It may be past your mother's birthday (what wonderful gifts you gave her!), but remember that the winter holidays aren't too far afield. There should be lots of fruit available now so you might want to try your hand at jams. Right now it is peach and blueberry season in NC, just past is strawberry, blackberry, raspberry, and cherry (all in the freezer from my garden and farmer's gardens), but coming up is pear, apple, and late peaches, and the oh so wonderful figs. Your area might even have some of the tropical fruits in season? If you don't want to make jams with as much sugar as the usual, you can use the "low or no sugar" pectin. Easier than the other recipes you successfully made. And, there is nothing in the world to compare to a jar of peach jam in the middle of January that tastes like it was just plucked off the tree. Most people don't know how good jam tastes homemade with sugar instead of corn syrup. My personal favorite is seedless raspberry chocolate jam. Congratulations on finding out you are addicted like we all are here. We like newbies. Nancy

Hi Used to do that every winter. Spectacular but declined when warm weather returned There is a hybrid called "Sunpatients" that is far more heat tolerant. Everybody raves about them but I have not tried them Went with lobelia, verbena this year My sole waterlily eats up every square inch so limited to winter for "floating gardens" Putting in some Asian lotus right now so that will probably be the end of the floaters gary

Iris City Gardens in TN carries Eleanor's Pride. Macey and Greg McCullough 7675 Younger Creek Road Primm Springs, TN 38476 USA 800-934-IRIS (4747) 615-799-2179 615-523-8399 (fax) email@iriscitygardens.com Here is a link that might be useful: Eleanor's Pride

Trust me on this--this is a 'bat your head against the wall' situation. You CANNOT change your parents. You CANNOT change your brother. All you can do right now is step back, see the situation for what it is and realize that your parents are going to give this deadbeat whatever he wants, for the rest of his life, and there will be nothing for you, ever. If you speak to professionals in the field, they'll tell you it's common for parents to over and over again put the 'needs' of a deadbeat child over the good of their other children and even ahead of what's good for them (the parents). Parents will often let one child bleed them dry. And oh yes, they will from time to time go to one of their other children, complaining about the drain on their finances--BUT they rarely really want any help. And if you do attmept to push them to do the right thing--guess who will be wrong and will be on the outs with the family? You. Not only have I seen many other families go through this same scenario, but let me tell you about DH's family. His one sister has always been a taker. She's got all sorts of explanations as to why she needs money--mind you, her husband has a very high position with the government and has made 6 figures for years. Anyway, this deadbeat, over the years, has gotten her parents to pay for: her kids' braces, her cars, her appliances, new roof for her house, and dozens of other stuff. FIL and MIL used to go to DH, complaining about the drain on their finances. DH would get all upset, worried for them, and make good suggestions. They didn't want to hear anything reasonable. Eventually, that SIL finagled and got control over their finances. the stress she put FIL under killed him way too early. Then she STOLE over a quarter of a million $$$ from MIL (who by that time had Alzheimer's). Cost us $20,000 so far in forensic accounting and legal fees to stop the hemmorage of $$$$. It's been 7 years, and the case still hasn't been completely resolved. And honestly? There's no money left in the estate for the rest of the children to inherit. I don't care if I NEVER get any money from someone else's death--that's not really how I choose to make $$$, but darn it, it's grossly unfair for one child to steal the estate from the others. If I knew in my eary 20's what I understand now about these family relationships, we would NOT have allowed ourselves to be victimized the way we were. We would have walked away years ago. I know that sounds cold, but we batted our heads against the wall for 35 years, always doing the right thing, never taking a penny from anyone that wasn't ours, and none of it was appreciated. ever. I know this isn't the advice you want to hear, but truly, the best thing you can do for yourself, is to handle your own fiances responsibly. To protect them from others, and to make up your mind that if your parents choose to give away their money now, to a child who should be able to pay his own way, they ARE NOT your responsibility in the future, when they are down and out because of it. Do not feel guilty if they come to you for help later in life and you feel you need to turn them down. They made their choices, it's not up to you to pay the consequences for others mistakes, truly.