Hi all, I just posted this on the "Swap thank you" thread, and I'm gonna post it here too! I seem to have come home with fewer of the black plastic plant trays than I arrived with! I really, really need them to grow stuff in and to carry stuff around in for the swaps, so if you wound up with oneor morewould you please keep them and bring them back to the Fall Swap so I can get them back to use again? I use them to move stuff around my yard when Im growing it before the swap, and with as much as I bring, it would be impossible to handle it all without the trays to put it in. Thank you all, I really appreciate it, Skybird

Thanks. My fence was put in my Mike Bigham with BHT Fence in Charlotte. I opted for the design you can see without any additional horizontal crossrails. There was some debate about what 'officially' was up to pool safety codes in Union County, so out an abundance of caution I went with the one that was for sure up to code. Code believed to mean that there is 48' between crossrails. Either way, I liked the less obstructive view of fewer crossrails. The fence manufacturer is APG Meridian and is called Swedge Lock. It has no screws and no welds and is made in America. I guess there's been a big increase in Chinese aluminum and steel with other manufacturers and its likely to be inferior to the American made stuff. I put the fence fully surrounding my pool, then added the adjacent dog run area (that we sodded in the pictures). All told it came out to 240 linear feet of fence, three self-closing gates and one double gate so I can mow the dog run. All told around $5500. I'm not sure if big brother cared that much in my corner of Union County - but I felt better having it fenced in for the dog and any other random animal wandering through the back yard. So far, only a few small frogs and your standard assortment of bugs have made it into the pool. Here is a link that might be useful: Swedge Lock website

I'm sitting here laughing, because so far, all the questions of the day are so pertinent to quilters in general and you've all got our number. I am a thrifty cloth purchaser. If I find 'the perfect' pattern, I'll spring for it, but that's once in a blue moon. A year or so ago, I found a very authentic Japanese print, made in Japan, and four times the price I normally pay for quilting fabric. This is going to be my very own special quilt. I have most of the coordinating fabrics, but have not found just the right shade of teal blue, settled for one I don't like and am waiting on finding the right shade of teal blue to start it. I have this picture in my mind, and have waffled back and forth for a year as to the perfect pattern to display it, and think I have it nailed enough to comment to it as soon as I find a block of time in my off season with the business. Soooooo looking forward to it.

Mine have been all-over patterns, but they usually have different fabrics in different places or are variations of I-spies, and I can't envision myself ever again doing something like a Storm at Sea, for instance, where all the long diamonds are the same fabric, all the small diamonds are the same, and so on. I had only a tiny amount of variation in the one I did, and that was mainly because I didn't have enough of a particular fabric. I got so sick of the thing before it was done! Ugh! On the other hand, my very first quilt was a churn dash with bright red on the corners of the blocks, and I really enjoyed making the blocks using different prints and colors apart from the red.