Ilene, You're welcome. A lot of times the tags just say PPF, which I assume means "Plant Propagation Forbidden". What the tag ought to say is asexual propagation is prohibited. That means you cannot reproduce the plant asexually via division, tissue culture, cuttings, etc., without the written authorization of the patent-holder and that is part of the patent process. Since they hold the patent, they have the right to charge a fee to anyone who wants to propagate their plant that they developed. When someone holds a patent on a plant variety, they have that patent for 20 years and during that time they receive a royalty every time someone buys one of the plants. Various wholesalers often pay the patent holder a licensing fee so they can raise and sell the plants. The royalty fees and licensing fees are supposed to be the 'payback' you receive for creating a new variety or cultivar of a plant. Someone found to be in possession of an illegally propagated patented plant would be guilty of patent infringement. Note, though, that I only mentioned asexual reproduction. You do have the right to grow a patented variety sexually from pollen or from seed. I bought a packet of seed the first year Royal Black hit the market and have been raising my plants from that seed ever since. A patent is not the same thing as a trademark. Plant names can be trademarked and then no one else can sell a different plant using that name. Dawn, Most peppers will overwinter in frostfree zones, particularly if they are in well-drained, disease-free soil. One of my Royal Black pepper plants was planted as an understory plant in a large container that held a brugmansia. I overwintered that plant in the garage last winter, dragging it out into the sun on warm days and keeping it in the garage on cold ones. Twice, on two different nights that went down to 18 degrees, the brug and pepper plant both had freeze damage and lost leaves but then bounced back. So, apparently my Royal Black overwintered in the garage, and I really didn't expect that it would. Dawn

My next door neighbor does rather "contemporary" decorating for Christmas. They use some of those extra large ornaments just laying in the greenery on the mantel and on the hearth. I was really surprised at how nice they looked when I first saw them. You can also use them out in your yard like a "garden globe" to add some color. You can often find those wide, metal casserole holders or candle holders at the TS to use as a "base" for them. Not sure if you could take the caps off and use them upside down on a dowel or garden stake--the wind might whip them around too much. If I had them, I think I would just hang them along the front edge of my porch--maybe with some big bright bows at the top. Luvs

Thanks, Cherry for having me "guest artist" on your blog! I should mention now that I've done couple dozen candy canes with the beads,when you are twisting the wires together try to leave about 1/4 in. wire close to beads untwisted so you have a little bit of "play" & can get a nice spiral, I found a couple of them I had really tight & didn't want to go in a good spiral. I have used an 11 inch 24 gauge wire & put a little loop at the bent end of cane to finish it off more professionally. With 11 in. you get just a little longer cane & I think will look better on bigger trees. The directions for the glue gun holder are over on the "lady buying glue gun for GD". post. Cherry your trees look great, love the magnolia blossums on the 1. House looks fine to me!! Thanks again, Jan

Velvet_Sparrow: You are describing the famous Shiny-Brite ornaments from the 40s and 50s. I saw those ornaments at a store we have here called English Gardens. Gorgeous! Christopher Radko actually bought the Shiny-Brite name in the late 1990s. He makes the ornaments exactly in the original style, right down to the original packaging. The story was in Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion magazine, Dec. 2004/Jan.2005 issue. My ornaments are definitely original Shiny-Brites. I recognized some of them in the magazine. I actually found a few more at another garage sale, and I only paid 25 cents for all! There are some at a local craft mall that are selling for $3-3.50 each. Even broken ones are selling for $1-2 each. I've seen people make wreaths out of them. The reproductions have the Radko name stamped on the ornament caps.