Good for both of you! A lot of women just can't give up their authority in the kitchen, just like a lot of men think of cooking as something they shouldn't be expected to do. imo, both groups are missing a lot of fun. DH took over the grocery shopping shortly after he retired. The first few months were both exasperating and hilarious, but he's gotten to be very good at it. Of course an incentive is that if he wants 'junk food' like ice cream or potato chips, he has to buy it himself. He doesn't do a lot of cooking but he did learn to read a recipe... as long as I annotate it as to pan size and list the exact order of steps. Some time ago Suzi mentioned writing everything down that she wanted to remember. I'm trying to do that with all the kitchen details and recipes. A lot of my cooking is seasoned with a 'dash' of this or a 'glug' of that, so I'm having to measure and experiment before the recipe can be used by anyone else.

...and the first 3 bud sets have arrived! =) All 3 of my Cherry Tomato plants have a wee bud set...yay! I'll post pics in a few days to a week when they're a bit more easily visible.

I don't grow gladiolas since I can't be bothered digging the bulbs in fall but that combo pic of the Stokesia, yarrow (Coronation Gold?) & glad is a stunning combination of color. The brick walkway makes a lovely textural contrast. Well done you!

Orubis...You have no idea how timely your post is! The gutters are going in on Tuesday followed by French drains on Wednesday. :o) We don't have gutters on our current house (never needed them), but the new house is a whole different story. We realized after the first heavy rain that they'd be neccessary. It's been pouring rain for 2 days and there are trenches where it's coming off the house. The puddles are turning into lakes. *sigh* Since we're on the subject of gutters, we were amazed at the variance in bids that we got for them. We need 141 LF and 10 downspouts with a few miters. We had 4 bids that were between 800-900, 1 for 1700, and another for 2700!!! I think that guy's method of bidding a job was to see how much he owed in bills that month. LOL