Hi Luna, I like the moonflowers growing on the arbor you made! I grow them every year. I love their fragrance (second to honeysuckle) and I enjoy watching them open. I like all the ideas for the ladder, but do you think a honeysuckle will be too big for the stepladder? I could always prune it though. If I had the room, I would use the ladder inside to let some of my hoyas (favorite houseplant) ramble all over it. The ladder's in the storage shed and probably needs some TLC. BTW, I got this idea when watching P. Allen Smith. On his set, there was a ladder leaning against the wall and I thought a ladder would make a neat looking trellis. Thanks everyone for welcoming me here! I'm usually over on the hoya or vine forums. Talk to you all soon! Brad AKA Moonwolf

I've tried staking my peppers with wooden stakes, using the inexpensive wire tomato cages, and doing nothing ... and I've had the best luck using the wire tomato cages. Last year, doing nothing worked through most of the summer for me, but come early fall, when the vines were long and the fruit most plentiful, I had entire vines (with nearly ripe peppers) snap off in thunderstorms. So this year I'm going back to the wire cages, just to be safe. I hope you'll come back and post pictures of your tomato bed this summer. My experience with cherries is that they get gigantic and take over everything, so I'll be curious to see how yours do and how you end up pruning them. :)

Ok. In order for the arch to be higher, the tanks would need to be much closer together if you put them on the inside of the panel. They might be hard to get between, to weed, etc. So I would suggest you put them on the outside of the arch.(one on each side). I don't know if you considered that already as the option and pretty much have the tanks where you want them, but it looks like you wouldn't be able to weed the tank on the right, if it is right near the fencing. Have you put any drainage holes in the bottoms of these tanks? Don't put too many in. I was using about 9 food-grade stock tanks and put waaaay too many holes in them and the water would drain out much too soon, and I have to water them about every other day......which is a drag. I've tried to plug some of the holes and they're doing a big better. But mine are up on some cement blocks, and not right on the ground. I love trellis gardening. I grow (in the ground) cucumbers on both sides of the trellis and they love it. I also use my kids old swing set with fencing up one side and over it and grow winter squash, and it seems to love growing upwards.

There are only two patterns on the Premier yarns website using the trellis yarn. One pattern involves crocheting, and the other is neither crocheted NOR knitted. See: http://www.premieryarns.ca/product.aspx?id=6896&pid=166517 And while snooping around the Internet, I found: "Similar to Lion Brand Trellis and Bernat Matrix, City Life Ladder yarn is a glitzy ladder yarn." HTH.