alodal, Gardenias like morning sun, afternoon shade. THey like composted cow manure in the soil, and depending on what your soil is like, add alot of it, and mix it up well with your exsisting soil. They need mulch, VERY important, if you don't use it, don't plant them, that is how important mulch is. At least 2-3 inches of mulch, not to the stems of the bush, underneath of them. When a gardenia needs water, it will ask. Use your fingers to check for moisture, and also look at the leaves. Are the leaves all folded, like its saying "I need water". Never fertilzie a plant right after you plant it, or when it is blooming. It doesn't like to eat when it is stressed out. Gardenias develope next years flower buds in this summer, so always trim or prune a gardenia right after it blooms, that way you won't miss next years flowers. That's it. And enjoy, yellow leaves are fine. DOn't stress over them. THey really are more hardy than you think.

I'm in KC...I'm well aware of the illness that is befalling me! I started out with three raised beds in the backyard and now have 9 as well as a large pumpkin patch with two AG plants going crazy. 85 tomato and 64 pepper plants, zukes, cukes, okra beans, and a plethora of other stuff keeps me out of the seedy (pun intended) pool halls in the summer. I think we're going to go with the E-W orientation and definitely want to keep the GH where we can see it every day out of our dining room windows. I did some ciphering last night and I think that he sun should hit the roof panels most all of the day in the winter. The side panels may only get about 1/4 of them hit with sunshine i the winter though. In summer...they should get over 3/4 full sun. As for my uses of the GH...I'd like to be able to bring in some of my tomatoes I have in containers and try to keep them producing until Nov. or Dec. The GH will be mostly vacant in Dec and Jan though. In late Feb, I will be moving my seedlings from my indoor grow table to the GH to get more light and hardened off. Besides my big garden I keep most of my family and many friends away from the garden centers and put heirloom tomato plants in their hands. With this building I may need a lot more friends! ;-)

Glad you know about storing them in the freezer. I learned that here, and the hard way after having a bag go bad on me. Here's a recipe I made this weekend, in the bread machine. It's a light bread, not very sweet but good with cream cheese and jam for breakfast. Lemon Poppy Seed Bread Recipe 2 1/4 teaspoons yeast 3 cups bread flour 1 tablespoon lemon zest -- grated 1 1/2 teaspoons poppy seeds 1 teaspoon salt 2 tablespoons sugar 4 tablespoons nonfat dry milk powder 1 tablespoon unsalted butter 1 cup water 1 large egg 1 teaspoon lemon juice GLAZE: 2 teaspoons unsalted butter -- softened 1 teaspoon lemon zest -- grated 4 tablespoons powdered sugar 1 teaspoon lemon juice -- or more Add all ingredients except those for glaze. Use basic cycle. While the bread is cooling to room temperature, make the glaze. Glaze cooled loaf of bread by drizzling glaze on top and sides of loaf. Let dry before slicing. Not very specific directions I know, but I just dumped everything in the bread machine according to the manufacturers directions for adding stuff (liquids first), and it came out good. The only thing I can add is use a "light" setting for the crust, I used med. and it is a bit overdone. I didn't glaze mine, so it's good for toasting.

Wow, here I am almost 8 months later and there is very little progress toward our bathroom! No word at all from Jim, the contractor. I wonder if he is still doing the commercial job or if he even wants our work. Plus, Toby, our dog, is even older now - 16 - and on prednisone, so he is peeing a lot. He has doggy dementia, too. He is not terribly confused, not enough to put him down, but there is no way I want new, clean grout on that floor. The bathroom is on hold until he decides to take a trip over the rainbow bridge. I have just contracted to replace the last four windows in the house. The aluminum sliders will be gone in 6 weeks or less! We are getting an awning window for the bathroom with a blind in the glass that can be raised and lowered. It is our sunniest room, and light from that window lights up the whole end of the hallway. I wanted the option to raise the blinds up. The three bedrooms are getting double casement windows with blinds in the glass. Hey - I don't clean, so the blinds are a major, major plus for us! Now I have to get windowsills for all three bedrooms. And for the bathroom, the need for a windowsill is forcing me to decide on the counter top for the vanity. It seems to me that they should be the same material. Tomorrow I am going to try to find the Cambria Quartz source for the area. I want the place where I can get a leftover piece of someone else's slab, since I need such a small piece. My vanity is only 18" x 46". I am hoping for the color called Parys. [houzz=https://www.houzz.com/photos/cambria-countertop-2010-traditional-kitchen-phvw-vp~2704735] Since I still have not chosen the color for the wall tiles in the bathroom, the color for the vanity top is going to determine what direction we go, since it is the next critical decision that I have to make. I like Parys because it is dark and will contrast with the white sink. It will also contrast with all the different wall tiles I have considered. I especially love the glowing blue bits in it. It reminds me of my favorite stone I use when making jewelry, Labradorite! It has that chatoyancy, that glow when it catches the light just right. Opal also does that. Parys just glows in any light. Other things I have made progress on have to do with the vanity. I have sanded it and have decided to replace the original drawer pulls. No way will we enjoy finding the little bail that recedes into a groove on those babies. I am going to fill the holes and then drill one center hole and use a glass knob with chrome in the center. I had already purchased three of them to use on the new cupboards that I was adding into the wall across from the vanity. I have also removed the metal floor protectors on the bottom of the 8 vanity legs and discovered that the small feet that can be leveled that I purchased will fit into the ends of the legs. Holes have to be drilled for them. Because the floor will be made waterproof, and sloped toward a drain, if I did not put levelers into the feet of the vanity, the whole thing would be unlevel and the sink would not drain properly. A and C below make up my leg levelers. Yes, I do try to think of everything. When you have THREE YEARS to do nothing but plan, you do a lot of planning! I have also purchased the shower plumbing - the rainhead, the shower temperature balancing valve, and three volume controls, one for the rain head, one for the shower head, and one for the hand-held, and the controls will each have those labels on them! I already had the shower head. I still have to decide on the hand-held system. I also purchased a really cute hand towel holder. I don't like the rings because the towel gets bunched and does not dry well. This one is from Ginger and it has two bars that move on a swivel, independently of each other. The bars are 12 inches long and the holder holds them a good 2" away from the wall. Plus, since they swivel the whole way around, if one is particularly wet, you can pull it away from the wall and it will hang perpendicular to the wall as you wait until it is dry. In this picture, they show the arms out away from the wall. Normally, they will hang closer to the wall that the thing is mounted on, I would think. For instance, I plan to hang it on the wall to the side of the vanity. The arms would be folded up close to the wall most of the time. I suppose you could install it on the wall next to the medicine cabinet and have the towels hang over the vanity area, if you liked.