Compumom, I'm sure you could grow the same plants in your neighborhood, but they are a bit labor intense to maintain, especially when we do not have rain. I'm glad you like what we've done to the yard, especially since you actually been in my pergola! Here's a picture of a piece of grape wood that we bought and glued tillandsias on. If you are growing grapes, this is something you can do with leftover grape vines. Dcarch, you can see the other hummingbird feeder in this photo. I hesitated to post this photo because I did hear about the East Coast weather this morning and had not realized that it was that cold there. Colleen, the teak furniture that we bought at The Teak Warehouse was made in Thailand or Indonesia, and so I'm not surprised that you SIL has the same table in Australia. Cathy, I have had to maximize use of the yard because it is fairly small, I think. We still have enough yard to make it seem spacious, however, and we would like to do more entertaining. I spend a lot of time in the pergola, mostly just relaxing, and so began to focus on what I liked and didn't like, and I also noticed that the grapevine was taking up valuable shade space, which would be better used by bromeliads and orchid cactus. Most of the yard is too sunny for those plants. When we first moved in, there were quite a few sore spots that I had to addres right away, just to make it tolerable - the first being the white concrete patio. Once we stained that, the space was really transformed and much more inviting. There used to be a stepping stone path from the patio to the pergola on the other side, but it has been covered with grass. We're considering whether to excavate that. Improving the yard makes me want to cook outside more, and Kevin always helps me with that. Lars

I don't usually check for BSCB because I prefer ones with bones and skin, and the last of those we bought were $1.49 a pound. I put them in the smoker on Sunday with a boneless turkey breast and some spicy Italian sausage so that I could make quick meals with them this week. I'm afraid boneless skinless chicken breasts would dry up in the smoker, but the ones I cooked on Sunday came out very moist and with a great flavor. I use them in pasta salad that I make with a lot of pickled Italian vegetables plus an olive salad (in a jar) that is supposed to be used to make muffaletta. The dishes that I made with BSCB are actually a lot more work than the other chicken dishes I make, which is another reason I do not buy them often. Lars

Yeah you don't want the "cake" turkey. It's chopped up and reformed into a "loaf". LOL I bought a fresh turkey breast yesterday, however, they were frozen..so I stuck it into my freezer until Monday. Just check in your local grocery store near the "whole" chickens or turkey parts. Like ground turkey and such.

Whether bone in or boneless, I cook it the same way. Shove a ton of herbed butter under the skin(I like sage,chives and thyme for a turkey),heavily season the skin with salt and pepper,and roast that sucker. I have long wanted to try Ina Gartens turkey roulade(minus the fruit) but finding a whole,boneless skin on turkey breast has proved almost impossible around here. And I couldn't debone one myself, it would be shredded...