Jon, yes, it is shorter growing than most of my epis and the stems are thicker as well. I don't know if the flowers are starry or not, I just bought it a few weeks ago, right before we started getting the greenhouses covered for the winter. It is such a temptation to tease you about how I've never seen a flower stare, and I'm obviously immune to anything but temptation, lol. Sorry. Diane, living in the deep south has advatages and disadvantages. We pretty much have a 12 month growing season but that also means we have a 12 month mosquito season too. Slugs and snails don't seem phased by what passes for winter here but on the other hand we can walk out in our gardens and see things like this: Clerodendrum indica Meyer's Lemon Variegated Angel Trumpet Alsroemeria psittacina Justicia brandageana Solanum jasminoides Manettia luteo-rubra So I guess it all evens out in the end.

I do sentinal beach combing, write down and keep track of everything that washes up on the beach. Years ago I went to Florida for the seabean convention, yes, it's real, every October in Coco beach. One of the attendees works cleaning the beach. She had found a "brick". Threw it in the dumpster at the park. Well, when we found out we all HAD to go and look. So we loaded up in 3 cars, drove across town, PAID to get into the park and proceeded to pull everything out of the dumpster she had thrown in. We were looking at bottles, big chunks of something we tried to break open by dashing it against the parking lot, the "brick", which was a very well-wrapped package of very high grade marijuana. It was pretty stinky and rotten. But did that stop us? Oh no, we all had to smell it, touch it. So here we are, a bunch of old farts in a parking lot, professors, lawyers, nurses, throwing around stuff that had washed up on the beach and playing with a couple of pounds of rotted marijuana. The people at the hotel had a good time watching us but luckily noone called the police. I do not know how we would have explained that one!! Honestly officer, we're out here in the pitch dark digging through a dumpster with a couple of pounds of marijuana because we're at a seabean convention!!! Do you think they would have thrown us in jail or just the nut ward? I gotta make reservations for next year, that's a fun convention. Tally HO!

Color me confused! I remember a plan with the kitchen to the left of the entry, big and open with a woodstove and a couple of chairs in the corner. Then a butler's pantry of sorts behind the kitchen with a mudroom/laundry with your big old kitchen sink off to the left of that. I think you had a living room to the right of the entry with a master bedroom behind it, maybe opening up to a patio or deck with the hot tub. I think there may have been a Florida room in the back, behind the butler's pantry. I have no idea where your dining room was. Now, you have two different plans entirely. Both have too many places to lounge and to eat and no place to sleep. (Actually, I do see the MBr off to the left, but if I admit that, I have less to harp on.) I do my bathroom plans on paper graph paper with colored pencils. This weekend I bought myself a house planning template with toilets and bathtubs and door swings for doors of all sizes on it. Last week, I priced out my tile at HD with cheap white tile and carrara-look trim, and again at Tile Store with Carrara. I have my swanstone shower walls and ADA roll-in shower pan all chosen. Now I just have to wait two years until we can actually do the job! I bet I can price it out in several other colors and materials by then! What did Tim Allen do, Marti? Did you lose consciousness, LL? Waiting to hear.... Just how hard did you hit your head?

I was sure I posted something here about farm tables available on ebay, but don't see it. Anyway, there are some good ones, and you can put charming Provencal stools underneath so that you can push them completely under and they'll be totally out of the way when you want them to be. When it says absolutely no shipping, you can hire your own shipping company to go pick it up. You probably already know that when buying from ebay you need to ask lots of questions and make sure before buying. Eventually I'm going to get something like this and depending on the condition of the top, maybe add white marble or butcherblock. Here is a link that might be useful: various antique farm tables