I waited until my caimito has a lot of roots before I repotted it. I never disturb the roots when repotting. I put some soil into the larger pot, then take the caimito out and place it directly in the pot. Then add more soil to it and water. I think once your caimito is big enough then it will be hard to kill. Last winter my tree stayed in the basement and my husband thought the soil was wet so he did not help me to water it. Couple days later and when I went to check on my tree, all the leaves wilted and dried up. Most of the leaves fell when I shook the tree. I thought my tree was going to die. So I pulled off all the dead leaves and took it up to the morning room. I water the tree and pay more attention to it for the rest of the winter. The tree then slowly recover and now it's full of leaves.

I am here tonight for a favor. I am in need of quick prayers for my 24 year old daughter. She went to the emergency room yesterday because she first started having stabbing pains in her chest then her left side began tingling and she was dizzy and had difficulty concentrating. She was tested for stroke and bloodclot and when they could not find anything, sent her home. Her pain went away but not the tingling. I took her to the chiropractor and she didn't do any work on her because just simply looking at her and her reactions to certain tests made the chiro ask me to take her back to the er. I took her to a different hospital and they have admitted her. I know someone asked if MS was in the family and I do have a cousin. They are doing an MRI tomorrow and after reading the symptoms tonight, realize that Elizabeth has several of them and they even mentioned some patients had pains described as stabbing which is how this started. I am scared for my daughter and pray that MS is not the problem. Please keep her in your prayers and I will keep you posted. Thanks Margo

Well, I must not have walked under any ladders or had any black cats cross my path because boy do I feel lucky!! My seed packet has arrived with the most wonderful assortment of seeds. Are you sure it's not Christmas? Trading seeds is always fun, but with Alana leading the way, and everyones participation and fantastic seeds, this was the most fun trade ever. I have loved it all. Special thanks to you Alana for all the work and thoughtfulness. To each of the traders thank you for sharing all these seeds!! Must get back to my oohing and aahing. :)) Happy Halloween I'm off to see the Wizard! Jean/recipesaver2

Do consider that you are going to be waiting a long time for a 6' tree planted even as close as the center of one of your lawns to provide any significant amount of screening or shading of the house. But which particular window are you thinking about? A tree lined up just right with one of them and planted close enough could provide an adequate level of screening pretty quickly - maybe even immediately if of the right size and shape. With it also casting a moving shadow over part of the house some day. Otherwise you could block the street with solid fencing and/or hedging/screening plantings consisting of or including dense shrubby kinds. Usually river birch is not affected by bronze birch borer, with up here anyway it being the European, Himalayan and paper birches that are being hit now that the pest has come this far west. For instance the next door neighbors to a friend that lived near Seattle had two cut leaf weeping European birches and one river birch in their back yard. When the borer came to their neighborhood the European birches were being drilling out and dropping branches on his side of the fence in no time. Luckily the neighbors were quick to have these cut down. Providing in addition a much better view of the river birch, which as of the last time I was on the friend's property was still standing there looking intact.