Hello, Christopher, and welcome. It's good to finally hear from you. I was also a lurker for quite some time before I had to courage to utter anything. I have two of the roses you've ordered, Sophie's Perpetual and Mme. Dore. The former is a bit fragile for the heat here in Southern California but Mme. Dore is a beauty, with very good rebloom. I think you've picked very suitable roses for your area and wish you much joy with them. Diane, I added ORG Renae to my order of Marjorie Palmer and Leveson-Gower and am glad to say that all three have been confirmed. I'm hoping to add another rose to my order from the second part of the fall offer that should be available later this month, since shipping for four roses is the same as fewer. Oh well, I did say some time ago that I was done ordering roses....... Ingrid

"Honeyberry" or sweetberry honeysuckle is extremely hardy. It's fully hardy here and, just as important, chinook-proof. Extremely early to leaf out, even earlier than alpine currant. It's also described in Sara William's Prairie Xeriscape with other honeysuckles as "tough, drought-tolerant" and "well-adapted to prairie conditions". Rick is growing various varieties of this - we just have a couple of the straight species (rather than named selections). "Russian sea grape" is a rather peculiar name for what's more commonly called sea buckthorn - hardy as all get-out. My mom grows them in zone 2, and the city (Calgary) uses them here and there. I love the look of the clustered golden or orange berries, but they are rather invasive (root suckers) so not suited to our city yard. (Got more than enough suckers already from lilacs, roses, various Prunus, 'Schubert' chokecherry, gooseberries, etc.........) Some old, basic hardy grape varieties for zone 3 are 'Valiant' and 'Beta', or the straight species, Vitus riparia - not great for eating (IMO) and not even very attractive to birds, but good for jelly. 'Fredonia' and 'F-130' are another couple of newer ones that are available up here. Grapes, even the toughest, are a little touchy here, possibly due to the chinook conditions, but can thrive in zone 2. (My mom, zone 2, has a huge old grape vine that's older than I am.) We have the U of S sour cherry introduction 'Carmine Jewel' - I'd recommend 'Evan's' instead for much larger, sweeter fruit and probably almost as hardy. Or, actually, Nanking Cherry for sweeter fruit than either, though much smaller and less flavorful than 'Evan's'. (All have been totally hardy here but that seems variable by area...with respect to 'Evan's' anyway.) Also have Mongolian cherry - sour as he!!, and very small fruit. (So, tell me again....why exactly is this thing taking up space where I could instead be growing perennials??? ;> ) 'Evan's' is beautiful in bloom (and produces very heavily, very quickly); all have nice fall color. I'm still waiting for local success stories on kiwi; tried a pair a few years ago that didn't even winter.

I wonder if these guys are my female's children??? :-p What is also cool that I forgot to mention is that when I got home, I took down, cleaned, and refilled the feeder. And when I went back out to hang it, there was a hummer hovering in the empty spot where the feeder had been hanging, pecking at the home-made ant moat (which I had made from a red plastic Maxwell House coffee jar lid)! LOL It was like "Hey!!!! What happened here? Where's my FOOD???!!!" As I approached, it backed up to let me reconnect the feeder and flew to the side while I straightened it. Then it finally returned about a minute later. Also last evening was the very first time that I heard my hummers chirp! Wow!!!!! All summer has been silence... Not even any sound from the wings. Now I was hearing all sorts of racket... not too dissimilar from sparrow chirps but shorter and more abrupt in duration. One other interesting observation is that for all the years that I have lived here, I always had spider webs - many quite large and intricate, with huge spirals attached from the balcony ceiling to the balcony rail or to the tops of my overhanging shrubs along the rail (a distance ranging from about 3ft - 4ft in diameter). But for the first time ever, not this year... Not a spider web to be seen. And of course I know why! ;-). Here's another pic from last evening... looking for an "incoming"! LOL

Well, after an agonizing and stressful search for a color, I am doing Raspberry Truffle after all. I had patches of every color on the walls...from Cardboard by SW, to Kona by BM. Nothing hit me. Then I decided to paint a larger square of RT. Almost a full wall next to the windows. I painted 3 coats and I am going with it. I also tried Cottage red (nice but almost maroon) and Pomegranite (close second). I primed and painted all the woodwork today. When he came home and saw a chocolate brown swatch, I think red didn't look so bad to him!! Tmr I am taking off and hitting the paint store early. I will let you know how it comes out. BTW, I asked the Benj.Moore dealer if he could mix Tobacco Road. I figured I would use the aura paint. He couldn't find it on the computer as some other's have suggested. I will use Sherwin Williams recipe since it looks almost perfect to my eye. I was curious given all the hoopla about the "original version".