"I dunno - To me, an evergreen landscape is a boring, unchanging landscape. You don't have flaming fall colors, bare winter twigs etching the gray winter sky, the flurry of new growth in spring - You just can't gauge the season!" Actually, there's a lot of foliar variety in broad-leaved evergreens -- and it does change with the seasons. What about the new chartreuse green upright emerging foliage of Daphniphyllum macropodum contrasting against the older dk. green drooping foliage. And with the proper selection of camellias, it's possible to get blooms from October thru March, depending on mild spells. A camellia oleifera covered in white blooms in November is something to behold. The new growth on red-tips photinia looks like a red blooming plant - flaming red. Somewhat similar with Ternstroemia. Late fall fragrance of Osmanthus. Azaleas -- many are evergreen -- can be ablaze with color when they bloom. Same with rhododendrons. Leather-leaf viburnums are blooming right now. Huge fragrant blossoms on Magnolia grandiflora. So, no, I'm not buying the 'boring, unchanging landscape' thing -- at least not for zones 7 and 8. This may be true for zones 5-6 though.

My goodness, Sherry, I'm having trouble understanding your dissatisfaction with the rose for that location, especially from a blooming perspective. You've had it in the ground for three years and had it so healthy and reblooming for all that time that you've had to cut back some of its long healthy canes? Antique Rose Emporium describes the length of their canes as winding around a 14' pole they pictured, so that part probably didn't come as a surprise. The blooms look wonderful to me, and that's true also past the first ultra-full flush. No rose has two first flushes, unless maybe it's a hybrid musk with an ultra heavy fall flush. But the Red Cascade rose is almost as beautiful in July as it was in May, and few roses happen to be nearly so floriferous as this one when other roses aren't doing much in the heat. This rose looks about as good as it can get for a southern garden to me. In your April picture so full of the red rosy blooms of Red Cascade, notice that most of your other roses really aren't doing much, especially compared to Red Cascade. But in July of last year and this year too, it's holding its own in comparison with many of your other roses. Some roses likely have the beginnings of all the blooms they are going to produce eventually during the season already incipiently present at the start of blooming each year, and their reblooming merely projects those blooms that take much longer to come on than when the first flush appears. I have a feeling from looking closely at your pictures (which show many darkened earlier blooms) that this rose might be of that type, especially considering its parentage. But it hardly matters, since apparently it does contain so very many blooms waiting around to get started at some point during the season. I certainly wouldn't criticize a decision to switch to some other kind of finely feathered evergreen shrub, but all the little red dots of Red Cascade's striking color on beautiful feathery foliage look spectacular to me. I take back all the previous suggestions I posted last night, as I don't see that you could likely improve things any by doing something different. Perhaps your mistake, if you made one, was in choosing a rose you really don't like as much as you thought you would when ordering it. Maybe really tiny flowers aren't noticeable enough to count for much blooming to you? If that's it, then just ignore all the oo-la-lah's I've been thinking in looking at your beautiful rose pictures, Sherry. Just replace those little miniature rose plants if you really prefer larger blooms! Best wishes, Mary

So instead of going back on GW last night, I got sucked into watching the Notebook (again). I have a love/hate relationship with that movie. I hate that I love it. Thank you for taking out the time to respond. I dream about kitchens at night and it really is wonderful to get some help. Microwave - looks like everyone agrees that a GE Spacesaver is the way to go. I agree. Now, where to place it? Should I keep the frig where I currently have it and put it next to there? Or should I have the frig where I have it in my proposed layout and keep it next to there (above the DW)? Someone told me I should keep the cabinet above the DW for dishes coming out of the DW. But it also makes sense to have the MW right next to the frig. Banquette - StacyLH - love the idea. That's what I thought of originally but changed my mind because a lot of people said it was uncomfortable. After reading the threads on them on GW, I guess the trick is to make sure to do the banquette right so it is comfortable. I will do another search on GW to see if there is any guidance on dimensions, material, etc. on it (I spent 30 minutes on it this morning but haven't had a chance to read all the threads on it). Stacylh, I actually love the photo you found of the banquette. It looks perfect my kitchen and it also looks comfortable. I also need to see if I can get DH on board with it.

I think I am close to deciding want I want to do in my living room but I need your help, please! I changed out more formal wingback chairs for the more contemporary chairs (pictured) and I got a computer armoire for my living room (courtesy of CL). Now what I was thinking was putting built in bookcases with cabinets on the bottom on the back wall behind the tan chairs and trimming out the opening between the living room and dining room. Please let me know what you think about.... 1. Painting the bookcases all white (trim color). The armoire is off-white. 2. Painting the bookcases white and leaving the back wall yellow (SW Restrained Gold) or painting it another color. 3. Painting the bookcases off-white to match the armoire. -or- 4. Any other better idea I have not thought of (which is likely :-)) p.s.-In the pictures, I have pulled the tan chairs about 2 feet from the wall. If someone would be willing to photoshop some of these ideas for me that would help me SO much!!!! Squirrel helped with my built ins around my fireplace and they turned out TERRIFIC! I don't think I would have been able to make such good decisions without her. Thanks in advance for all of your help!!!!