Welcome to the forum, Lynette, I remember having saturated soil, and not all that long ago. That's Oklahoma for you....swinging from one extreme to another! Pines are having a lot of issues with various bark beetles in recent years in Oklahoma and it seems to be getting worse, so a pine is not what I would choose if I wanted a tree that was going to live long and stay healthy. It would be quite frustrating to plant one, have it adjusting and doing well for a couple of years, and then having the bark beetles kill it. We had a large Eldarica pine tree in our front yard in Fort Worth, but it was not planted close to the house because pine trees get very large over the years and if you put them too close to the house, they will get increasingly too close to it as they enlarge and then will begin to grow crooked as they attempt to "lean away" from the house. We planted ours 20' from the house and only about 12' from the front sidewalk, which was almost too close to the sidewalk as the tree grew. This summer, a neighbor of ours lost a row of pines that had been planted along the fence line by a previous property owner about 25 years ago. They were huge--easily 30' to 40' tall and served as a wonderful privacy screen. I've been watching those trees grow for the 16 years since we first bought our property here, and they grew really fast....but a wildfire got that section of them this summer and now they're gone. They looked great for all of fall and winter every year, but often struggled in the heat and drought here. Based on watching them all these years, I've never planted a pine tree in our yard here because I want a tree that can tolerate our summer weather and still look good and stay healthy. I don't know that watering the Maple made it weak. It is more likely that the two back-to-back drought years were hard on it. Any tree can snap in wind. There's only so much wind force that any tree can tolerate, and even healthy, high-quality trees can break in a wind storm or in an ice storm. I've mostly stuck to planting oak trees on our property because of their hardwood and longevity, with a few understory trees like deciduous magnolia, chaste tree, various hollies and desert willow that flower and give us periods of color. We have about 10 acres of woodland although we built our house on higher ground in what essentially was fallow farm land/cow pasture that had been left to grow as it choose for about 25 years and it only had two trees that we kept when we cleared the land to build the house--one post oak and one large native peacan tree. Since building the house, I have made my decisions on what to plant in the yard based on what I've observed is healthy and happy in the woodland. I like Susan's suggestion of the Chinese Pistache. They are very good trees. I'm going to link the website of the Oklahoma Forestry Service because it has links to several guides that detail great trees for various parts of the state. Maybe you'll see something there that you like. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Tree Selection Guides at OFS Website

First, to answer a few questions.. Sombreuil, the large duct/pipe is the HVAC(?), central heat & AC (heatpump). I don't understand why it is this way, perhaps it can be explained simply enough, that I'll understand... It comes into the room, continues about about 3', (I said "4", previously, but definitely closer to 3), then angles over to the ceiling vent by the window. Couldn't a vent be placed at the wall, right where it comes into the room? It supplies nothing but that one air-vent.. The small black pipe seems to be venting, presumably sewer. Oh - the lamp cord is the plug-in for that flourescent light fixture flopper put in. (HATE it!). Did he screw that up, too? There seem to be varying opinions on the wiring... I'm not sure what to think, at this point. Above most of this room is a void, pseudo-attic space behind 5'(ish) kneewall. I can access it - but it's not easy. The insulation, I want to get rid of anyway - it's gross. I could definitely stay away from any electrical when replacing it. (It was resting on/smooshed upon that K&T, I've pushed it up & away for now - what I could reach, at least). Money is more tight than usual, right now - due, only in part, to this bathroom/laundry room fiasco. (I thought things happened "in three's"? We passed "3", got to "6", still going, lol!). So, the very THOUGHT of bringing in "Mr. Electrician" makes me start to sweat & tremble... I am Chicken Little, by nature.

Yes, our water is really hard and seems to eat the insides out of appliances. We're on our 3rd water heater, 3rd dishwasher, and 2nd washer in the 15 years we've been here. We've come home to water spewing out of various appliances a couple of times. That door on the back wall is the water heater closet. Our current water heater has lasted longer than any of the others, and I told dh the other day we should probably replace it now just because we're probably living on borrowed time with it. The washer and dishwasher are fairly new. And I really hope to be out of here before they go. Maybe after speaking ill of the water heater, I should stay up all night too. I'm almost there now anyway.

Ingrid, I second guess myself all the time. If I have room in my garden and choose a plant on-line (I rarely go to nurseries--they are known for their lack of variety and hardly any roses), I wonder, before and after I order, did I do the right thing, should I have bought this one instead, will it do well in my garden under harsh circumstances, will it look and grow the same, etc., etc., etc. I also tend to push the envelope a bit as well. Who else, where it is hotter than Hades in the summertime, grows raspberries and has great flushes of them (in a drought stricken area as well!). So at least I am adventurous when it comes to the plant world. It is probably a good thing I don't have a bigger yard. Lord only know what you would find me growing in there. One lesson I learned early on, the definition of a weed. A weed is ANY plant that grows where you don't want it to. That has helped me get rid of plants and not think too much afterwards. Each plant and whether or not it does well, is taken as another of life's lessons.