We've had much better luck with Craig's List than free cycle. For appliances, we sold them on Craig's list - we actually got lucky with the frig and oven and found people in the wanted sections and negociated a reasonable price/no hassle and that was it. Sold the dishwasher. Gave away a few cabinets, threw away a few (disassembled/left by the curb/cut up to smaller pieces). We tried Habitat - they first didn't come, then came and didn't take much... never will use them again. Frecycle folks are usually a hassle - want you to deliver, don't have a truck, can't lift themselves, and lots of drama but that's just our experience. We haven't had to rent a dumpster - we just slowly throw stuff away - get good trash bags and load up 2-3 trash cans each week. Sometimes we'll move one over toward the neighbor so they can't tell whose it is... she wouldn't mind if we put it at her end nor would several others as she has the same house we do and loves what we are doing. For windowes (example), we threw out 3-5 sections each week for how ever many weeks and it worked out fine. Saved dumspter fees and a trip to the dump - neighbor was going to try to get rid of them too but why bother him.

The common yellow oxalis we have here has tiny "bulbules" (sp?), which lurk 12 -18 inches under the ground. You can easily pull up the plants, of course, but those tiny bulb things stay under the soil, and up it comes again. I once had a gardener who decided to eradicate it from a flower bed which is about 12 feet long and 6 feet wide. He actually dug up the top 2 feet of soil, and sifted it by hand to get all of the tiny bulbs out. That worked for the first year, but by 2-3 years after he did that, back the oxalis came. So, being lazy, what I do is just admire it in the Spring, except where it is trying to smother other plants. Then just pull it out around those plants. By late Spring here it has died down, and I pretend it is gone. Of course, it comes up again the next Spring. It is one of our first blooming plants to bloom (starts Jan/Feb), so I just regard it as such and let it be mostly. One of my cats likes to eat it (we used to eat it as children - we called it "sour grass"). Jackie

Gorgeous pics, PK! Lauren, I'm just southeast of you In Waxahachie. I have full southwestern sun in front & part shade in back & on one side. The other side is "ungardenable". Just a narrow strip between the house & the neighbor's wood fence, it's just a walkway for me & a nursery for poison ivy & trumpet vine! I started along the sidewalk & expanded from there; seems like it keeps me from straying too far, messing up proportions, & having to undo & re-do. I put a rosemary on each side of the sidewalk close to the front door; it's evergreen & it smells like Christmas when I get the mail! There are nandinas at the corner of the house, softening the sharp corner, & right now they're at their best, still green & loaded with red berries. Along the side next to the neighbor I put 3 Lady Banks roses, as a hedge of flowering shrubs. They do get sparse in the winter but they never have gone totally bald. There's a Martha Gonzales rose on each side of the sidewalk where it intersects with the public sidewalk that defines the "hellstrip". They're compact, pretty much evergreen, & they have gorgeous blue-green foliage & burgundy stems, & the flowers are a bright cheery red. I widened the beds on the front & side of the house, & they have salvias, mums, flame acanthus, lemon mint (I love it for the "makes you smile" fragrance, but it does spread!), old irises, mistflower, a couple of crinums for proportion, & a lot of "tote & plop" plants, the ones you can't resist bringing home, & then you have to tote them around until you spy a bit of earth where you can plop them! Along the sidewalk leading to the Marthas, there are dusty miller, obedient plant, datura for proportion/contrast, & a few dwarf cannas that I may move this spring...it seems like they're more backyard flowers than front yard. Along the hellstrip on the northeast, I have roses, crinums, tons of irises, & some tall Mexican petunias that have to be watched lest they take over the universe but which bloom in the summer when everything else suffers in the heat. In the shadier areas, there are cast iron plant, Jewel of Opar, pigeonberry, & probably some other stuff that I can't remember right now! Although my little plastic wading pools are no comparison to PK's (I pile up mulch around them & pretend I can't see the blue plastic), I have 2 of them in the back, one for bog plants & one for water garden plants. At the corner, on the small wedge-shaped area defined by 2 streets & the intersection of the 2 sidewalks, there are red yucca, salvia, a four o'clock, & a big group of irises, Scattered throughout the whole place are paperwhites, narcissus, lycoris radiate, etc. Between all of this, I'm working diligently to replace the huge brittle old hackberries with juniper, olive, gingko, crepe myrtle, & loquat, & to lay down brick pathways. The things I've learned about cottage gardens & other lawn-less gardens are: If you possibly can, draw your lot on paper, sketching in the house, fences, sidewalks, utility areas (I keep the compost pile & the trash can in the narrow strip by the neighbor!). Draw in pathways where you generally walk, & keep those areas clear. You will get tired of walking around a planting area to take out the trash! I just happen to know this. Make a list of some things you like, & color code the list for the environments those things need, such as shade or sun, & their mature size (do as I say, not as I did: I'm the person who once planted a Mermaid rose beneath the eaves!). This will also keep you from planting bur oaks beneath electric lines. I haven't done that one, but it broke my heart to see the electric company's "trimmers" mutilating 100-year-old oak trees in my neighborhood, cutting big "V"s in the middle... Pencil in some things, such as rosemary by the front door, lemon mint by the back gate, bird feeders where you can see them from the window you use most-such as over the kitchen sink or in front of the computer desk. Pick long-lived plants, or plants that self-seed, when you can. Plant irises where they can be mulchless, & where the neighbor's magnificent century-old oak tree won't shower them with bushels of leaves every autumn. Plant the things that need more attention close to where you will see them every day. Make room for a sitting/tea-drinking/visiting area, including a table & enough space to scoot your chair back without bumping a flowerbed or smacking the edging. Enjoy your garden, engage with it, play with it, have fun!

This is a bit off the ? I posted of collectibles, but really I guess related too! I too have used Ancestry.com earlier but found a few things I had asked them about but wasn't sure of the accuracy... they then posted it as factual & not as the question posted by me?! I have also gone to the local Mormon churches here & they are very helpful but a lot of more info. must be kept in Salt Lake City too. The genealogist in Sweden that did my genealogy a few times used Ancestry I noticed though also. Since my grandfather came as an adult to the U.S. from Sweden & my Dad a first generation here in the U.S. and I am a second generation & as our families are small, it was fairly easy for her to trace my small 'tree' here in America & go way back in Sweden where the families didn't move around much! I only paid for her to search back 3 generations in Sweden & then to America but may some day have her go back further & also find some very distant cousins living there in Sweden today! It becomes addictive, doesn't it! I find by my making a family 'Tree' (drawn like/as a tree!) on poster sheets, that for me it is so much easier to trace the ancestry than in the genealogists' way I guess in a book-like form. My Mother's tree (Drake) goes directly back now from me to the 1500's in England & was done by one of her uncles years ago. Now that DNA is available & getting a bit cheaper, wouldn't it be interesting what other things are in our ancestry to add to the 'tree'?!! As a little girl I always was interested in the people in the old photos & listened to the conversations of the old relatives at get-to-gathers & have always made sure all photos were named/labeled & perhaps dates (so many photos kept of 'people' but no writing on the backs: worthless!!) Fourteen albums (so afar!) all arranged in order & with a 'directory' I made to help to retrieve something if I need to. My family has found it so helpful to find current family photos w/o going through ALL of the 14 albums! Sure glad I have some others out there with my passion! Thanks everyone! -Vieja