i changed many things. important lesson learned: once you start this kind of project it can feel like a speeding train leaving the station, and not everyone may be on board (i felt like i wasn't and it was my project!). particularly with this economy - when they get the job they want to GO! meet a milestone - get paid! i had to learn to slow the train down. it is my project. if it takes me 3 months to figure out the design before i sign off, so be it. i had to really pull the breaks a few times to keep control of the situation. i was getting pressured from the GC as well as the cabinetmaker. you are the customer, take your time. design is an iterative process. do not expect to get it in 1 or 2 rounds. be sure look at things in different lights, mock things up in cardboard if necessary, get real life samples, live with them. when you think you have the final design live with it for a few weeks before signing off... it took me 1 year before i was ready to say OK to building.

Hydro, I must confess up front I am a chemist which makes it less intimidating for sure. But just for knowing the cost of this, I took the 5 major nutrient ingredients I add to make my concentrates and priced them in the 50 pound bulk bags they come in. (That is how I purchase it in bulk 50 pound bags) Then I took the mix I use and figured out a price per gallon to mix my concentrate. Then I divided the quantity of concentrate I use to make 1 gallon of working nutrient and came up with a price of working nutrient per gallon. It was so low I had to check my numbers on the spreadsheet I made. For vegetative mix it was 3¢ per gallon and for Fruiting mix it was 4¢ per gallon. And it was actually less but at 2 decimal places it actually rounded up to those prices. I was shocked. (By the way, 50 pound bags last at least 3 years for the major ingredients) The bulk nutrients are really easy to mix. Just weigh out a portion on a gram scale of each salt and mix them to dissolve in water and dilute to 1 gallon. Not even close to needing to be a chemist for this, more like an average cook can do it. I mix 2 fractions, the nitrates and the sulfates so they don't drop out of solution. That is the way most commercial nutrients are packaged as well. I did not include the cost of trace minerals which I calculated as well because they are more difficult to proportion for anyone without the proper measuring tools which for trace nutrients involves scientific glassware. But the nutrients only add 2¢ per gallon to my mix. Pre mixed trace elements are also available at hydroponics stores (albeit at a higher price) and are made to be simply measured out and added to nutrient mixes. This may not be for everyone, but for anyone serious about the hobby, pricing my costs was a real eye opener! In addition to Kieth Roberto's formula which I like, there is an excellent book by Jim McCaskill called Plant Nutrient Facts for Hydroponics & How to make your own fully formulated plant nutrient. He goes through the math and gives worksheets to help a hobbyist formulate their own nutes. It may be hard to find the book but worth looking if you are serious.

One minor item I've changed is my lawn. So, at the outset, please realize, my lawn is the size of a large postage stamp, so what I do might not work for everyone. That said, I've got one hell of a crop of Glechoma (creeping Charlie, creeping Jenny, son-of-a bitch-plant) and at one time, I would have taken the necessary steps to get rid of it. In fact I used to do this, which consisted of two applications about ten days apart of your basic phenoxy herbicides. I've also got wood violets just cruising in the lawn, quite a few dandelions, and whatever else I'm forgetting just now. The lawn's a mess. Yet I neither spray nor even fertilize these days. It just doesn't matter. In fact, I'm getting so I like it this way. We also have a sort of "bulb lawn" consisting of a legacy planting of the little bulb Siberian squill which BTW has the most intense cobalt-blue flower of any I've ever seen. So there's all kinds of non-Kentucky bluegrass things happening in my lawn, and I've gotten so I don't mind at all. I will literally hand weed a few bullthistle rosettes out when they appear. But here's the real deal; I would likely still be killing lawn weeds were it not for a very blessed happening within my tribe-the sudden appearance of not one, not two, but three brand-new grand-babies. These kids are going to be playing on our grass, the youngest of them are going to be sticking things from the lawn i n their mouths, and so on. That's the real reason why I stopped with the chemies and fertilizers. And truth be told, since this is an old part of town, with non-stripped-out topsoil, old plant roots growing, living and dying for decade after decade, you really don't have to fertilize the darn thing. Down on the corner, neighbor who picks and picks at stuff, has every cheesy (in my opinion) add-on to his house's trim, etc. waters and waters that lawn when the summer dry time comes. I used to do some of that but this guy takes it to the nth level. So, you all know where this is going right? When good rains come back, our lawns look identical. But my real contribution-as I see it anyway-is in all the land we're reforesting (appropriate for up here), the woods we're managing, both up there and at one son's place who also owns some woods, and in my very career path. I have actually spent my entire working life-one way or another-involved in plants, horticulture, biology, and so on. It's what I do, period. But that would have been so regardless the state of the planet...I think.

Thanks, Becky. I had thought about moving the DR rug into the LR. Need to measure to check if correct size. This is DR prior to getting the current rug. Drapes are mostly blue. Any suggestions for a rug here? Saypoint, rug is definitely blue, not minty. I know colors on monitors are not always the same. LR colors working towards are blue, tan, and cream.