Hi Jan, and welcome! I was new to this forum in 2011. This is a great place to learn about hostas and the people are wonderful! Sometimes I feel like the whole forum is out there with me when I'm wandering through my gardens. Here's my story: In 2006, I bought 6 hostas in the fall for 75 cents each, planted them at the back of the fence and forgot about them. In 2008, I divided an Undulata Albomarginata into 10 hostas to form a border around my pachysandra bed. In the spring of 2010, I noticed that the 75 cent hostas had grown into lovely plants despite the fact that they had been ignored for the past four years. I also noticed that all the other perennials I had planted over the past four years had died! So, I made a trip to the local nursery to get some more hostas to fill in the spots where my perennials had died. It was on that day that I made the startling discovery that those names on the tags like Elegans and Frances Williams meant something. I ended the season with about 70 new varieties. During the fall of 2010, I found this forum and for the next 6 months, I read each and every post. I started making lists and finding nurseries to buy the hostas on my list. On March 28, 2011, my husband drove 60 miles (one way) to pick up some of the hostas on my list. He came back with 11. When the first nursery in our area opened on April 1, 2011, I bought 9 more. On April 2, I drove the 60 miles with my husband and got another 23. Well, before I knew it, I ended up with 96 hostas in our house waiting for the last frost! By the end of May, I had aquired about 180 hostas and swore that I was done buying for the season. I managed to buy 134 more, for a total of 314 new ones in 2011. My kids call me the crazy hosta lady. My son still talks about driving with 40 hostas in the back of the car, accompanied by a chirping cricket for 300 miles! My daughter, a Creative Writing major in college, wrote her final paper about my hosta obsession. She got an "A", her professor was intrigued that people actually collect hostas and will go to great lengths to find a certain cultivar. I don't know how large our gardens are, but the grass in the back is slowly disappearing. We have plans to start planting them in the park in back of us when we run out of room. I love to grow my hostas in full sun, I won an irrigation system in a contest that keeps them cool with misting water during the hottest part of the day. Gesila

Hmm. Daylilies only, or true lilies too? We had a place called Daylily Heaven near here, and a friend of the owner told me that the prices were based on people's desire to have the newest, niftiest plants; that after the first season the same plant would be much less expensive. It sounded like a strange subculture to me, but the plants he'd gotten there really were beautiful. I get into so much trouble on bluestone, plants delights, forestfarm, heronswood and even good old white flower farm websites that I will try hard to avoid any new pitfalls! > for bored victims of CHAD, especially late at night when we should be sleeping. That is a great description - it's certainly true for me!

I had a similar experience today to the closet problem..i've been looking for the booklets that came with our frig, and range, since Jan 1..when we installed them..as i had to order filters..and i couldn't find them..well when i was reading in my book about redoing your closets..i thought..yeah..i could put the jeans on the bottom rod rather than my jackets..so i was moving them..there were a few pair of jeans folded on a stool in the closet..and i thought..ok girl you can hang those up..walllahhhhh ..under the jeans were the long lost instr books..just in the nick of time (of course when i ordered the filters i was shocked at the price) Then i also spent most of the rest of the rainy day cleaning my desk and paying my bills, in between reading the rest of the "Kick the clutter book" I'm on yard now and can't do that ..it's raining..snow melting..windy..nasty.. OH OK for an update..i love the computer here where it is..i can look out the window at the garden and I'm out of ron's way..i can hear the news beind me on the t v or listen to music..and i'm near the front door if guests come..Ron seems to like his library table and the placement of the love seat in HIS room, and the other tables seem to be working OK where they are..but the living room ones are temporary fix until i get something better for there. Joel saw dr on Monday for his shoulder (his scheduled post surgery appt) and dr increased his weight restrictions ..took xrays..and said he was doing good..so no milking it..i know better. he is a tough cookie..he works in a job where he gets burned, cut or hurt on a regular basis..maintains HOT rubber and plastic moulding presses.. a quick story about Joel..when he was 12, he went to work trimming christmas trees, came home with hands all blistered and bloody..and went right back the next day..most people would have quit..he worked that job until an early high school graduation at 17..he is a blessing

I was hoping there wouldn't be any big wildfires, but I knew it was a foolish hope, at best. When winds are in the 45-55 mph range, especially when in combination with low dewpoints, fires just happen. I haven't heard any news yet this morning, but those fires in NE OK, especially in and around Nowata County, seemed especially wicked from what I saw of them on the evening news. I know some structures, including at least one residence, were lost, but given that the wind was so strong, I thing those firefighters did an incredible job of saving as many structures as they did. I hope the livestock all were able to find green wet areas in which they could stand to escape the flames. The last report I saw said at least seven small towns were briefly evacuated as the wildfires approached them, but I don't believe the evacuations were long-lived. We didn't have winds quite strong enough to shred plants here, or at least not at our house, which is fairly well-sheltered from a lot of the wind due to being in a creek hollow. I also wasn't as worried about fires here because the 12"+ of rain that has fallen in the last few weeks has greened us up a lot, and we haven't even had a freeze yet. The NWS did come back at mid-morning and put us under a Red Flag down here, but we didn't even have a single fire in our county, as far as I know. Our worst wind gusts were only about 30-33 mph so it wasn't bad at all. I remember the Christmas Eve blizzard and I loved it. It was my first white Christmas ever, and I waited decades for it. It was pretty but I was over it in about 2 minutes. Let's face it....snow just leads to mud and muck and messes, so it is most appreciated when we are inside looking out at it, and then less appreciated when we're out stomping around in it trying to break up the ice in the animals' water pans or whatever. I like to look at snow, but I don't necessarily like being outdoors in it for very long. I'm a warm-weather person and every year it seems like the cold and gray gloominess of winter just drags on for far too long, while I am dreaming of spring and making planting plans. While it does seem kinda odd to be discussing fires and blizzards at the same time, and especially while some of us still have green gardens that haven't frozen yet and are still producing, I'm always mindful of the fact that our worst wildfires tend to occur during our winter wildfire season after everything is dry and dormant, and then also in mid-Spring when we get those wicked north winds before much of the countryside has greened up yet. The garden catalogs are starting to arrive, so it is beginning to feel like winter. We got down to 39 at our house last night and tonight will be about the same, but no frost and no freezing, so the garden lives on.