It is true. The gallardia is toast and needs to be tossed. Your soil appears to be compacted and gallardia needs freely draining soil. This means loose soil with tiny air pockets. If there is a Lowe's near you they sell bagged soil conditioner for less than $4. This is what most compacted soil needs as it contains small pieces of pine bark that keeps the soil from packing down again. It gets mixed into the top 6 inches of the soil after you have turned and loosened it with the garden fork or with a shovel. It is likely that tha water you gave it was more than it needed, but not lossening the soil was probably the biggest problem. A free soil test from your county agrigcultural agent would be a great place to start with any amendments that you may need. If I don't have a soil test and can't wait for one, I just use soil conditioner, a little lime, and bagged dry cow compost in small amounts dug thoroughly into the soil. You may not need lime if your soil is not acidic. I never fertilize new transplants. It is best to let them begin to grow slowly into their new soil. Most of us have made the same mistakes as you and learned from our mistakes. Thats why this forum is so helpful. Once you get the area dug and replanted, be sure to mulch, with shredded pine bark mulch if it is available. This mulch will break down and improve your soil also.

You can give your children all the things you want to by setting a plan and living the plan. For example, if you have a goal of 2 kids, paying for college and then giving them this gift, funding your own retirement. How much of your salary should you be saving to achieve these goals, what is your assset allocation in your investment portfolio -- that's what you have to work at. Figuring out whether to put the $ in the child's name vs your own is quite beside the point.

Our agent told us since he was incurring the cost of advertising the property and doing most of the legwork, that's why his part of the commission is larger. I posted on a local realtor board and was told 2 percent is the average around here, and a lot of agents aren't showing homes that offer 1.5. I asked our agent to change it to 2. I don't even know how to be sure that he has, but then again I just looked at my listing on craigslist which says we have stainless steel appliances. We don't. It's also still advertising an open house for "this Sunday" (no date) when the open house was this past Sunday. I'm so sick of these errors. From misspellings, to inaccurate facts, to having no signs for the open house, showing up 10 minutes before it started (he said he'd be here 30 minutes early), to not posting the virtual tour on realtor.com until a month after going on the market, the commission issue, telling other agents we need 24 hours notice even after we more than clarified we don't, turning away a showing, etc. It's hard to wrap my head around all this when the guy's not even getting paid until he makes the sale. He's young. Maybe he only remembers the good times of real estate when these things didn't matter. Like I said, we can't act until the weekend/next week. Thanks for your words of wisdom and patience with my tale of woe in the meantime. Man, I screwed this one UP.

Don Juan is not your usual climber. It starts blooming right away. Its kind of like a pillar rose in that it blooms all over, not just on lateral canes, so you can train it up a pillar and it will still bloom. It will bloom even more however if you "peg" it (train it as horizontal as possible). I don't know how cold hardy it is, because I live in South Florida, but I do know that it is one of the best performers for our heat, so that makes me believe that it does not like the cold. I once asked the owner of a local nursery why she didn't sell roses and she said it was because it was just a "slow death" for them here in SoFl (my rose garden would beg to differ) and that the only rose she knew that did well here was Don Juan. Well, there are many roses that do well here, but Don Juan does not only do well here, it thrives. But many others just perish in our heat or succumb to disease no matter how much to fuss over them. Save yourself alot of heart ache and get yourself a rose that is KNOWN to do well in your area. It will be worth your time and money for many years of beautiful blooms and alot less work to get them. You don't want to be fighting an uphill battle, especially when there are SO many great roses that will do will in your area. :)