Thanks for starting this thread, Ingrid. In fact I was thinking not only of resource-thrifty plants and gardening techniques, but also of attitude adjustment. I agree with your ideas. When I started gardening here I had an idea that water was going to be the critical item, and with our dry summers and diminishing rainfall that's true, though we also have our flood-landslide years. Scrounging up organic matter also turns out to be quite a chore. I think it's scarcer here than in the U.S., and our clay is very poor in organic matter, though once adequately supplemented it takes care of itself. People who garden in Florida sand, for example, may need to amend forever--do you? I'm asking--while, if I can ever get ground well enough amended that the plants there grow vigorously, the litter and prunings from those same plants provide all the organic amendment that ground needs. Unfortunately there's not much of the garden where this happy state of affair reigns, but it's true for the escarpment in front of the house, the bed beside the house with the big climbing roses, much of the woods, and a few other places. My goal is to get the garden feeding itself. Generally I'm friends with annual grass in the beds: it grows, dies, and provide a layer of organic matter above AND below the ground, with its dead roots that I don't have to dig in. I want all the ground covered with plants busily generating organic matter. Nonetheless I anticipate that we're going to be buying bales of old hay for years to come. Digging big planting holes and heavily amending the the soil we return to them has shown itself to be a necessity. We water plants the first year after they're planted, and little or none after that. We have one hose for the big garden and water by hand. Plants grow VERY SLOWLY here. This is part of the attitude adjustment I mentioned. However, if I dug them a good hole to start and the plants are tolerably adapted to their conditions, they hang on through all kinds of adverse conditions, not keeling over when the summer drought hits. They develop good root systems, I believe. We have deep clay they can dig themselves down into, the ground is moisture retentive, and we have 40" of average annual rainfall. All this makes dry gardening feasible. (N.b. I believe there are plants that grow in thin soil in dry climates: not everything requires clay and good annual rainfall.) More attitude adjustment: I accept that my roses aren't going to bloom to speak of in summer, nor will much else. By the end of summer the sunny garden in fact looks like a bomb hit it. Total devastation. I stay indoors and forget the garden, rather like northern gardeners in winter, or I stay under the wisteria pergola, where I have my sansevierias and other potted plants to admire. Last summer we got busy clearing a strip of woodland of ivy and brush, and the shade down there was very enjoyable. Just a pleasant spot to be in is worth having, whether or not anything is in bloom. And good foliage and interesting plant form can be present and enjoyable even in a drought. I love the seasonal aspect of the garden, looking forward to cyclamen and the persimmon in fall, admiring dormant buds and sarcococca flowers in winter, getting thrilled by the first sweet violets at the end of February. As always, I have more to say, but I ran out of steam. Coming up: trees. I want to hear others' thoughts. Melissa

I'm very behind in my thank yous. We had our Christmas this past weekend since this was the only time the whole family could be home. My grandchildren were here helping Granny with her cards so some may not be exactly right. From Christine - socalgardengal I received Kaley's Pink hollyhock seeds, dwarf czech bush tomato, foxglove, ingeglio gigante liscio tomato, and Jaune Flamme tomato. Jim and Tonya - jimryder sent sea holly, sunshine coneflower, zinnia giant flower mix, tiki torch coneflower, and nyagous tomato. Lorabell - I also got one of her very cute poems. The card was very nice. She sent columbine lime sorbit, red romaine lettuce, and ornamental sunflower. Detroitgrl77 sent Abe Licoln tomato and Azoychka tomato. Clipclop - Linda sent poppy and 2 castor beans (yea). Sjc48 - Shirley sent a beautiful handmade card, I just loved it. I got Raspberry daiquiri with the card. From Karen, I received Alcea rosea "spring celebration", dianthus " velvet n lace", dianthus "indian carpet", a poppy, and agastache "giant white". Lexiegurs - Dawn sent Carolina cucumber, Pink Caspian tomato, Alaska pea, Sub Artic Plenty tomato, Black seed simpson lettuce, Gajo de Melon tomato, Green Grape tomato, White libon onion, Blacktail Mountain watermelon. Laura - sent cracker jack marigold, orange marigold, hollyhock, Lady tomato, red poppy, yellow black-eyed susan vine, and Hale's cantalope. I think that is it for now but I have to go through the cards to make sure I haven't missed anyone. I thank everyone very much for the time, effort and thought sent with each card. Debby

I visited 2 pre-fab/modular companies and,yes, a couple of the houses fit my budget and I liked - but, when the add-ons (appliances, digging new foundations, removal of the existing house, new septic system,etc) were added in to the cost - everything would run at least $100,000 more than renovation. The alternative would be adding a trailer/mobile home and having local fire dept burn the house for practice. The builder of this house was the owner of the property and used timber from the land - he had a sawmill, etc. so the wood used in the house is all true 2x6s, 2x8s. etc. One can see rough cuts on the timbers(8x8s) that support the house - locust, chesnut. We are second owners of the house, buying it from the builder's widow. The first floor is about 800sqft-LR,DR/study,2 bedrm,kit, and bath and we will be keeping the same "footprint" Your thoughts are valid and this is why I came here for advice and ideas. Contractor and I have already discussed unforseen possibilities - rotten/insect-eaten wood. The attic shows good wood but who knows what hides behind the wallboard on first floor. Contractor knows that he has $150,000 to "PLAY WITH" and I have another $30,000 available for those unforeseen problems. Architect has worked with contractor for over 6 years (probably on much larger jobs) so that is a plus. What haven't I answered - oh insulation. Contractor told me what he would be insulating - walls, ceilings, pipes (esp waterline from pumphead) and I checked online - seems to be the areas normally insulated.

Karen Hause, have you seen the flowers of this sedum? If so what color are they? We don't have a fully authoritative answer but have some strong leads regarding its identity. We'll write more about this, but the flower color would provide additional clarification. Incidentally, side-by-side comparison makes us more convinced that your blue sedum is S. hispanicum not 'Blue Spruce'. We'll write more about this, too.