, few people or pets ever come into my yard. I let the cat out for the night, he's back, hope he didn't walk through that area, it can take awhile to dry and for things to develop. So it's a good thing I quit when I did and not attempt anything in the front. Maybe from now on I'll just do those several specific plants I did and probably not as often as necessary because I procrastinate anyway. No way could I have suited up and done that if it had been hotter, so that's a future consideration. I don't know how other people deal with this stuff. It was quite the learning experience. If somebody locally could convince me that organics really work and show evidence of clean roses like I see so much here (this was mostly to save my cherry trees and a few other congregating plants that aren't blooming), it won't seem like as much trouble because spraying is trouble, too. Kelp I don't worry about any of it, practiced with that in my pump sprayer. Well, since I've done another one of my diatribes, I was thinking about writing a blog in our local paper about my experience with iminicloprid. The Bayer product for spraying that has evidently flown off the shelves. Here we are with no honeybees, and we want to keep our pretty blooms and kill bumblebees and other pollinators? At least I thought of them and took off the blooms or targeted things that aren't blooming now. Madness. But I think I'll hold off on that because I don't feel comfortable writing on one of those things, few read them anyway. My neighbor across the street says he has no JB's.

Steve, are you sure theres not something else youd like to have since Im sending the Callirhoe seed anyway. It wouldnt cost anymore to stick a couple more little packets in! Ill probably send it out the beginning of next week, so post here or email me if you can find anything on my list youd like to have. And Ive come up with a new possible germination method that Ill email when I send the seed! I still have Lavatera seed left from last year, so Ill just keep trying with that. If you do happen to find some from this year and have time to send it, that works too, but its not necessary. BTW, Im gonna be in SLC! Ill be there for 40 minutes on Christmas Eve! Hehehehe! Ill expect you to buy a ticket to somewhere so you can get thru security to come out to the gate to give me a baby plant!!! ;-) Seriously, if you have a couple seedlings next spring, after it warms up so they for sure wouldnt freeze in the mail, you probably could pad them with a little bit of moist peat and send them. In the meantime, if I ever get germination, Ill let you know! I havent gotten it done yet, but Im still planning to plant some directly in the ground outside to see if normal overwinter conditions will do the trick! Autodidact and Bean, I didnt get the purple coneflower seed collected before it snowed a couple nites ago. The snow has melted off now (beautiful day! It was 70 in my backyard today!), so I brought some in to dry the rest of the way. I leave on a trip tomorrow for three days, and by the time I get back it should be ready to send, so itll go out, probably, next Monday. Ill email after I put it in the mail. Isnt there anyone else around here whod like some free seed? Check out my list above. DELETE the Acanthus, since it apparently didnt produce seed this year, and ADD Aruncus dioicus, goats beard. See pictures of the things I have available at the thread linked below. AndhallelujahPMs are apparently working for me now, so if you want something, just PM me, but still post here that you didjust in case I dont get it! Happy seeds, Skybird

I have the opposite problem; The tall ones come back but the lovely little blue butterfly variety never do. I live in zone 5a, in sw Mich. Our weather is very flexible from polar blast one year to hardly any snow and mild the next. Same with summers. I replant the small blue ones every year as they are one of my favorites. I struggle with keeping the big ones from flopping and breaking when in full bloom. The tall one gets full sun from about 11:30 on. This is the third year it has bloomed. I did nothing to prepare it for winter, cut it back and mulched early spring.