I'm doing good for an 80 year old. Do not spend much time on garden web since the changes. I'm into African Violets now. I have two shelf units-5 shelves each. I do the RRs for leaves and have about 50 now. My hoya are outside on the patio under the roof. Get some rain when the wind blows. I've sore of neglected them. I love when they bloom though. We sit outside in the evening and the fragrance is beautiful. I wished they bloomed more often than once a year. I may bring some inside and put some of the smaller leaved ones on a shelf instead of the violets. I am on Facebook more than here on Gardenweb. I can't get used to all the changes. It was easier before because i had tabs for the hoya forum, african violet forum, and the cactus forum. Now I just go to African violets and only when we are active in a RR, which is now. Most of the violet people went to facebook. Such is the times, changing, changing. Good to see you are still with the hoya. Keep up the great work.

You could just make a tray out of plastic, corrugated sign board to catch the mess that you could wash down after emptying it. A better solution, though not as easy, would be to fasten sign board panels over the sides of the cage with wire to keep the mess inside. I would also line the floor with it so their feet don't fall through. You could line the underside so they could still get traction from the wire floor. I've included a link to a website on building your own pet cages that may give you some ideas for using sign board, although the site is primarily about guinea pig cages. We had built one of their cages years ago for our piggies and the sign board lasts for years and is very washable, as well as being easy to work with. I don't think you'll have much luck training them to potty in one place. The larger hamsters are much easier because they usually choose one corner, but the dwarf ones just go wherever they are. Here is a link that might be useful: Pet cages

LOL, OJ. I think a lot of us could use a little help along those lines. Thistledew, I clicked on the link and that looks like a really nice steamer. I have a Haan and really like it. I'm pretty sure you'll enjoy cleaning your floors more than with a mop and bucket. Let us know what you think, okay?

Hi Rob, Not much to add ... and hope that you're back at least part way out of your blue funk. Brother, retired farmer who lives 1600 miles way, has one son, only child, in a city 100 miles from here, a couple of small grand-daughters from son's second marriage, and comes to visit them a couple of times a year. He'd called to say he was to be in the neighbourhood, and we got together on Friday, I called son and he and his partner were there for lunch, as was brother and wife ... and a couple of favourite cousins were, as well. Brother spent a few years when he was very young with the family of our Mom's brother and their two children when she was ill, so he considers one as almost a sister: the son, a local farmer, died several years ago. The other cousin lives locally and I see her at church fairly often - she, who had voice training, has sung in the choir for 75 years. The brother and I went to deal with some complications over inheritance of cemetery plots that Dad owned ... and it looks as though resolution is to be easier than we figured. Then we sat and had a chat ... and he's rather worried about future viability of his son's marriage. We don't see one another often, but we've been close, over the years. Our brother died over forty years ago, when his kids were in their teens, and our ready-made sister that came with our stepmom lives near brother in Saskatchewan. It's a red letter day when we get together. ole joyful