I like blue and use it a lot - in the garden; in the house; in my wardrobe... but I've never felt the need to pursue 'true' blue - if it's reasonably blue, I'll likely be happy with it :-) Color preferences are definitely a personal thing, although it does change over time I've found. In general, these days I prefer cool colors more than 'hot' ones. I do like pink - but mainly the cooler shades of pink. And I prefer to use large quantities of a color - I'm drawn for some reason to monochrome type color schemes where the planting includes variations of a limited number of colors. Sometimes though the introduction of an unexpected color can be just what's needed. Gardengal- orange is one of those colors that I don't normally use but I particularly like the spring scene out the window of my home office. The squirrels obviously raided a neighbour's tulip bed and added their booty to my garden! I wouldn't have planted these tulips myself but I love the combination and, luckily, it has been coming back for at least 5 years now! Without the orange, this would be a rather dull scene...: Another accidental orange combination I really like is this one of some of those cursed ditch daylilies that came with the house plus the next-door-neighbour's Jackmani (?) clematis tumbling over the fence. I like it so much that I have refrained from ripping out the ditch daylilies (that are otherwise a PITA!) I seem to have strayed off topic somewhat here but I really like playing with color and am always looking for color combinations/ideas to adopt. How do you use orange gardengal - i.e. what are some of your favorite orange scenes?

Lynxe, I'm not willing to go overboard becaues I've found that the prices always go down with availability. I'm just looking around right now, and really wanting a blue=ish daylily. I really like the lighter shades shown in the photo above of "buyorsell888." I'm finding it on the 'net for $12, but wondering if I should wait and see if I can find a better one. I'm drooling over "Another Day in Paradise" and "Master of Disguise" (see Blue Ridge Daylilies 2011) -- neither of which is a real blue, but with gorgeous blue markings. I'm thinking I might be able to afford them after about ten years, LOL.

carecooks, as are your circumstances, space constraints dictated our choice of the 30" slide-in rangetop. We could have accommodated a 36" drop-in cooktop in the same cutout that once housed our 36" Creda, but I really didn't want a stainless base under those cast iron grates. And the deep bowls around the burners on the slide-in, as on the range, can directly accommodate a wok. So since the 36" slide-in would have intruded on surrounding cabinetry, we opted for the 30" as the best compromise. Obviously, when you've a serious cook in the family, more burners seem attractive. But Hubbest has been able to do his stocks and reduction sauces on our four burners and still have space for a stir-fry. The generous size of the burners and the X-styled grates between right and left pairs give us adequate space and good mobility. In addition, getting the 30" rangetop allowed us a better hood capture area, for we went with an 800 cfm 36-incher up top, and that little fella really sucks it up. (About that, more anon.) Functionwise, we're happy campers. And since we both are cast iron cooks, the no-nonsense looks of the BlueStar suits us fine. (But I bet the lady who loved the Creda and her OTR "recirculating" would be horrified.) ;-)

Golly, hate to rain on the parade but I don't think that is High Blue Sky by Ernst'98.