Thank you for all of your nice comments! I really appreciate this board---I have learned a lot! The 4-H Grand Champion was daighters tall pot with the black-eyed susan vine. Son #1's "Love-Lies-Bleeding" pot earned him a state fair trip and a purple ribbon. Son #2's pot with the Canna and Persian Shield earned a reserve Champion and State Fair trip. We had a fun (very busy) fair week! One of my daughters questions for the judge was "Why does my winter-sown black eyed susan vine from collected seed not bloom?" It grew well into a very heathy thick vine..but no blooms? Any ideas?

Wow, well first off I would like to thank everyone for all of the compliments! You are all far too kind! ChemGardner: HAHA! emerald1951: Thats better than brown! HEHE hijole: Thanks Greg ssk22: Thank you. They are slow growers for sure. Where as a normal jade out here would be 4' tall by now the mother plant is only about 2' tall max! teatree: Thank you, I am glad you like them. In retrospect I think that I may have messed up the name on that one, I am going to have to check my tag to make sure. pirate_girl: Thank you so much for the kind words. I am hoping that eventually those Tabliforme will get to their repoted 18" diameter. That is if I can keep the darn mealy bugs off of them. My biggest challenge in all of this truly is the mealy bug. I have tried different sprays that work for other plants we grow in the greenhouse, but nothing really touches them. I have even done full submersions in a 5 gal bucket with style oil mixed in to only mediocre results. Last time I sprayed I used some orthene, so hopefully that is the ticket. You are also right on with the Anacampseros. It was on the tip of my tongue but just could not remember it! Thanks for the ID. Murdstone: I am not sure if that is a Trichocereus or not. I will check the tag when I get home tonight. azpedsrn: Thank you, glad you like them wantonamara: Yea I still have about 60% free bench space left, hopefully I can find new specimens to fill it up slowly buy surely. chaparralgirl: HAHA you are too funny! Hope you had some good dreams! I hope to get more pictures as more plants come into bloom. I have some pictures of plants in bloom that I did not post yet because I did not want to post too many images! unprofessional: Thank you! I agree, they are absolutely beautiful once they grow out a bit. puglvr1: Thank you glad you enjoyed them meyermike_1micha: Well San Diego actually, but its actually pretty much the same thing! HAHA. I need to get those repotted. I always see a nice growth spurt when I do that. dellis530: You are welcome. The small greenhouse now has mostly a bunch of haworthia, aloes, and other assorted stuff that likes some more shade. I will try and get some pictures of that sooner or later rosemariero6: You are welcome, glad you enjoyed it. I try to keep things clean so I dont have a huge mess at any one time to clean up! alpq: You are very welcome cactusmcharris: HAHA glad you like the lithops. I have wanted to start adding more to my collection but they are tricky little buggers to track down. My cousins husband has quite a large collection of them at Kristenbosch in SA. Maybe i can talk him into sending me some seeds! Thanks for those suggestions, I will defenitly look into them. Yes i am very much looking forward to going to the S&C show, it will be the first one I have had the opportunity to attend.

Ok, I'll jump in. This was taken in early November on my Dads 95th birthday. Dad and Mom celebrated their 62nd anniversary in September. Standing from l to r is my wife, Sue,(she posts here as Bigbaby occasionally), me, my brother, Joel, and his wife, Nancy. Ron

Here's a few more Grant is with my SIL's dog, Captain. She brought him over to play with Grant last month. Grant LOVED having him here and he made me cry because he looks and acts sooooooo much like Dakota. I miss her so bad. I love her baby blues!