The two fruitless olives to consider are "Swan Hill" or "Wilson's" (Olea europaea wilsonii). They will be labeled and although you may see flowers, they don't produce viable pollen so no fruit. You might also consider Mastic, a small/medium sized evergreen tree. Several of the trees you mentioned above are deciduous (loses leaves in winter), which may or may not be a consideration for you. Eucalyptus microtheca - grows to 30 or 40 feet tall and wide. Mexican redbud - this tree is deciduous and may be difficult to find Monk's Pepper (Vitex agnus-castus) - spikes of purple, pink or white flowers are followed by small BB sized seeds. Deciduous in winter. Texas redbud - deciduous Here is a link to a site that has over 600 plants and a great search feature that will help you with your tree choices. Here is a link that might be useful: Water Wise Landsaping

Hi lovetogrowflowers. I don't think you are bothering anyone. Lucy is right, try not to stress yourself out. Take deep breaths. LOL. I think your plan for the two potted ones are perfect. I read in one of your earlier post asking about if the crawl space was ok and someone I believe said yes. For me, I WOULD strip the leaves first. The brug will be trying to take care of the leaves instead of useing its energy to go dormant. Plus you wouldn't want bugs to sneak in on a leaf and spend the winter eating your brug. :( As for the one in ground...well people cut back or don't cut back for different reasons. One of the biggest I think is for safety and the health of the plant. During the winter the brug branches will freeze so they cut them back so there is less of a chance this will happen. Who wants a mushy rotting brug in spring? How tall is the brug you still have in the ground? How close to the ground is the Y? The experts can chime in if this is a bad idea, but how about if you...1.Stip the leaves. 2.Cut off only the top green tips. (Save them) 3.Mulch as high as you can get it, at least to the Y if it's close to the ground. 4.Cover the brug with a REALY big rubber trash can or tub. 5.Maybe even cover that with an old blanket. Or would that be over kill? The cuttings you could take in and root them. Hopefully none of that was bad advice. Me and Lonny are newbies too. This will be our 2nt winter. We killed one of the two brugs we had last winter. But that was because we brought them in and tried to keep them growing. This year we brought all in again. This winter we have many more, plus young ones. We made a Brug room and have been learning lots. So we are going to give it a try. If they had been bigger, we would have left them out in ground to go dormant. Now that I have writen a novel.(sorry, long winded) Try not to worry, you brought them back to health and they are doing well enough to be around to overwinter, so I think you are doing well. Kim

That variety (according to my resource, NCSU) grows very slowly to a height of 3 to 6 feet and 2 to 3 feet wide. Some other resources say 10 feet. I have no experience with this variety. Do you have a deer problem? They love all the arborvitae except for green giant. As for finding a larger one, do you have a John Deere Landscaping Nursery in your area? Everyone thinks that they only sell wholesale to landscapers, but they will sell retail (at least ours will), but you have to call and ask. Osmanthus heterophyllus 'Gulftide' is an (dark green) evergreen, but does have some spiny leaves. It's an 'average' speed grower to 10 ft x 4 ft. Chamaecyparis obtusa 'Kosteri' is a slow grower to 5'x4' and is bright green. Chamaecyparis obtusa 'Templehof' has a pyramidal shape, slow grower to 8'x6' Juniperus chinensis 'Blue Point' is pyramidal, blue-green foliage and an average grower to 10'x6'. That's about all I can think of right now. Cameron

Thanks everyone for your great comments! Buehl, love your idea but sadly, no, I can not close up that window. It is the window to the street, the porch and I love it. Even if I didn't love it the Historic Preservation people would never let me get rid of it. So it stays. It sounds like you all agree adding the fourth counter makes it too small. What if the counter was 18 inches instead of 24? Would 6 inches help much? I still need storage underneath. Bmorepanic - you are not the first to propose cutting down the other side. A second designer I hired suggested cutting that down to a 15-18 inch pantry only (pantry for dishes, not food - food pantry has a good home) floor to ceiling piece of furniture painted a different color. I actually love the idea but here's the rub...that counter is totally our favorite place to work. Our dishes are in the uppers there and that works with where the d/w is...we hate to mess with that part of the space. I am thinking I could make something that was a pantry-like cabinet but still had a counter...not as deep but we could still prep over there... and keep the 24 under the other window. My husband and I don't love the bigger counter moved to under "street" window because it is weird to face the street while you are prepping...and at night the blind comes down and that is even more strange. At the other counter you are facing whoever is sitting at the counter so that seems a happier place to work. Our goal in adding the counter under the window was to have a place to plate the food out of the oven. We also have to have room to store: all kitchen gizmos, pots and pans (we have alot) but I think we could also hang some. I would also love to have a spice drawer, pull out pantry for oils, and a tray storage. Am I high to think I can get all of that in? I know if I go shorter than 20inches it won't happen. Ugh! I can tweek my plan now but I have to decide by Monday if the counter under the "street" window is 24 inches or less. If it is going to be 24 inches then I have to reconfigure the garden window so the sink can be centered. If it is under 24 inches then I can tell my GC to center the garden window and take another week to figure it all out. But not much more. I would love to hear more ideas - it is so helpful to get input from people who understand kitchens as opposed to someone who designs kitchens. My guy threw boxes and uppers everywhere and now I fear I am cooking in a space the size of an airplane bathroom. Here is a link that might be useful: amacs renovation blog