Thought I'd report back on germinating beans with a nitrate solution. (Only a third [8/24] of my beans planted in ground earlier in May had germinated). In the cell pack with Miracle Grow I planted 72 beans. Thirty one germinated, so 43%. The cells were too small, so that a couple of beans got their roots growing over the stem, so that they could not get up out of the soil. Pretty weird to see a bean with true leaves trapped in the pro-mix, coiled twice,yet not able to escape the roots. Those roots were partly above the soil. Also, some beans came up with oddly thin stems. (That was the case in the garden as well.) Quite a few had trouble completely splitting their seed coats even after their were well above the soil, so I gave them a little help with that. Tonight I planted out as many as I could. Will be interesting to see how many survive transplant. I left the weaklings in the cell packs to see if they will develop any more. I still need to plant out a lot more but I'm going to move on to my seed purchased for 2018. Got to get them in pronto.

This is a most riveting subject, and a most interesting thread. I think there is a little bit of truth in many of the posts so far and I've changed my mind on this one at least five times. The actual print inside the frame gave me the impression of a photograph because of the fine white line like old photos get when they are damaged. That being said, one can take a photo of a drawing and parts of this picture are without a doubt hand rendered including the background and that could very well be a studio backdrop. My impression at this point is that this is likely a studio portrait and that it is in essence a composite with the facial features being the true rendering off a negative and the rest a lot of touch up and very poorly executed outright embellishment. If you'd like to see an example of a turn of the century hand painted studio backdrop, I can show you a large portrait of my great-grandfather and his brother sitting in a real chair, but with a very fake staircase behind them. LOL It was not an unusual practise, clear on up to the forties and fifties for some photographers to take portraits in black and white and hand tint and retouch them in the dark room. It wasn't because of the cameras not being able to, but the studios having the equipment to develop them. So seeing 'sketch marks' doesn't prove anything but the skill of the craftsman who took and developed the portrait because you're just as likely to see the editing on a real photograph as not. I have a portrait of my g'grandmother I'm inserting here because judging by her age it would have been taken about 1918-20. It has been hand tinted, and if you look at her blouse, it has obviously been hand retouched for detail and the bottom darkened out to extend the photo as much as possible to the paper to fill it. I think this is what happened to the boy's dress......it was probably enhanced by hand and the chair by imagination and lack of artistic ability. Even poor people scrounged up the money for portraits in the old days, God knows my ancestors weren't rich people and we have them to pass along. But they certainly were special enough not to be done on a whim. One portrait my g'parents had taken in the twenties was of my little aunt who was expected to die at birth, but lived until two years. So, they coughed up the money, even with ten kids, to have a portrait taken of her. I'm no expert and I'm not pretending to be but before I'd blow this one off as a fake, I'd have it checked out. Regardless of how it pans out, and even if it turns out to be a Cracker Barrel nostalgia shot..........it's a Jim Dandy and worth hanging on a wall just to see the mug on that kid.

I'm not sure - but I'll list them and see: 2 pair basic pumps for work (black/navy) 1 pair black loafers (work/casual summer) 2 pair black ankle boots (work/asual winter) 1 pair knee-high snow boots 2 pair dress flats (silver/brown) 2 pair "dressy" heels (black/cream) 1 pair tennis shoes 1 pair yard loafers 1 pair flip flops for summer 1 pair black vinyl knee length heeled platform boots (for Halloween type dress up) 14 total, looks like. I'm okay with that - the "dressy" heels and flats I hardly ever wear, but I do need to keep them for those rare occasions I need a nice shoe in a specific color for a holiday party or some random event. I never wear the navy pumps, so those could probably go, but it's nice to have the option should I want it, and they're in good shape. I wear the heels out on a pair of pumps and ankle boots every year (due to daily wear, I'm sure), so I generally buy a new pair once per year, toss the old ones. This year I might see if I can just have them re-heeled though...

I have a shoe storage cabinet in my bedroom. It is basically a book shelf. Mine is 14 inches wide and it holds my husbands size 11 shoes as well as my own. Before I had it built I measured the biggest pair of shoes then measured from the heel up and added 1 inch to see how far apart to make the shelves. Some of my shelves are 6 inches from the top of the shelf to the top of the next shelf, giving my about 5 1/2 space between the shelves. These hold my husbands shoes and my heels. I have 2 shelves like this and the other 3 are an inch smaller in space. It holds 15 pairs of shoes--actually I have about 20 because sandals I stack one on top of the other I have it covered with a cloth cover I made, but it would be an easy matter to add doors with european hinges. If you want to make it narrower you could slant the shelves and add a cleat to catch the heels of the shoes.