I'm excited to see your success, Jenn! As I've previously written, it's probably going to take tweaking to work similarly in other climates and your imagination and creativity provide new thought and ideas I may not have thought of. The idea wasn't "mine" to begin with, but was shared by a gentleman in Australia on the Rose Hybridizers Association, further tweaked by Paul Barden and shared on his blog. Since nothing I'd previously been successful doing had worked in my new climate, I figured I had nothing to lose. I know you understand my excitement when it WORKED! It's been as exciting hearing from folks who have tried it and had it work for them, too. A further tweak, and one which could easily work well for anyone wishing to trade cuttings...I've begun treating cuttings I've sent, when the recipient has wished it, as if I was wrapping them to remain here, before sending them. I'll remove the foliage and soak them a few hours in water, then treat them with the Dip'n Grow and wrap them in the damp newspaper and mail them. I've let them know what date I treated them so once received, they can be held until the two week period is complete and then unwrapped. It's worked rather well in many instances so far. Something else to explore and experiment with if you're trading cuttings. This should have been a thought many years ago when a friend sent me cuttings of an Ipomea from New Orleans. Five days in the mail, wrapped in damp paper, those things had five inch roots and grew like a house-a-fire when planted. If those could form roots in those conditions, why couldn't other types of plants? If they're going to spend three to five days in the mail, held in the same conditions (temperature, of course, isn't as easily controlled, but the dark and damp sure are), why not include that in the wrapped time to keep them fresher? It's very similar to the way bud wood is stored from one season to the next for production. I'd wondered why there hadn't been complaints about them rooting instead of holding until budded, then it dawned on me. We are finding temperatures in the sixties range optimum for root formation. Commercial sources hold the bud wood at closer to freezing, so it stores like produce in a refrigerator, much like what has been reported from people who have tried holding the wraps in the vegetable crisper. Too cold, and it behaves like produce. Too warm, and they're stimulated into bud development and leaf growth at the expense of callus and root formation. The range between 60 and approximately 69 degrees has been shown optimum to encourage callus and roots to form while keeping the cuttings fresh without pushing leaf development for the two week period. Significantly shorter periods are premature because the callus is often not formed or reduced compared to the results after two weeks. Until the Christmas Eve batch, I'd experienced weakening of the cuttings by holding them longer. I thought that batch apparently wasn't as 'dormant' as previous batches were due to the weather we'd had prior to their being prepared and wrapped. I wasn't satisfied with their development after two weeks, so I held them an additional week to see what would happen. That extra week really made a difference, where it had been disadvantageous before. That batch callused and began forming roots to an amazing degree in those additional seven days. Evidently, temperatures were more conducive in the second two of the three, because they had caught up with the New Year's Eve batch. Or, the weather the second batch endured the week between Christmas Eve and New Years better prepared the wood for the treatment. The only two variables which changed between the two batches were what the second batch was exposed to out in the garden, and the temperature in the drawer the third week the first batch experienced. Since both batches were pretty equally developed, I have to conclude it was the temperature inside the drawer the final week both experienced sitting there as nothing else varied between them. I don't know if I would have removed all the bark from the woodier cuttings, Jenn. I'm sorry I didn't think that was what you meant before you did it. I would have only exposed more cambium below where the plant would be eventually planted, but who knows? This is another "tweak" which may prove beneficial. These have most of the circulatory system exposed to the conditions which foster differentiation, callus and root formation. Theoretically, they COULD form roots anywhere along their length. You might find you need to plant the whole cane under the soil and allow new growth to emerge as you would from a bulb or tuber. As long as the growth buds weren't destroyed or too badly damaged, anything is possible! Kim

The only thing the Thermador didn't have was a convection fan. It was self clean, broil, timed bake, bake, micro, broil/micro, bake/micro with a low, medium or high setting for the microwave. I personally rarely used the microwave only setting since I had a stand alone microwave. From what I understand that is why it went out of favor with consumers - it was a poor micro-only oven. Now as to the design flaws of the built-in Jenn-Air convection/microwave, I'm going to be adding to this so I don't make any mistakes and misrepresent it. I rarely use the Jenn-Air convection/microwave any more. My biggest complaint is that it turns itself off. I'll preheat it, hear the bell that it reached temperature and when I'm finished prepping find the oven has turned off. It will only preheat for a certain amount of time and after that time has been reached, it will exhaust the heat from the oven. A second complaint is the temperature fluctuation - more frequently lower than higher. The temperature is displayed on the digital readout. Heaven forbid that you open the door to check on your food, it takes forever to re-reach the set temperature. The oven was half programmed correctly. The oven does permit one to set the convection/roast/microwave to any combination one would desire. It's the convection/bake/microwave that can't be set other than the reprogrammed settings. So the capability is there - just incomplete. There is one thing that we do use the oven for regularly and that is reheating pizza, pancakes and waffles on the crisper pan. If you are into convenience foods then this oven is for you. There are just two of us and we both cook so normally we would use the smaller convection/microwave oven more - we don't because of our frustration with the product. As I had said we did use the GE convection/microwave more than our full-sized oven. I will be adding to this post. There are more complaints. I just want to document them correctly.

Well, update on the microwave debate. I thought hard about the convection oven since it really seems like a good thing. But since I use my Traeger smoker grill for most meats I wasn't sure if I would use it that much or not. Well, long story short (kinda)...I went to Walmart..(hate Walmart LOL,...but they didn't have a good selection in-store and nothing appealed to me), then Target and they had a couple that weren't bad, but no real deals. So I stopped at Sears on my way back home and when I seen it music played, light shone from above....well..maybe not exactly..but it grabbed me from 100 ft away. It was a Kenmore stainless microwave/pizza oven combo! I have looked for years at pizza ovens on e-bay and thought about it, but then wouldn't know where to put it and it would end up in the basement on a shelf. This has a pizza drawer under the oven big enough for a 12" pizza. Can also use it to heat up frozen type foods as well. Bottom line: I'm happy. I guess that's all that matters. It was on sale for $179.00, so not cheap, but it seems solid, is heavy as heck and a nice size. Duane

I saw something like that on a website called Marksdailyapple, re: resistant starch. Although I am not paleo I still read it because I enjoy the weekly success stories. I found it interesting because my personal experience, when I go fully paleo, I start to have histamine reactions to many proteins that I don't normally have and then I have a very limited diet. I found if I kept say Glutino crackers (not a lot, a handful every few days), basmati rice, or Udi's bread I can handle proteins, both products I mentioned are made with tapioca and potato starches so I started using them in my cooking with no problems. The potato thing is interesting as I find I can have nibble of potato and if I get this weird feeling at the back of my throat (maybe bitterness? not sure) I don't eat it but if there is no reaction then I usually have a 1/4 portion without problems. I think it has to do with the solanine content. I do hope the medical system starts to direct their attention to intestinal health, I really think there is something there. My medical turnaround has been remarkable but very much ignored by my doctors. I'm happy and healthy so that's fine by me. Because my system is crazy at times I find my skin starts to react oddly so I make it a point to drink a tbsp on gelatin in warm water to start my day and within a week there is an improvement. It makes me gag but the results are worth it:). Thanks for any input as I love any bit of information of health and diet I can get and very much appreciate it. I came across hydrolystate gelatin from Great Lakes Gelatin but you have to buy a lot of it so I wasn't sure if it was worth it to get it. LOL - 10-30 years ago I would have been rolling my eyes so deep in my head about "this person" (future me) talking that they would have gotten stuck!