OMG, cindee...I'm so envious of JT! Love your gardens! Very, very beautiful! The crocheted sombrero is wonderful! She looks like she is having a great "stay-at-home" time (like she did in Iowa). So glad she hasn't talked you into a "tatoo" yet! Don't turn your back...she's a little pistol! Jeanne S. p.s. Your tomato planting intriqued me...lots of hard work but sure must keep the weeds at bay! Interesting!...fence and black weed cover.

LOL. The tag is whatever text you want the text you enter will be highlighted in blue and will be clickable, leading to the URL you paste in after the "=" sign. leave out the spaces, of course. PV

Hi Lalaland, I am glad you enjoyed the photos. I don't mind answering your questions. The eldeberry was very large but it has very soft wood and it is very brittle. The extra weight caused the branches to break. Most shrubs have much stronger wood than the eldeberry. That Etoille violet is growing in a snowball tree about the same size as the eldeberry. I have never had any breakage problems. The snowball tree has much stronger wood. The XRM does get very large if grown in full sun with lots of water. It is smaller than my SAC, but not by much. I have 3 of them. I just love the fragrance. I have one by the back door, one by the front door, and one along the sidewalk. That way I can enjoy the sweet fragrance when I am coming and going. The ones that are growing in part shade with tree roots are smaller, so location will affect it's size. I think the color combination with Kermensina is very good. The red color in Kermensina goes so well with XRM. Emilia Platter's color doesn't go that well with it. I just needed a place to put her and that was the only spot available at the time. I think a red, white, or purple would look better than a light blue. The XRM is a long bloomer, usually 8-10 weeks. I have heard from other gardeners that it doesn't do well in cold climates so it may not grow well for you at all. In our mild climate the clematis usually start leafing out in February and grow until late November. Yes I think the late large flowering clematis look great with the viticella types. I haven't had any problems with the viticella types overpowering the late large flowered varieties. They both have the same pruning type with is a plus. I have about 4 tanguticas and I have never had any weediness in my garden. I have only had 1 seedling show up. I don't know why. I have never had a seedling from my SAC or my serratifolia either. Both of those are supposed to seed like crazy. We do have very cool nights and maybe the seed doesn't ripen well. I also have my flower beds crammed full so there is little room for a seedling to grow, although I am always getting volunteers from my type 2 clematis. They are always popping up in my parking strips which are very inhospitable, go figure. The seed on tangutica's are very small so it may rot or blow away. The type 2 clematis seeds are very large so they may stay put and germinate. Buyorsell, I have the same problem with some of my clematis growing next to large trees. My neighbor planted a redwood, Doug fir, blue spruce and a cedar next to our fence. They are now 25' old and huge. Their branches overhang the fence and block the sun and rain from my clematis. The clematis I grow on that fence never get very large. The grow ok, but never great. I wish they would cut them down, I really hate them. I don't think people should plant 200' tall trees in little city lots next to the neighbor's fence. I am letting some of the clematis vines grow up into the fir trees. I just want to see how high they will get. I have a viticella Blue Belle that is about 40' up into one of the Doug firs. If I stand back in the driveway I can see the blossoms way up there. I remember reading a clematis book and they had let a Etoille violet grow unpruned into a Doug fir and it was enormous and had thousands of blossoms. I don't know if Blue Belle would ever get that big with the Doug fir stealing all the water. Maybe that Doug fir with the Etoille violet was growing on the coast where it gets a lot more rain. We certainly don't get much rain here in the summer. I am off to go water again. Karen

OOH Jim, you can't go wrong with a dinner like that. Sharon, I love your little bowls. Just perfect for your chicken pie. Now I have a craving for chicken pot pie. I haven't taken pictures of our last couple of dinners. We had Halibut for dinner on Sunday night. Monday night it was just toasted tomato sandwiches. The tomatoes were not from our garden but they were local heirlooms - Black Krim. My favourite. Last night I roasted a small Sirloin roast and served it with mashed potatoes and peas. I did bake bread this week. I had kneaded up dough last Wednesday and had intended to bake it the same day. That was the night that Matt and Dana were here for dinner. Never got around to it though until Monday night. I'm glad I waited. The long fermentation really does make for a great loaf of bread. More flavour and with lots of wonderful holes. Makes the best toast.