Thanks for looking/commenting Kevin and all. I love that 'Monterrey Frost' agave too, so nice and impervious to the recent cold. Yay. My 'Hercules' aloe definitely has tip damage too. It's been in the ground for six years and has grown a ton--I'm excited to see the blooms and to see that it's finally branching. I'm sure yours will do the same too. Now for something that looks (looked!) bad, and then good. I'm tired of the "dwarf" oleander around part of my covered patio, so this weekend I ripped them out (big job) and replaced them with fifteen rosemary plants, and added 1000 lbs of gravel mulch. I cleaned up the arbor too and planted honeysuckle, which is thriving on a trellis nearby, and I finally added some pavers underneath the arch too. I'm embarrassed about the "before" pic, but with the holidays, a month of houseguests, this awful weather and my work things just got nasty, hah! It took all weekend but now it looks better. Not great, but better. Happy gardening all, keep the updates coming! BEFORE: tired, sickly, abused "dwarf" oleanders and an orange that unlike my others never looked good. Not the open soil under the archway. Shame shame on me, hah! AFTER: not perfect, but better. I removed the sickly citrus, and the oleanders and replaced them with rosemary which does so well here, and has great scent and blooms and color. I also added pavers under the archway and planted two honeysuckles (Lonicera japonica) at each side. Last year I had all sorts of different vines on there--quite a mess. The recent cold snap took care of that so out they went, plus I cleaned up the remaining twigs (tsk tsk tsk).

Dee No worries about your review of the URI article. I was a bit put off by the lawn/imidocloprid thing myself. Usually the URI entomology articles are quite good, but that one wasn't. I did however, find a link through that article to Arbico Organics that sells a variety of different kinds of beneficial nematodes. I've been looking for Steinernema Carpocapse for some time. Not only does this nematode control grubs, it also is the only beneficial nem that will control foliar nematodes. Foliar nems are a real problem in Hostas and are hard to control. The link is below. Thanks for the Prarie Sun ID. Lost the tag on that one. H. Cracker Crumbs is a mini. I little bright gold thing. Bella Anna is always pink, regardess of pH. The only drawback is that it flops like Annabelle does. I need to get some Peony supports for it. I bought that one for $5 at Weston Nurseries in November after the pallet sale broke up. It's grown well. Enjoy the weekend. It's going to get hot next week. Remember, nothing lasts in the garden. Steve Here is a link that might be useful: Arbico Organics

Pixie Lou, you have a lot of nice lilies. I only have a few because of the RLLB. I just couldnâÂÂt keep them clean if I had too many. As it is, the âÂÂOraniaâ this year looked fine until after it bloomed I noticed the foliage has a fair amount of holes in it. You canâÂÂt cut the stalks back to the ground after blooming, right? I would like to have enough to smell them in the house, but nope. The âÂÂOraniaâ does make the whole front walkway a very pleasant trip when they are blooming. And thanks, glad the comparison of peppers was interesting. I think growing hot peppers does make a difference, they seem to be a more vigorous and shapely shrub that produces more and smaller peppers. The large sweet peppers seem to be more difficult to get more than a few per plant. Thyme2dig, what a pretty daylily border! IâÂÂm not always pulled to purchase a daylily and some of that is the way I see them being used. The way you have planted them all together that way without competition from other plants and with that great shrub border behind it, I really like it a lot. What is that dark shrub in photo #3? And is that Nasturtium at the base of your purple tripod? Jane, I donâÂÂt blame you about the FarmerâÂÂs Market next year. I took a couple of yearâÂÂs off from the vegetable garden and I missed it and here I am still doing it. :-) But is this year an exception? I think some years are not the greatest and this year just wasnâÂÂt. IâÂÂm going to try to salvage some of the season and go for some fall crops of Broccoli and Lettuces and Kale and other greens. This weekend IâÂÂm probably going to start. I have three squash plants without a squash between them. *sigh* Spedigrees, thatâÂÂs a good looking lily and the foliage is a lot cleaner than mine. :-)

Hi Dee. My daughter is part of the Children's Cast with Jose Mateo Ballet Theatre. This is her 4th year. She was a mouse her first 2 years. She is now on her second year as a polichinelle - the little ones who run out from under Mother Gingers skirt. She is especially excited this year since she is the "naughty" Poli - which means she gets to do cartwheels instead of returning to the skirt. This year I was asked to be a Cast Leader - which means I'm 1 of 3 trying to coordinate all the children. With 60 kids per show, 200 kids total, and 25 shows this year, it has been a ton of work. You are right how it overtakes your life. We start listening to the score the first weekend in September - audition weekend. And we watch Battle of the nutcrackers on Ovation every year (they just put the Maryinski 2006 version on demand last night - guess what I watched!). I try to get her to one of the Jose Mateo performances every year. And we usually go watch one other production of nutcracker every year. Though I will admit I'm happy to watch Swan Lake once January hits! My DD is only 9, so I have many more years of this ahead of me!