I love Sunset magazine, I'm a two-generation subscriber, but really nice to see the link and flip through all the gorgeous photos with additional links for info about some of the gardens. I have over an acre, and have two very tiny strips of lawn out front, more for color and to break up our lanscaping, and a small square of lawn in the back again, just for color. The rest is planted in nearly all water-wise plants on drip. After working on our sprinkling system, fixing leaks, and switching some areas to drip I was able to bring our water bill down by about 50%. Thanks for sharing, jkmom. Patty S.

I am SO looking forward to doing this to my front lawn in Texas! Last week I went to a class on water sustaining, and built a 55 gallon rain barrel from a food grade drum. The class was so interesting, learned stuff I had never thought about before - we really are getting to a place where we need to get away from watering so much. With all the new houses, businesses, parking lots, malls, etc our land is quickly getting covered. Texas only has one natural lake, the rest are man made, mostly during the 30's to provide water for later population growth but it's not enough. Our largest water user in the Dallas/Ft Worth area is the airport, cleaning planes, runways, deicing, etc. I'll quit rambling here - just one other thing, should have known this, but all our potable water is recycled over and over for our use, but runoff from overwatering, etc. ends up in the storm drains which empty into the creeks around here. That means fertilizer and lots of other stuff ends up in the creeks.

Kathy, a very different rose than Tuscan Sun. TS has loads of petals, is more heat sensitive and fades quicker, takes longer between flushes--but this last growth spurt and round of blooms is amazing. Tuscan Sun has more vibrant early-bloom colors, red orange tan, fades to a beautiful pale shade of salmon white that can stay on and look good. Much smaller petal number, though. There is something to be said for both of them, really. Kathy

thanks for the nice comments. Joan, I have been busy with our 2 1/2 acre garden plus all our flower beds, the plants are growing good but unfortunately the weeds are too! Did you watch the weather, they said the next couple of nights could have really could sunsets and sunrises because of the haze from the forest fires from Canada, you know I will be checking! Have a good day everyone!