Northwoods: I am not sure why so many of your bagged apples fell off but I presume from June drop? If you are bagging early in the season that might be a reason. Most are bagging when the fruit is the size of a dime to beat insect damage from curculio/leafroller but when June drop comes, the trees will drop some fruit naturally. I prefer to spray early for insects (starting at petal fall) and then bag mid-late june. This also gives me plenty of time to get them bagged since I am covered against insects anyway. Just a thought that perhaps june drop is the reason. Of course since I am only bagging the Haralson this is not an issue for me. It would be if I bagged all my apple varieties. Tony: The last time I bought Imidan 70 was from Schlabach's Nursery in Medina NY. They stopped selling it this year and now offer Avuant instead due to the restricted use issue for many states for Imidan. Not a problem for me. I have many friends in the orchard industry who will sell me a pound or I can get it direct if I buy it in 4 lb lots from Keystone. 4 pounds at time will last me for about 7-8 years. I keep it triple packaged,cool and dry and have no problems with the longevity issue. 8 year old Imidan seemed to work for me just as well as fresh. Imidan can be purchased IF you have a pesticide applicator's license (if it is a restricted use chemical for your state) and if you are willing to buy 4 lbs at a time. For many home growers with just 2-3 apple trees, the cost for such quantity and the pesticide applicator's license required make Imidan out of reach.

LOVELOVELOVELOVE these pages. Anxious to see more. I'm now experimenting w/encaustics - another addiction for sure.

Thanks guys! The hardest part of this project was stripping the casing from the wires. I REALLY enjoyed wrapping the pieces with the copper. Love the look of that. I have always wanted to do stuff with copper but it seemed to expensive, now I have an inexpensive alternative. I think I may add some more 'danglies" to it, just a little more pop! Riveter Slow? Geez, there's nothing you can't do!! Glitter glue-actually didn't think of it, but now that it's been mentioned....

thyrkas, I have a collection of fountain pens, mostly inherited from my grandparents and great-grandparents. They are not the ones I use on a daily basis as they require a bottle of ink and need to be re-filled. While the process is fairly simple, with curious kids in the house, it's far more tidy to use a modern fountain pen with a cartridge. I've a Parker fountain pen that was quite reasonable in terms of price and the cartridge refills come five per package, if memory serves, and only cost a couple of dollars. Many types of daily use fountain pens and refills can be found at the big square office products stores like Staples. The beauty of a fountain pen is that it slows down my writing and in doing that, forces my brain to slow down as well. It's a lovely way to write and nothing else can really compare. If you try it, I will be interested in hearing about the experience! I like the idea of only writing on one side of the page. With a fountain pen, you sometimes get a blotch of ink that could soak through and writing on one side would keep it a bit more tidy. And there is that bonus of editing...although I may have some rather sparse pages here and there in relation to my earlier post...if you get my drift. PAM