Follow up 2 years later The Fairy (planted in full sun. doing beautifully, little disease, profuse flushes of bloom in spring and fall. Intermitent during heat) Little White Pet (planted in full sun. some black spot, but not horrible. profuse flushes of bloom in spring and fall. Intermitent during heat) Needs regular deadheading to get rid of old blooms (cling to plant and turn brown) Rose de Rescht (Some black spot in full sun, but not terrible. Gorgeous smallish deep rose blooms. Definitely worth growing. Great color. In a little bit of shade 10 ft away it was a black spot magnet) Mme. Alfred Carrie (1/2 day sun. How many ways can you say stunning and gorgeous? Drenched in white blooms in the spring. Intermittent from then on. A reasonable display in fall. Some mildew otherwise quite healthy. HUGE and very vigorous. Reached 20 ft in 2 years. I'm a little worried about having planted it next to a building) Lovely sent. Zeperine Drohin -- 1/2 day sun. Also drop dead gorgeous mass of bloom in the spring. very intermittent during the heat. OK flush of bloom in the fall. The spring makes it worth it. Absolutely mass of bloom -- think Tournament of Roses float. Lovely sent. moderate blackspot in no spray garden, but not unsightly. Sombruiell. -- absolutely healthy foilage. One of the most beautiful flowers I've ever seen. A tendency for the secondary flower buds not to develop or to turn yellow and drop off. I suppose this is a disease. Heavy bloom in the spring and fall, light in the summer. Huge, also extremely thorny. My garden is on a corner lot and my neighbors love all of these roses. Modern roses that fit into an old rose garden. Schneekoppe (Snow pavement). More than reasonably healthy rugosa. Very vigorous, spreads by suckers. Could form a thicket quite quickly. wanders into lawn. Beautiful flower. My neighbor's grade school sone said they smell like cherries. Blooms fairly steadily all summer. Summer Bouquet. Healthy, nice bloom. My only problem is it's quite wide. about 5 ft across. Heritage By vote of neighbors, the most beautiful rose on earth (or at least in my garden). Wonderful light sent. Little disease. Flower is a bit fragile, but worth it. Sophies Rose beautiful flower, some black spot, but not unsightly. The Sombriel was gorgeous. It's growning very vigorously and had almost no disease until it got a tiny bit of blackspot in late November. I'm really looking forward to seeing it this year. The Comte de Chambord was a disaster. It was covered with blackspot seemingly forever. Looked horrible. I pulled it and sent it off to the Fort Totten dump.

Amy, Why don't you run that same question by Rose Gretch, Public Relations Director for The National Gardening Association - rose(at)garden.org and Cathy Barash, President of Garden Writers Association - bloominggourmet(at)mchsi.com. Change the (at) to the symbol. They have something coming up in Washington.

Ooooh! More great advice! I LOVE the idea of Easter Brunch at the Kennedy Center! It is special enough for the occasion and unique to DC. Plus, I checked it out on Chowhound (thanks for the link!) and the reviews are very favorable. Oh, I'm getting excited now! I've also arranged for a Capitol tour with my Senator's office and requested a tour at the Bureau of Printing & Engraving. I passed on the White House tour because it seemed like a lot of security hassle for a short tour. Did I make a mistake - is it really not to be missed? Emma, you are not alone in your enthusiasm for Air & Space - I will go with an open mind! I booked our hotel at the Embassy Suites near Dupont Circle, but I'm not totally sold on that idea. It is a 5 block walk to the Metro which sounds kind of far to me. I'm wondering if I should change to the ES at either Chevy Chase (Friendship Heights) or Alexandria. Both have Metro stations very close by, and it sounds like lots of restaurants as well. Alexandria sounds very charming, I'm leaning towards that way. Will we miss anything if we stay too far out? (Are those places too far out?) I need good restaurants and shopping, don't need nightlife. We'll be there for a week. (I did check out the ES at the Convention Center but it is coming in at over $350/night including tax. I just can't bring myself to go that high!) Thanks again for the great ideas - keep 'em coming! Nicole

Had to pop this one back up to the top. It's true. The Obama's will support this again in 2009. Thank goodness. Check out the list of authors attending. I finally made it to DC earlier this year and visited one of the three buildings that comprise the Library of Congress. Quite impressive and I'm looking forward to returning so I can check out the other two buildings. Thinking this would be a good opportunity to do so. Here is a link that might be useful: The 2009 National Book Festival