shasta, I hope I didn't read it on this thread :-) but no one mentioned digging them up in any of the discussion I read about it. You just leave them where they are. I don't know everything, but I covered mine with chicken wire (read that somewhere, they'll grow through it) so the squirrels wouldn't dig them up. Then I had to cut some of it away this spring because it was cramping some of the tulips, haven't bothered covering it with mulch but should if I leave it. I think I'll take it off after the leaves die back and take my chances. I don't see anybody else doing that. As usual, the squirrels and/or chipmunks are messing with my stuff, gotta cut more chicken wire for all my planters. I love the critters but am really cross with them at this point. I think I did check back on the bulb forum with another question I had. Someone wanted to know if you could transplant tulips now. I can't remember the answer to that exactly - I wouldn't - would wait until fall, but they were talking those bulblets. One opinion is they take so long to mature and bulbs are cheap but you can grow those, sounds like a hassle. We'll see what happens with mine. There was an opinion that those grown in shadier spots are less likely to come back. Clunk. That could be mine on the east side of the house that don't even get a full morning of sun because of trees. Anyway, you might want to try it, and it's probably not too late to give them some bloom booster now for when they quit blooming for the food storage process, couldn't hurt. Your tulips are really pretty. And I still love your jug ghetto. Mine aren't thick like that because the germination is more in patches. But a visual is a great help and tells me to uncover mine (it is still getting pretty chilly here at night and I've got vent holes in mine). Now I'm seeing peoples' photos here, and I'm not seeing vent holes in the top part of the jug. Maybe they are just small and don't show. I will let them grow on until they get more like yours, more likely to transplant more easily than smaller ones. Also I decided if I reuse the jugs next year, I'm going to follow the packaging tape suggestion. I had a terrible time getting the duct tape off the 3 I did, white duct tape no less. I was thinking I could cut around it with my exacto knive and just put more over it again. You must have a lot of room for all those plants! I hope I'm around and you post pictures when you get the flowers blooming. I'm really hurting with a fairly small yard and few sunny spots because I love trees, too, and would have more if I could. I was thinking of some of the photos I've seen where people have acres to work with and told myself I'd better be thankful for what I do have!

Hello Friends, Thank you all for all of your nice words. This warm weather has been a long time coming and I am so happy that Spring is starting. Tim - Have not had any fruit on the Mexicola Grande yet, the wind has taken anything that has come close. Andrew - As always my friend, it is good to hear from you and Thanks for the compliments. Great to hear about your Carrie, it's pretty exciting huh? Check your e-mail, you've got mail. Tropicaliste - Thanks for the compliments and I will definitely put the age of the trees and their names. I know everything is helpful when growing in pots. Bo - Thanks for the nice words. I don't plan on Pruning the Jakfruit anytime soon. It seems to be brancing out quite nicely on its own. I plan on planting it out in the next month or so and hope that it will take off this Summer. That is so Awesome that you got the Violette de Bordeaux fig tree. You will be so happy with the Fruit. I have actually only rooted 1 fig cutting, I got mine already rooted so I don't have a whole lot of experience rooting Fig trees. Congrats on your new Fig tree. Mango Perro - I wish I was in Hawaii Ethan - My California Brother, thanks for the nice words and I will keep the pictures coming. Thanks again friends for all of the compliments and I will keep you all posted on the progress. - Jacob

My master bath used to be 4'x8'. I demo'd two bathrooms that were back to back and stole 1.5' from the other to make it 5.5'x8'. >I would like to know from others who renovated a small master bathroom from an older home if you were able to "find" space and make it appear bigger, gain space by using small vanities, etc. Our toilet is in a bump out so that the door--on one of the short ends--can open. This was original to the house. Now, it's just a shallower bump-out, 1' instead of 1.5'. We're using the full depth of that 1' for a wall cabinet, which will be 48" tall x 28" wide. This gives us a place for the humidifier, my box 'o Ace bandages/splints/etc, the cleaning bucket, and all the linens for that bath. Our medicine cabinet will be recessed. It back up to another medicine cab, which must have a light above, so it has sconces. There is a 10.5" gap between the door frame and the wall. We found a 10" deep cab that we're filling back there. Our vanity is actually a full 36". Part of it is 21" deep, and part is 18". We found a brand that looks nice but packs a huge amount of storage into the space. To put in the wall cab, we had to replace the toe-kick heater with a towel warmer, due to space constraints. Our colors will help open the space. The 66" tub will have frameless sliding doors. The walls and floors will be patterns of white with a light gray grout. There will be tile wainscotting to 40" in patterns of white, and the ceiling and substantial crown molding will be white. The walls will be a medium blue-green, but so little will be visible that it'll function as just an accent color. We can't steal space from the walls except for the medicine cabinet because it backs onto an outer wall. If it weren't for that, our 10" cabinet would be 14" deep, inset into the wall. With an 18" vanity, you'll have plenty of room to feel comfortable, even though 21" is murderous. At 4' depth, our 17" sink was bad, but an extra 6" would have made it okay. Our hall bathroom is now 8'x5.5', with a bite out of it where the toilet is for the master bath's toilet to have room with a swinging door. We stole space in that bathroom outrageously! A cabinet above the toilet, which is 8" deep, is recessed 4" into the wall (3.5" stud plus wallboard). I made two other in-wall cabinets, each about 14"x12", interior. One will be hidden behind a picture frame, so only one will be noticeable. I also but a HUGE medicine cabinet above the vanity, which is only 28" wide but packs in 6 drawers and even a shelf in the plumbing space--and looks nice, too. We couldn't recess that cabinet because the one backing it in the master bath is recessed. The lower in-wall cabinet will hold the first aid kit, while the upper one will hold meds that we use but not regularly--cold meds, etc. The medicine cabinet will hold all daily use things that don't fit in the drawers--even the kids' toothbrushes and tooth-brushing cups aren't going on the counter, which will have just the bathroom clock and the soap, and that's it. On the back of the toilet bowl is a kleenex box holder. In the tub area, I don't use regular shampoo bottles but travel-sided ones with really small openings to make it easier to get just a little shampoo or conditioner, even, and the toys are in a cute plastic frog toys scoop on the wall. Clear glass shower doors--when they arrive--will also help keep it open. I can't emphasize enough the importance of not having stuff sitting out to making a space look larger. Nothing makes a room feel small like a lot of stuff just cluttered around. The mud will only be in the shower. The rest will be sheetrock--the size of the room you have is what you get! In your case, if you REALLY can't move any walls (I'd want a tub in there!!!), I'd indulge in some creative thinking. Your bathroom is 4.5x9' total, which REALLY isn't horrifically small. (Remember that mine was 4x8....) I'd start with the shower. I'd stay in the same footprint but do a Kerdi shower so the threshold could be SUPER narrow--just 2". That gives you a good 2" of apparent interior space in the shower, plus likely another .5" of width without the mud base. Recessed niches are a MUST. Too big is better than too small! I'd get a frameless shower door--almost goes without saying in this setting. I'd do wainscotting to 40", continuing over the top edge of the vanity--this is a kind of "special effect," because unless you paint the upper part of the wall a dark color, it tricks the eye into believing there's more space. Continuing just those 4" behind the vanity makes a big difference, here. For the flooring, I'd do either a small mosaic OR 12x12" or larger, and the 12x12" should be on the diagonal. A "rug" effect actually makes a small room seem larger if the rug part has diagonal lines and the border is small. For the ceiling, crown molding make it seem higher as long as the molding and the ceiling are both white. Painting the ceiling any color but white lowers it in comparison to white. Use hooks rather than rods. They make the space seem bigger and stick out less. I designate a minimum of two hooks per person--one for a towel, one for a robe. The back of the door is a good place to hang things. Use art--and use it strategically. A properly-sized picture can make a space seem larger, and you can use it to hide another recessed medicine cabinet. With a .5"-deep frame, you can have 4.5" shelves. Extra TP, first aid stuff, and irregularly used meds can be stored there. Recess the medicine cabinet, if you possibly can, and make the mirror as WIDE as possible for maximum reflection. I'd commission a custom vanity for the space, and I'd use an undermount sink or would install a square vessel sink in an apron-front manner, like this: http://www.overstock.com/Home-Garden/Kraus-White-Rectangular-Ceramic-Vessel-Sink/3250161/product.html You have 42" of space, which is plenty for quite a nice amount of drawers plus a good-sized sink. If you used the sink above, you'd have, with a frameless design, 10.5" for drawers on either side. Make the cabinet kitchen counter height and have two shallow drawers and a deep drawer, and you can still have 8" of open space at the bottom. Even a bun-foot design has less visual weight than going all the way to the floor. Under the sink, add a shelf directly under the plumbing to make a shallow extra "landing" for a small container of things. The one thing, in my bathrooms, that I want space for and don't have is dirty clothes. But as far as everything else, I have MORE storage than I know what to do with! I have space for a cleaning bucket in each bathroom, for all our meds, for my makeup (and plenty of space for kid makeup, when the time comes), even for the Drano, for linens in my bathroom, for tons of bulk storage (extra soap, extra lotion, extra hair products, etc.). We have so much space that the counters can be basically bare. AND far from looking crowded, our hall bath strikes people as much larger than its square footage.

Annie, the color looks very similar. I had to guess on amounts because the site, which is the same one as the posted link above, doesn't say how much the pork belly weighed. I was using pieces that weighed between 1 1/2 and 2 pounds. As it turned out, the recipe is very forgiving. I was sparing with the spices the first time, prodigal with them the third, but each pancetta was delicious. I never used sodium nitrate/nitrite when I cure tongue or corned beef either, and believe me, they aren't gray. It's a totally unneccessary chemical as far as I'm concerned.