Severn, after I saw your thread, I searched for it and I found one dutch nusery that has it! It's a bit high grafted, which I don't like much, but I can live with it! About the mugos. Yes I had two very young 'Carsten's' but one of them gave up during August. The other lost 40% of it's branches but still it has some live buds left so it's a keeper. However, the one you remember isn't 'Carsten's', but it is rather 'Wintergold'. I have it for two winters in full sun and it displays a more orang-y color than 'Carsten's' and I highly recommend it! This year I expect it to make an even better show as it has grown bigger. Despite the hot days we have here, it started to yellow up in time. Unfortunately no other winter yellowing mugos for now. I've got my eye on 'Little Gold Star' though. 'Wintergold' past January, behind Nadina domestica 'Firepower' About 'Chief Joseph'. I liked the idea of owning one but the stories in the forum are quite scary. Especially Ken's... :) I asked Edwin if he had one availiable but he was out of stock. Since then I left it alone. I don't have too many shady spots here, to make experiments with the the Chief! Too much sun!! Best regards, Fotis

SO GLAD you tackled that one, ken! LOL Actually, I didn't find him as 'cranky' at all--but he IS 'to the point' without a lot of 'dressing it up'! He's right about the 'Mars' and 'Venus' thing! We gals can 'think' and be very intelligent but we usually kick into the 'feelings' of a thing, ultimately and react and act from that base. Guys--from Mars, are to the point, logical (in their minds--MOST of the time) and really have a hard time figuring us 'feeling' gals out. For instance: Why can't we just lash out and get over it--right? I think ken is someone you need to meet and spend time with, (in person) in order to understand he's typing like he's thinking, quickly to the point, fast in and fast out--with little emotion, which includes irritation or anger!! I'm not saying he may not have a moment or two of crankiness, on this forum (at least it does come across that way SOMETIMES--who doesn't have those moments, anyway?) but I really think he genuninely does not see how what he types, CAN come across that way at times! You have to know, that we cannot know the mood of any of us when we try to communicate this way--the one typing or the one receiving the words, used to make a point! I'm glad I got to meet him and figure this part out and now I can visualize him saying what he's typing, and how he's REALLY saying it, and I can just see him making those quips as in person, not crankily but 'quick to the heart of the matter' (as previously said) with little rehashing or dressing it up! I had come to think that he reminds me of a man I use to work for, and I was right--his delivery and way of communicating is very similar, and after I sort of figured him out, (that his bark was much worse than his bite) we got along just fine!! If he DID seem cranky, I'd just ask him (in a teasing way), "Why are you so grumpy today?" He seemed to appreciate that I'd hit him head-on rather than turning and running out crying and feeling all hurt and sulking the rest of the day! :o) Did I describe you even close to your reality, as you see it, ken? Janice (Venus girlie-girl)

Caroline, he is such a great guy. He worked for my DH during high school, but my DH would not let him stay there because he had too much potential. He decided not to go to college, but he went to school to be a Heavy Equipment Operator and is doing well for himself. He pretty much lives with us during the winter months because we spend every weekend snowmobiling and he is such a great help with our 3 kids, getting their snow clothes on, babysitting, etc. So, this isn't going to be a very well decorated home, and I am sure if us girls go in there and try and do things he will feel overwhelmed. He has stated he wants the paint off the FP (thanks for the link) and something done with the kitchen. I found the post on the Gel Stain cabinets http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/decor/msg0212371330160.html, so I will forward that to him. I'm just afraid the brick underneath will be faux brick. So, with gel stain cabinets, any suggestions for paint color in the kitchen?

Well I've been posting a bit here and there, mostly in the old house forum but I thought I should introduce myself here as I'm always reading on this forum. I'm Connie, I live in Chicago with my husband and 3 kitties. We just bought (over the winter) a 1250 sq. ft. Chicago bungalow. Just love the older houses (original hardwood floors, cool old windows, all glass doorknobs, etc, etc) Right now we're dealing with "deferred maintenance" issues. The best part of our place is that an older woman owned it and didn't do a lot of remuddling. The bad part of it was that an older woman owned it and wasn't able to keep it up. We've already removed tons of ugly old shag carpet, redone the floors, fixed up the electric, had all the piping replaced with new copper pipes. Now were working on the bathroom - keeping as much original as possible but the bath had no shower head, just a tub, so we had to redo a bit. Anyway for us, after years of living in apartments and a condo, 1250 ft is huge. An in reality, we have more space than that. A full basement that is being under utilized right now. Just laundry and a woodworking area. We also have a big walk up attic. Someday we hope to turn it into a studio (I'm an artist and my hubby's a musician) but right now its just storage. Although we have a smaller house, because it's old, we have zero insulation. Luckily, there's a Chicago Historic Bungalow association that will help us financially if we insulate so we'll definitely be doing that. There's no point in having a smaller home with bigger home utility bills! My biggest concern is the neighborhood. We wanted to stay in the city. My husband works downtown so he can take the El to work everyday. If we had moved out to the suburbs we would have had to buy a second car. With gas prices going up so much lately, we're really glad we stayed in town. Our neighborhood is solidly working class. It used to be Polish/eastern European and now is mostly Latino. Where we are it's quiet and everybody keeps there houses up nice but we're close to a less desirable area (problems with Latino and Black gangs clashing - sigh.) So far things are good here so we're hoping it stays that way. We just love our cute "little" house and wouldn't trade it for a huge McMansion even if we could.