OMG, Stage Rat! You are sooo wrong! The camera may not lie, but the photographer may point that box whereever she chooses. Notice there isn't a 5 gallon bucket in the pictures? That because no matter where I point that camera, I have to stop and move another bucket out of the frame! LOL. Oh, and most of my seedlings were annuals which grow 5x faster than perennials -- that probably accounts for the disparity in the sizes of seedlings. However, you are also sooo right! Nothing would do last year but that I had to have Larkspur. I got some mixed colors in my very first trade, so instead of being happy, I realized I really needed electric blue Larkspur! LOL. (and I got it, later on, too!) AND you are also right about the over two feet thing, too. My beds look out of alignment because I don't have enough of the shorties. And I don't have enough of the shorties because I was so SICK of them! That's all you see at the garden centers, when you think about it. So, I went too far the other way. In fact, I think I was in a wishlist swap where I told people I didn't want anything shorter than 15" LOL! Luckily I had some petunias from swaps & trades and 100 miniature (bedding) Snapdragon seeds that ALL germinated from Nettasaura and Drippy. NEXT year I might get it right, but the reseeding sounds pretty good, too. I have little yellow birds perched on my Bachelor Buttons, isn't that funny? They perch on the stems and just eat-eat-eat -- all day long. Every once in a while you see the whole stems start to lean and that one flies off only to come back again and test its weight on the fallen stem. Now they have added the Liatrus, but I can't figure out why because they just started blooming and surely haven't had time to go to seed yet, even the first flowers. The chipmunks ate all the poppy seed, the squirrels won't let any of the sunflowers germinate and the Japanese Beetles have ruined every dahlia and coneflower. It's a veritable feast around here....guess I should have sown double what I did. ROTFLMAO because I would be dead if I had to plant even one more jug! I'm sorry to be missing your shindig this weekend but I will probably be going up to Chicago for a birthday party in Sept and could make a short stop for a cold one on the way up or back. I'll email you when I know the dates. Lime

Like Alisande, I only see one about once a year...just passing through. I put out a lot of bird seed. I put black oil sunflower seeds in the feeders in the yard and I get a free mix that is a lot of milo and some sunflower seeds donated to me by Walmart, and I put it out along the driveway for the doves. It is so dry here. Right now I have 5 bird baths in the lower part of my yard, which is only about 1/2 acre big, but ran the horse water troughs over yesterday, and couldn't believe all the doves down there bathing. I guess I'm fortunate. I see sparrows in town, but out here in the country, we don't have them. Bluebirds can be seen in this area...supposedly, but the only time I ever saw them, was a pair in the yard of the old man that I look after a couple of towns over, and he couldn't have cared less. That was a few years ago. Now he has a pair of hawks nesting in a tree right out his door, and I can't even get him to walk to the door to look out at them.

Oceanna, it is BM Spice Gold, the color card makes it seem so dark, but it's not at all. The first coat goes on pretty dark, but after the second coat it's fine. I would say the eating area is the most accurate color. It is the same color in the hallway by the stairs, where the entry table ,where the kids pics are and in the family room and kitchen, oh an upstairs spare bath. Based on the lighting it looks different. I wanted all the same color, but at this time did not want to repaint kitchen/family room. If I was willing to repaint, I would have done SW Restrained Gold. Still trying to find the right light fixture I used the polyshades on the staircase on and the spare vanity upstairs in the pic. I used Bombay Mahogany. I would recommend using the cherry color, the Bom Mah is way too dark. I wish I would have painted the vanity a chocolate color, it would have been easier. The stain is very hard to work with as it is extremely thick and gooey.

1. Your house has great bones. It would look beautiful in any color. I'm advocating preserving the brick, though, because using that brick color was integral to the design of the house, is more appropriate for the era, and also because you can't get that brick anymore. It's historic & perhaps even rare. It's a golden color with a lot of depth & character, looks good no matter what the season, has a natural earthiness to it, and makes the house fit in with the land. And when the sun shines on it, it exudes a warm glow that's just so homey and lovely. 2. The Great Painted Brick Debate: caroleoh brings up a controversial post from last year about a house with gorgeous brick that the owner wanted to paint. The issues with that house were different though. The brick was only on the front, with vinyl siding on the rest of the house. The house looked nice...from one angle. The house looked disjointed from all other views. Also, the windows on that house were awful: unattractive vinyl windows, placed badly too (a lot of tiny windows on a massive facade). The owner especially didn't like how the windows were so prominent. The dark brick, though lovely, just made the bad windows jump out at you. She wanted to paint the entire house a soft, light color to unify the sides and downplay the ugly windows. She did, and it worked. There was a lot of heated argument about painting that brick, though. It was beautiful brick, but it's like the builder tried to cut costs elsewhere by using lots of vinyl, and the house ended up looking awkward for it. That pretty brick juxtaposed with all that vinyl didn't work. 3. Your example, snagd, is gorgeous. Your house could probably wear those colors & accessories very well, and I really can understand why you'd want to "update" the look of the house. In lots of cases, that works for the better. But I feel strongly that pretty old houses like yours are a dying breed. People "update" them or tear them down merely because of fashion. Here you have this exquisite historical home with authentic colors and design, all of which are still fabulous & beautiful. But you want something else, and want to make superficial changes that will destroy the historic character of the home, and perhaps the neighborhood too. (I'm saying all this without anger, btw, just trying to present a reasonable case for historic preservation.) Besides, if you clean the brick instead of painting it, you'll have more $$$ for the interior & landscaping :)