donn, thanks. 24/7 sun is quite a feat in the NYC area. ;>) yes, indeed, indeed! why do you think I cling to this funky old old house...great garden! hakonochlea, what a great idea. I could use that along the edges maybe & the little bluestem across the center, which definitely would be too hot & dry, I think, for the Hak. plants will be watered the first season, but what I want to eventually establish would be something sturdy enough to deal with those occasional super dry summers that we get. soil here is good & maintained with regular composts, but I want to get away from any but emergency supplemental watering. how does the deschampsia look by the end of the summer? reason I am clinging to the bluestem is that I want a big Sept/Oct grass finale thing.

Carol, Well, the lack of rain is keeping me grounded whether I like it or not. I've been watching our ground carefully and think it will take a minimum of 20" of rainfall to make our ground 'plantable' again. (sigh) When you get rain here, it tends to be 2/10s or 4/10s of an inch at a time and that small amount almost evaporates before it can soak into the ground. It is pathetic. We have to be optimistic or gardening here would drive us all to distraction. I haven't canned a single thing and I may not. I am afraid to start a batch of anything because if the fire pagers went off, either I couldn't leave to go to the fire or I would have to leave the batch I was processing and ruin it. Since our fires have been so intense and the firefighters have been suffering so much heat-related illness type symptoms in the heat, I feel like I dare not miss a fire. Last week we had a fire so hot and intense (on a day when the temp was 112 or 115 depending on whose thermometer you trust) that every Fire Rehab person there ran out of bottled water, bottled Gatorade and ice, and we all carry immense quantities with us when we go. We actually had to leave and go get more drinks and more ice during the fire, which has happened only one other time in 7 years here. The fire danger is reduced in some of OK by the recent rainfall but not as much as people would like to think, and here in my part of OK, it isn't much reduced at all. So, I am trying to focus on the firefighting and dream of better gardening days next year.....or maybe in October or November if rainfall returns here. I'll plant lettuce in containers after the high temps are well out of the 90s, but we're mostly still in the hundreds, so that still seems light years away too. I have no idea what I'm going to do about the 120 or so people who usually receive gifts of canned goodies from our garden. Maybe I'll give them each a jar of dust, withered dead leaves, and dead locusts and grasshoppers, and tell them "this is what our garden produced this year". I have enough frozen tomatoes for a batch or two of salsa, and that is it. I do have lots of peppers and onions, but they're frozen because I didn't have time to can them. Normally I use tons of peppers and onions in home-canned salsas and sauces, relishes, pepper jelly, and canned pepper products. Since the freezers aren't full of produce, they're full of baked goods for the firefighters. Lots and lots of them. Different people from different departments like different things, so if we're responding on mutual aid to one of those fire districts, I try to take the rehab snacks I know they like best. I've been baking like a little maniac. I haven't even bought farmer's market tomatoes this year. We had fresh ones from April through late July or early August and I just decided that when they were done, we were through eating tomatoes. I don't like it, but it is what it is. I'm thoroughly disgusted with this summer's drought. Dorothy, I'm so envious of your plantings! (And everyone else's too.) On the noon news that I'm watching right now, our local TV met just said that for most of this station's viewing area, we'll need 15-18" of rainfall soon in order for the soil to improve enough to be usable for anything. Of course, with every month that passes, the amount of rain we need to 'fix things' increases. Unless a hurricane heads our way with a huge plume of tropical moisture, that seems unlikely to occur this summer/fall. The tropical systems we've had so far haven't amounted to much in terms of landfalling storms either, so they haven't been much help anywhere. I'm at the point that I am starting to wonder if we'll get enough rain here to stop this drought this year, and if we don't, then the drought will continue into winter and spring, putting the 2012 garden in question. It is hard to plan for next spring when you know you need a couple of feet of moisture in order for the ground to be wet enough to plant/grow anything. I spent a small fortune on watering this year and you'd never know it from how everything looks. Dawn

I use won ton wrappers for different types of filling but usually serve them more like a ravioli than a pot sticker but you have me thinking! Some of my favourites are a lobster filling, cabbage/cheese and potato filling, and a Ricotta and prosciutto filling. The Ricotta and Prosciutto recipe would do well made in the shape of a pot sticker, fried in butter and dipped in a Marinara sauce. Ravioli With Ricotta And Prosciutto 1/2 cup prosciutto -- Diced 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil 1 large garlic clove -- minced 1 shallot -- minced (green -onions would do fine) 1 cup ricotta 1 cup Parmesan -- Freshly Grated 1/2 cup Asiago -- grated 1/2 cup frozen spinach -- thawed and -squeezed dry 1 egg nutmeg salt and pepper won ton wrappers (or fresh -pasta) Saut the prosciutto in the extra-virgin olive oil just until softened. Add the garlic and shallot. Saut until limp but not browned. In a bowl combine ricotta, Parmesan, Asiago, egg, spinach, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Add prosciutto mixture. Place a spoonful of the mixture on top of a won ton wrapper, wet the edges. Place another wrapper on top and seal the edges. Alternatively you can fold the wrapper over the filling to form a triangle. I often use a ravioli cutter to trim the edges. Place the filled raviolis in boiling salted water. They dont take very long to cook. They float and become slightly translucent. Serce with a light tomato sauce or a browned butter

I am very new to this site but I absolutly love it. Everyone seems so nice and open hearted. I have not started to really quilt as of yet but I will be starting shortly. When I was 13 (16 years ago, I am almost 30 now ) I decided I was going to hand sew fabric together for a quilt for my niece who at the time was 5. I did and to this day she sleeps with it every night, falling apart and the batting all at one end of it LOL. She is expecting her first child in October and she is calling me everyday for a handmade quilt for her baby. I can't say no. I can not think of a gift for her or the baby that would be more from the heart and soul as that. But I want to make my first real quilt right! And the second quilt I want to be an upgrade for my niece. My love and admiration for quilting came before that. From the time I was 2 I slept with a quilt from my great grandmother that was hand quilted and I wouldn't sleep without it. Even after coming home from the hospital after being in acoma for 3 weeks I was carrying that quilt in behind me because my mother faught the hospital on not letting " personal items" in ICU. I slept with that quilt until it was too raggy to keep in one piece. Anyway I think the love of quilting did come from my roots. My mothers family made quilts from only scraps and what ever they had availible and the quilts were either made heavy or light depending on the need. I have always admired them and even though I don't sew regularly or knit I am so motivated to finally dive in and learn this that I can't wait.