My DIL found a barrel with a tight fitting lid behind a local supermarket but we can't figure out it's original use. Anyway, it's a bright yellow and I really don't want to put it at the front of the house, where - of course - the best run off is. The house is stuccoed with coquina, so am thinking of giving the barrel a good "sanding" then painting it with one of those just for plastic paints in a matching color. Meanwhile, my tomatoes and bell pepper are starting to look very thirsty despite hand watering. I'm beginning to wonder if I've forgotten how to raise food! cora

I thought that the design software would help us set limits on numbers of plants per area but since it has yet to arrive in the mail perhaps Martie is right we should continue on so we dont loose too much momentum. I still however would like to plug our choices into a digital design and will share my attempts and ask for guidance with that as we go along. Below is the list of chosen plants for the vegetable beds although still in the kitchen garden lets move on to herbs (again another area of gardening that I know nothing about). This game is a creation of mutual effort so if you feel strongly about one thing or another or have a different vision please let us know. Should we move the fennel, garlic, and onions to the herb garden or are they considered veggies? The herb garden is 30 x 30 which will allow for nice wide pathways and easy access to plants. Clematis 'Polish Spirit' - Vtskier Turnips - Cady Rhubarb - Mad Gal Spinach 'Prickly-seeded ' - kt Carrots 'Early (Scarlet) Horn' - Bug Tomato 'Early Cascade' - Nhbabs Peas 'Sugar Snap' Tee Pee - Cady Beans - green, yellow and purple with Dill - Mad Gal Basil 'Lettuce leaf' - nhbabs Fennel - Florence - kt Asparagus - Vtskiers Apple 'Golden Russet', espaliered - Martie Eggplant - Bug Swiss Chard 'Ruby Glow' - Cady Onions - Martie Cherry Tomatoes - Vtskier Garlic Nhbabs Globe Artichoke - kt half-dozen sweet bells if they have freezer space for winter use, 4 'Mexi-bells' if seed were still available (slightly warm, wonderful for salsa which I put up in dozens of pint jars each year), 2 Jalapeños, a 'Cayenne' and 3 'Thai' peppers for both heat and their beautiful, compact size. - Solana French Breakfast Radish - Bug Red Leaf Lettus - Mad Gal Cady its your turn to choose an herb.

I have been busy bringing in the plants that I want to keep over the Winter. I brought the two Hibiscus in a couple days ago since the weather guy was warning us of a frost. Today I cut back the Mandavilla and brought it in. Also two large hanging begonias and one Coleus. I've never tried to keep a Coleus, but it was just too pretty to throw out. They are all in the end of the garage where I have an entrance door with windows. Also I dumped some container plants, and took down the deck umbrella and brought it in. I'm right proud of myself!! The weather today has been perfect with sunshine, and temps in the high 60's. S'posed to get some of that rain on Saturday, when the family will be here for my DD's birthday. I hope it will hold off though. Enjoy the weather while we can. Winter is just aeound the bend. Sue

Nancy, I hope your nice weather lasted. I wasn't watching the weather much last week other than trying to keep an eye on our own. Tim said something to me yesterday that reminded me what a tough summer it has been here. He said he couldn't think of any community in our county having two such awful losses of members in such a short time, and after I thought about it a while, I think he is right. We are in a little unincorporated rural to semi-rural area of Love County in between the towns of Marietta and Thackerville, and our neighbor who was the lineman was the second tragic loss of a community member here in the last couple of months. The first was a gentleman who perished in a fire after the gasoline tanker truck he was driving was cut off in traffic, overturned and burned. Two horrible losses suffered by two families in such a short time in such a small community as ours....it is unfathomable. The first was one of those things that your brain refuses to believe when it hears it, and then the second one was exactly the same.....too horrific to be real. I think all of us here are just so done with 2018 and trying to remain positive and look ahead to what hopefully will be a better year in 2019. I wonder if your burnweed will be burnweed? I still think when Jason IDs a plant, you can take his ID as gospel. I don't think I've ever seen it here, but y'all have such different soils and different climate up there in some ways that it is like we are in a whole different country----ha ha, at least you are in the Green Country and we're in the Mostly Brown Country. That would be funnier were it not so true. Larry, In August of any year, I still think it is better to be too wet than to be too dry. We had good rainfall last week, but the dry ground slurped it right up. Well, at least the rain did fall. Since you came back and posted a photo of your little Yorkie (he is so adorable!), I guess you and the tractor survived the mud and are not stuck out there in it. Jennifer, I didn't try Vick's on the feet because we didn't have any and I wasn't going to go anywhere for any reason. I am starting to feel better but it was a rough week, and I think the recovery is going slowly. I am bored, but that's a good sign, because I don't start feeling bored until I start feeling better. It sounds like you had a really fun day babysitting that six year old. I bet she was disappointed to learn she was going somewhere else the next day! There will be time later to catch up on outdoor work. Just take care of yourself. Nancy, Heavy rainfall in August is such a gift that you just have to get over the pouting, you know! My grandmother always admonished us to never look a gift horse in the mouth. If I whine about rain in August I know what will happen----the following August we won't get any rain at all. So, I hope you got the pouting and all out of your system and can appreciate the gift that August rainfall truly is. Sometimes when we say we are bored, I really think that what we mean is that we aren't able, for whatever reason, to do the things we really want to do. Sometimes I'll be whining to myself that I'm bored, but it isn't because there aren't things to do---they just aren't the things I want to do. Because of that, I don't do them and just sit and say that I am bored. Your 90 degrees sounds nice to me (unless the heat index was, like, 99 or 100). We were 97 on Friday and 96 yesterday. I think today is supposed to be closer to your 90, but I guess I haven't looked at the forecast in a couple of days so I'm not sure. Larry, Hercules is so precious. I love Yorkies but we always have medium to big dogs. I'd have a Yorkie in a heartbeat though. It is hard to watch our furbabies get old and sick. We have been down that road with so many dogs over the years, and our black lab mix, Jet, who is now 13, has chronic kidney disease and, according to the vet, is in the final months of his life. He is on medication and a special prescription diet and I try to treasure every day we have left with him because there likely won't be too many more of them. He was never supposed to be ours. Born to a stray dog, Honey, who followed me home when I was walking our other dogs, he was one of a litter of four. Tim's best friend picked out two of them, Jet and Duke, to adopt as his own when they were only two days old. He got the pick of the litter and we promised Ken we'd reserve them for him and not give them away to anyone else once they were big enough to leave their mother. The following week, Ken was diagnosed with a glioblastoma brain tumor. Again, we promised him we'd keep his two puppies with us until his treatments were done and he was ready to bring them home to his ranch. Sadly, his cancer progressed quickly. Diagnosed in late March or early April, he was gone before the end of May. By then, we were too attached to "Ken's dogs" to let them go, so we kept them. His wife didn't want them, as she felt she couldn't cope with two new dogs while coping with his death and trying to keep the ranch running full time while also working full time in Dallas. We understood and were happy to keep Jet and Duke ourselves. Duke left us three years ago and I've been all too aware ever since then that Jet's time is coming too. It is hard. I wish they aged at the same rate as we do, but they don't. As hard as it is to lose our furbabies, I have accepted that we just have to endure the pain of losing them----it is the price we pay for having had such wonderful pet companions to share our lives. Dawn