So great to see you again Kat. You are missed but admired for your big adventure. We'd love to hear more when you can get to the internet cafe'. I too am beginning in a new garden this season. It's all shade, so perhaps by next year or so, I'll be able to post pics of the Hostas you miss. We hope you can post pics of some of the tropical plants we can't grow and hear more about your new home. ~di

To say that I'm back is kind of overstating it. Haha. But with no laundry to do, everything picked up and toileted, and his online medical supplies order done, I have some minutes that I will spend with my friends. Rosefolly, thanks so much. If I play my cards right, maybe one of the kids will stay with DH for part of a day. I'm wondering which day would be best. Jeri, I really am surprised that the garden didn't just keel over. It's a lot more resilient than I expected. A couple of the Home Health nurses/therapists have admired it in terms that are pretty unwarranted from my view, but they say the weeds don't matter. They can SEE the English garden and love it --- but then I've noticed how encouraging they are to the caregiver so... but I appreciated their excited praise nonetheless. Subk3, I don't think that's it. Mine has purple flowers and the leaves are farther apart. Thanks for the suggestion though. I didn't know Wandering Jew was a weed or highly allergenic. Seil, thank you for the good wishes and the compliments. The garden is what it is. I'm not upset by the condition, and thankfully I don't feel stressed by it. I would like to go out and get that weed out before it eats the house but whatever. :)) Ingrid, I know you've been thinking about me. Your email was sweet and very appreciated. I wish I could have answered, but you said you understood if I didn't. That was a very stressful period so it was wonderful to hear from you even though I barely had the time or brain capacity to read it. Your caring wasn't wasted. Thank you so much for it. Molly, I'm so glad that you're glad. Things are beginning to SOUND more normal all around. Randy!!! How wonderful that you're back on the forum. I have missed you tremendously. I got the Shooting Star hydrangea at the grocery store, believe it or not. I really love it. I've been acquiring more reblooming varieties that tolerate sun, so I'm thinking some of the roses that have passed on will be replaced by them. The only thing I don't like about the hydrangeas is their deciduousness but it's only for a few months in the dead of winter so I guess it won't be so bad. I'll have to get clever with their placement, I guess. So happy you're back!!!! Thanks for liking our old photos. You're very sweet. Melissa, you nailed it. We survived, are going forward, and life can be hard. I led a very sheltered life before this. No real sadness had ever touched me. This made any previous bad times look like childish melodrama. Now I see other people's tragedy so differently, much more compassionately. Thank you for saying it so well. Thank you, Jeannie. Your kindness is so appreciated as well. What a wonderful place this forum is, filled with kindred spirits. Monarda, I like your optimism. I guess it will get whipped back into shape, but I think I also want to do some tweaking. We'll see, won't we? Can't just leave the furniture in the same place year after year, right? I know one thing for sure. Maggie is saying byebye...I think. Lou, what you said really touched me. I'm thinking the most I'll get to spend in the garden - someday - is an hour here and there. I've already learned that there are risks to being out of the room. He slid off the sofa the other night reaching for something while I was on the PC in the laundry room (doing the blog, in fact). Had to call the paramedics to get him up. Fun, fun, fun - he wasn't hurt at all. Two big hook and ladders came, no sirens thankfully. Firemen are very nice people. Kippy, MY weed used to pop up one at a time, and they were easy to pull and control. It used to be the least of my weed worries. On the positive side I have a feeling a lot can be accomplished in just a few minutes with that one. Let's hope so. Seems like several of us have it. :)) Sunny, you win the cigar! My weed is definitely Commelina coelestis, aka, Day Flower, Widow's Tears, Blue Spiderwort. If I had a bigger garden, I might keep a spot of it, but I don't think I'll tempt nature. Thank you so much for your prayers! Campanula, as usual I loved what you had to say and as usual I had to resort to the google dictionary - to find out what droll means. That was a lovely thing to say about me. I think you've got me pegged. I didn't know there was one word that would sum me up. It doesn't sound like a good word (d-r-o-l-l...comical has a nicer ring) but I think it nails me. Ha, I could definitely be a buffoon if I weren't so shy. The "generous nature" part is very kind. Such excellent words..."take it easy and just let life roll on by, carrying you along, floating, flying." Will do! And thank you!! Judith, curiously, today I noticed that my house is pretty clean and tidy. Suddenly, I'm my mother, always flitting around, picking up stuff, folding, wiping, no dishes in the sink overnight, I thought to myself, that's because I'm not out in the garden all day and because the CNA comes every other morning to give DH his sink-side bath. So glad you like the photos! Titian1, thank you. It does look like the green form of Wandering Jew except for the white flowers. Cynthia, thanks for the good advice. I, too, hope Karl is well. Andrew, thanks for the information on the spiderwort. For a minute I was thinking it's only in the beds, but then I remembered all the places it has spilled over and rooted in the gravel. Yes, thankfully no kudzu!! Hoovb, that's so sweet. You always amaze me with how much you can get said in so few words. That's definitely not my strength. :)) Sherry Here is a link that might be useful: If only sweat were irrigation...

...when one of your shower doors explodes! No joke, last night a minute after Cathy stepped out of the shower the door exploded. She has quite a few abrasions and one significant laceration on her left shin that's going to leave quite a horse-shoe shaped scar. I'm sure glad it didn't happen while she was still in the shower or we'd probably be at the hospital today. Fearing the other door might do the same thing we had a handyman come over and remove it this morning. Rather than taking it to the dump he wrapped it in a blanket and took a sledge hammer to it so we could also put it in the garbage can. Danged if he didn't have to give it 6-7 good wacks before it would break. Go figure!

It probably would be fine, assuming we don't have a heat wave kicking temps up into the upper 90s, which is not real likely based on the cooler-than-average weather so far this year. (I know both our counties have had a few warm days already this year, but they have tended to be the exception and not the rule.) Also, your "little" plants HAVE been in the ground for a while and should have pretty good root systems by the time you go on vacation. You can help prepare them for your absence by watering them very deeply (to a depth of 6") less often as opposed to watering more shallowly more often. That will send their roots down deep to where more moisture resides in the soil. Finally, don't feed them any fertilizer in the week to ten days before you leave. Fertilizing them at that point would give them new growth that might get thirsty more easily than older growth. If you are really worried about it and don't have anyone in your neighborhood that you can rely upon to check on your plants, you can buy a timer and put a soaker hose on a timer and put it in the bed with the plants. You can set the timer to water briefly every day or every other day or whatever will give you peace of mind. Having 2" to 3" of mulch on the ground will also keep the soil moist by slowing the evaporation of moisture from the soil. Being gone a week in May is not going to be too detrimental to your garden, especially if we receive anything close to our average May rainfall. Being gone a week in July or August would be a lot worse for the garden. Dawn