The rain had been gentle until this afternoon. I love a steady gentle rain. But at dinner time things got more serious with heavy downpours, thunder, lightning. Our company was not deterred by it though and we visited the new greenspace in our town and also went to Lee Valley's store where they purchased indoor plant watering devices for when they are away traveling. We also went to a great little shop where you can buy saffron for $1.35 and I bought maple syrup buckets (for cut flowers)for $2.50 each. Heard from David B the other day...for those who remember him. Just sold his "new" house. He seems to be doing well through lots of changes and spoke of plants and things which still interest him. 'bug

Hi everyone! My name is Lyuba and I moved to Tulsa, Ok from Ukraine in November 2007. I used to work as a translator until I met and married my husband. I had my condo filled with every color of African violets, but I couldn't bring any of them over. My mom and dad, grandma and grandpa gardened. It is in my blood to continue the tradition. I planted my first 3 bare root Lowes climbing roses this April. By now I've joined the Tulsa Rose Society, have 5 climbers, 5 English roses, and the rest are HTs and floribundas, so far 21 total, but it is not final. I have big plans and wish lists and my husband warns me about addiction every time I bring home a new rose bush : ) I've never been on any forums in my life, so I learn as I go. Sometimes make my share of mistakes like posting my pictures in another person's blog, not knowing and with best intentions. I did this on the Rose Gallery Forum while trying to learn how to post follow-ups. I want to thank every one of the Rose Masters for their gorgeous pictures, they are of such inspiration to all of us. I find myself checking the Rose Gallery for new pictures every morning. Thank you so much! I will post a few of mine. This particular rose is very special to me. My grandmother in Ukraine used to have a similar rose in front of the kitchen window, we collected the petals to make jam. When I saw the Spirit of Freedom in the local nursery I had tears in my eyes, it reminded me of grandma and childhood, and everything good and sweet. Pat Austin was purchased to commemorate my orange cat named Carson, he is a street kitty from Donetsk, Ukraine, that grew into the Feline King. We joke that Carson could teach Garfield a few tricks : ) His life here is great, except for one mocking bird that my dear husband named Deathwish. The bird follows him to every window, screeches offences and flaps its wings. Carson has to sleep with the blinds down : ) Life is never boring around here. I'm looking forward to learning more about growing roses and thanks again for sharing your great pictures. Lyuba

More about our birds. . . How we came to have the parakeet is a story in itself. Mother was out in the garden hanging up the laundry one sunny day and out of nowhere a blue & white parakeet flew right down and landed on Mother's shoulder. She nibbled lovingly on Mother's ear and mother said, "Well hello there" and the bird said, "Ooooh. Hello!" And Mother said, "So, who are you?" The bird replied, "Pretty Bird!" So, she kept her name. She never flew away after finding a nice home, having no desire to try living out in the big free world ever again. We never did find out from whence she came. I would like to add about the Mexican Love Bird. . . . . .that after cursing out the preacher and telling him to "Go to Hell!", and saying things like "Well, -uck a duck!", our love bird never said any of the really foul swear words ever again. Mother said it must have just been a cleansing thing for her, but I have always wondered just what Mother did to make her "repent" and come clean.??? And as for our parakeet, Pretty Bird? After her jello bath, she began saying, "Oooooh, Pretty Bird. Pretty Bird is a dirty bird!" We kids got so much fun out of her. She loved Orange Jell-O, not just for bathing but for eating it as well. She especially loved it when mother made it into a salad by adding grated carrots and chopped walnuts. Yum yum! She would walk across the table and sample everything. If she found something she particularly didn't like, she would make a mess of it and have a fit! So afterward she had to kept up during meals. She would fuss and squawk at us from her cage, demanding to be loosed at once! As you said, covering her cage was helpful in quieting her down. She would then say, "Good night Pretty Bird!" which would then of course, set us all into a round of giggles. ~Annie

I have a Daphne odora marginata that I planted maybe 20 years ago even though the experts say Daphnes are short-lived and difficult. (My name is Daphne so I had to have one!) It is planted on the west side of my house and now gets very little sun since the pear tree above it has grown so much. I have watered very little the last few years and it is still quite healthy. (I read somewhere that Daphnes die more from overwatering than anything else.) I usually pick a few blooms to bring in the house and they will scent the whole room. Some bearded iris are very fragrant. A friend let me pick a beautiful bouquet of them for my house, and the following day my living room was full of the loveliest, light scent. It took me a while to figure out that the iris were scented, as I had never heard of this before. The iris growers don't care about fragrance, so they don't make mention of it in catalogs. (I got this info from one of the owners of a huge iris nursery. He seemed annoyed that I wads bothering him with a question about fragrance !!!) You'll have to find iris in bloom iin the spring and sniff yourself or get recommendations from other gardeners. Make a note of the variety and then order that type for the following year. I also have a scented camellia (pale pink). The tag said 'fragrant' so I bought it even though I was very sceptical. Since I love camellias, I thought I'd give it a try since I knew I would like the plant, scented or not. I planted it several years ago next to my front steps where it didn't get much sun until it got tall, but now it is over 8' and had a ton of blooms last year. The scent is only noticeable outside when the temperature is warm, but then it is lovely.