HM, What I am saying is we (our organization) have never used the 1/3 rule. First, it is a bit excessive. 1/2 the diameter of the originating limb seems to be more than sufficient. But on top of that, trying to get crews of 20 pruners to correctly identify 1/2rd is asking for trouble. So even when they are 1/2 of the originating limb, they tend to remain intact. Let's just assume this is a tree that is under the age of three...all my trees I do now are on a fruiting wall trellis. Trees are anywhere from 3-6ft apart. The rules I give our pruners are along these lines... For limbs directly off the leader: 1. If the limb is the same size as the leader, cut it off. 2. Tape flat onto the wire any limb that is within 6in of a trellis wire. 3. If the limb is over 45 degrees vertical cut it off. For limbs already on the wire: 1. If the limb is the same size as the originating limb, cut it off. 2. If it is more than 45 degrees vertical cut it off. 3. I want my side limbs perpendicular to my wires, so if the side limb is parallel to the wire, cut it off. 4. Head back wire limb to maintain space with adjacent wire limb. 5. Work back side limbs to 4-9in targeting 1-2 fruit buds on Gala and 3-4 on Fuji or Honeycrisp. Heading back 1 year wood is ok if there is a lack of buds and it is too long. On all cuts above 24in from the ground, make them dirty...a .5 to 1in stub is fine on gala and fuji. 1-2in on Honeycrisp. That is the general template we use..each block gets tweaked a bit based on what I am seeing and what we did last year that works or doesn't work. My pruning probably seems a bit drastic, but my goal in the first three years is to grow as much tree as possible. Any variety on M9 or Honeycrisp on any root, once they go from a vegetative mode to a reproductive mode it is hard to get them to grow. Hopefully that clears it up. It was lunch time...I was hungry.

- A humorous wrong answer is sometimes more brilliant than the correct one. - Even when the answer has been given and generally agreed upon, there's often entertaining follow-up, either informational or personal anecdotes. - As Trivia Master, ThinMan doesn't often get to play. When dancing early on, I often try to be oblique in a way that gives him some guessing at hidden clues or puns so he can have some fun, too. Occasionally he doesn't catch on and I have to award my own gold stars, knowing I had the correct answer. Ana, who's doing the happy dance to awake with power on.

I would so love to post pictures, but frankly get lost at the terminology in the directions. someday the lightbulb will go on, I hope. meanwhile, the wallpaper is actually the nicest I've seen in an rv, thank goodness. a white and off white riff on fleur di lis is the closest I can describe it. the pattern is pretty large, the repeat is at least 4 inches, luckily it's very subtle and I quite like it. floors are light beige carpet---for now, anyway. the windows do have day/night honeycomb shades and the panels are for framing each side of the window, and to hide the holes i'll create when I remove the lambrequins. the large windows are 21inches apart from one another, and I can keep that space empty----though I am visualizing the poppy panels on the kitchen side hanging next to the solid panels on the living room side in that space. the cabs will not be in that 21" space, only under the windows, so visually there will be a break with panels hanging directly to the floor there. I want to order the valances and panels for the kitchen side today, and live with them before I order enough for the living room side, but if the dye lot is different i'll be sorry I waited--or is that overthinking it? also on that website there are a few other materials which would coordinate nicely with the poppy pattern, I'll probably use those if I don't use the poppy in the entire space.

Annette, I love the direction you're taking with your space! There is nothing warmer than Honey Oak or Heart Pine flooring imo~my son and I were just talking about this yesterday since he's wanting to have wood installed, and doesn't want dark. There's a real coziness to it. As for rugs, why not 2 different ones? I like the idea of the sisal since it will add texture also, and think it will be wonderful with either rug you choose, but I really love the William Morris. I have a WM in my greatroom and chose it for it's beautuful pattern. They're more unusual and not something you see a lot of.