Whoa! Conflicting replies! triple b, he's a very brazen rose. Not embarrassed at all. I water him daily, so I will keep it up. I don't think I'll underplant. I put chives in this pot with another rose last year and wound up with a pot full of chive roots and NO rose roots. Amazing! hoovb, the pot is almost 24" in diameter (22" or something like that). Only in the pot since March, I think. I just fertilized again on Sunday. Perhaps I will just do the same deadheading I did last time. I took off about 6" all the way around. It still looks vigorous, but I don't want to stress him if he could be feeling poorly from the BS. I don't spray. buford, Burgundy is a sport from Australia, I think, and it's SUPPOSED to be very disease resistant. Not like Iceberg (but go figure, my Iceberg in the ground has not gotten much BS. I admit to being very sloppy when watering lately, thinking this rose is bulletproof. I splashed a lot on the lower leaves. If I wind up having to yank this rose, my DH will beat me over the head with it - in a nice way. I hope to avoid that confrontation. LOL :)) Sherry

Crystal, Sounds as though you are doing OK with the cuttings. Be careful with the pea gravel. Keep it away from the cutting. The stones can get hot enough in the sun to burn the stem. Since the stones can no longer support the cutting, they are really not needed. If you have kept the second cutting in indirect sunlight for a few days, that should be enough. Personally, I put them right out in the sun. Watch for reflected sunlight that can double their exposure and cause a burn on the stem. The only time I put them in indirect sun is right after transplanting, or when introducing them to the outdoors after a winter dormancy. Putting them on concrete is a very good method to stimulate rooting. Plumeria love bottom heat in the rooting process. Don't worry about the different appearance of the tips. Different cultivars will have different colors to the claws. However, it sounds like the new ones are green cuttings, which are, in my experience, more prone to rotting than older cuttings (like your first one). So be very careful not to water them after the first soaking. You can mist the tips, but avoid allowing water to run down the stem to the pot. If the soil appears to completely dry out, make a shallow channel around the periphery of the pot and put some water there, keeping it away from the stem. And be patient. Some varieties take a long, long time to root. Mike

My cats have always been pretty good in the potty area (thank god) although they have taken down a fewoutfits I used to hang on the back side of my door when I lived in a condo...the worst damage was to a 1930's cashmere coat...it has shread marks where they used it to climb (and then get stuck on) the top of the door when they were kittens. But now we have a puppy. We've moved to the new house and have found out that he not only likes his pee pad (used by his breeder) but he feels anything on the floor is a giant pee pad. Today I'm putting the sheepskins down in the library (because it looks awful) and I'll be spraying with a natural spray that is supposed to keep him from pooping or peeing on it. I'm a neurotic decorator when it comes to rugs. They (IMO) need to be included in any good design, but now I can't put any down because of this freaking dust mop we now own. So...we'll see how the natural stuff works! I'll let you know....although my kitties don't feel the need to pee on every horizontal surface...so maybe to them it won't matter.

You don't show the floor plan, view lines, associated areas, which can change everything, but, that little caveat aside, extending your sunny blond flooring sounds very, very good. With the walls and floors blending in a calm, warm whole, and the whole set off by pops of color, it should be very elegant. Your reasons, all of them, for passing on a dark stain, handsome or no, are compelling. The reason to go that way would be if you wanted to create a more dramatic look in your home with big blocks of dark and light. I'm old enough, BTW, to both know how wonderful a home with a sunny, pale honey floor looks and to expect that many of these nice cool, dark floors will inevitably eventually be sanded and refinished in that style. Too beautiful to be anything but classic.