Marianne, Great stuff for your gardens! Use lightly as Terrene states - too thick and when it dries it will repel water which is NOT a good thing. Worms LOVE the stuff. Six years ago DH dug 14 holes on our property trying to get a worm to go fishing. Nothing. Today all he does is go to an established perennial, jiggle the base, and VOILA! a dozen worms come crawling out. The first time I did this I couldn't believe it. I just mulched a garden last night and my favourite method is to take 3/4 compost (homemade) and 1/4 UCGs, mix, and mulch. In the shade garden where slugs are a pest, I will work a bit into the top inch of soil. The coffee eats away at their slimy outer stuff and so in the end they dehydrate and die. UCGs have a npk of 3-1-2. They don't 'burn' your plants like manure and such. They attract worms which happily poop in your gardens so in essence you are vermicomposting on site. There's a plus to everything about this product. It's not instant, but it's valuable and you should be able to see results in a season. In terms of the lawn, ours used to go brown in July. Now it stays green and thick all season long. Last week I flung about 300 lbs. of wet UCGs on the lawn. (Again, don't do this too thick and no clumps. Just have fun and fling!) The next day we saw holes everywhere and figured the night crawlers had come out for a coffee party during the night. :O) It's wonderful stuff. My gardens would not be where they are today were it not for UCGs. Mind you, I compost most of them with shredded leaves, seaweed, and banana peels, but in the end, they are my food for the soil which feeds my plants. Can't have anything better!

Here is something that might work for you. So far, I have been unable to get it to work for me, but others report success. Could be that because I have dialup or AOL, something is different enough to make it not work. It's a little bit tricky, but not too bad, and if it works will remove most ads (including banners and those animated things) from all sites. First, go to this website: http://www.ecst.csuchico.edu/~atman/spam/adblock.shtml It will direct you through the steps for blocking ads by updating your host file. This works for all browswers--IE, Firefox, Netscape. The directions on the webpage above do not really explain too well how to open the host file, so here are the preliminary steps: --First, open Notepad (on my computer, Notepad can be found by going to Start, All Programs, Accessories and clicking Notepad). --Next, click File and then Open. --You will be looking for a directory that can be found in one of the following places: Windows XP C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\ETC Windows 2K C:\WINNT\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\ETC Windows 98 C:\WINDOWS *Note: I have XP but found the directory in the place shown for Windows 2K (WINNT). The website above shows a table that is pretty accurate and includes other operating systems besides Windows. --Now, open the file in Notepad. On my computer, once I had 'etc' I had to change "Files of type:" to "All Files" with the arrow and then click on 'hosts' and Open. From there you can use the directions from the website given above and paste in all of the entries to add to your host file. Supposedly, this will tell your browser that these ad servers are located on your machine and so attempts to retrieve the ads will fail. Unfortunately, it hasn't worked yet for me, but others say it works great for them. In addition, here are some more entries that I found from a Gardenweb post a while back that are specifically targeting GW ads. I don't know whether or not they are also covered by the entries above, but here they are just in case: 127.0.0.1 amch.questionmarket.com 127.0.0.1 a820.g.akamai.net 127.0.0.1 iv.doubleclick.net 127.0.0.1 i.ivillage.com 127.0.0.1 m.2mdn.net 127.0.0.1 tste.ivillage.com 127.0.0.1 img-cdn.mediaplex.com 127.0.0.1 ads.vmirror.com 127.0.0.1 cmhtml.ivillage.overture.com 127.0.0.1 ads.pointroll.com Edit each entry above so that there is a tab between the IP address 127.0.0.1 and the URLs. Click Save and you're finished. Close and re-open your browser and hopefully all the ads will be gone. Now, the second part of the directions on the webpage tell you to update your proxy configuration (even if you aren't behind a proxy). I can't figure out how to do it, though. I get to where I paste in the long line into the No Proxy box, but my computer then tells me I need more info in the address/port box and I have no idea what I'm supposed to put in there. If anyone knows this, let me know!

thanks gaucho and it seems there are different choices, some "rounded" what do I have to Match it to? i.e, will either rounded or the other work or do I need to match it up with one of the other decisions I already made for the cabs?

I finally finished my project and these are my comments about the chalk spray paint. 1). If you have a small project, this is the way to go. Relatively cheap and paint is very forgiving. Drips can be sanded off super easily. Just repaint sanded area. 2) I had 3 pic frames, so it required 2 cans. Spending $10 in paint seemed kinda high but it was the color I wanted. It might have been a little cheaper to buy regular matte spray paint, followed by an ultra matte sealer and given me same velvety effect. 3) now I understand why you need to wax or otherwise seal chalk painted items. It wears off easily, just like chalk on a blackboard. You don’t want to do all that work and have it come off. Here’s a peek at my frames: