I get the blues when the days are short, and it's too cold to be in the garden. I don't let myself get too excited about gardening, but this year, I'm gardening by going through my pics from different times of the past season, looking for pics of specific flowers for my blog. Usually, I have dreams about gardening a couple times a month, but have only had one so far. Maybe it's because of the blogging. We have melting snow today, as it's currently a warm 50 degrees. I am always excited when the days start getting longer instead of shorter. I feel that I can survive the winter, and hope for the soil to be dry enough the end of February to plant my first lettuce, spinach, radishes, and kale. I figure that I want to get out while I can, and if it rains or snows later, it's OK, because those seeds are in there, ready to grow when the conditions are right. I have had seedlings get snowed on, and still survive. Besides, I am already planting more when I see they are up. I have a plan to put a tomato plant or two in my new flower bed, and try to keep the leaves from touching the dirt, because mine always get diseased and die, and I don't have room in the veggie garden to rotate them well. I have some holes to fill in different beds, including the area by our repaired shed. I plan to put in some not too tall growing goldenrods, coneflowers, asters, and some kind of summer blooming annuals. Sue

SOunds like a grand evening Jo! Sharon, sending best wishes for Wolf's speedy recovery. I know you are taking wonderful care of him and your photos look just delish. Yesterday was Smokefest here, so we had a gracious plenty of all sorts of beast. I prepped pork shoulder, brisket, ribs, chicken and salmon and another friend who is a hunter and fisherman brought venison tenderloin, pheasant legs, a sea bass, and a bluefish. I dry rubbed the venison and pheasant and brined the bluefish and seabass. The salmon was also cured then dried before smoking as were the pork and beef. The vegetarian grill had peppers, corn, eggplant and vidalias. Other sides were quinoa salad with cranberries and pecans, spinach salad, cole slaw and pasta salad. Appys were taco dip, smoked salmon spread, Habanero Gold with cream cheese and crackers, chips & dip, etc Dessert was That D@mn Cake, Fruit in crust with cheesecake pie (Tracey Oh on the Pie thread) and an apple cake. It was all really good, but we did discover that there are not a lot of Bluefish fans AND home smoked salmon is far better than anything you can buy. Alexa

jterrilynn is a genius! :) I just now noticed she completed my railing on the octagon - lol!! Love it! You ALL have such a great eye - you have helped us leaps and bounds. My husband and I like the black posts. He and I are divided however on the lower level fascia under the deck. I am liking the house color as a tie-in to the rest of the structure with the brown fascia a close second. He likes it black. Hmmmm.... we have a few days to think about it before the painter returns. If anyone has more to weigh in on, feel free :)

You don't have room to store all that stuff....cut veggies and fruits etc. Can you possibly order out the mac and cheese? You're going to make yourself crazy! Plan out your plan of attack....when you will make what and where you will store it. Then who will buy what and where you will store that....and how you will thaw and re-heat what needs to be reheated. Realize that it will take a LOOONG time to thaw a gallon of pulled pork or shredded turkey....and to be safe it should be defrosted in the refrigerator...or a picnic cooler and the temperature carefully monitored so it stays cool until it's ready to be heated. You don't want to give people food poisioning. Hard liquor won't melt any kind of plastic....it's not a solvent for anything like that. And take advantage of all the neighbor's refrigerator and oven space that you can....and don't over look the grill to heat things...or keep them warm....and use all the picnic coolers you can find. Yes...have a few stories...like the time I invited 2 people who used to be married, with their present spouses....figured out it was fine....but one man's new wife had a fit and spent 3 hours cowering by the front door lest she run into her husband's ex wife! And there was the sweet young thing who went upstairs and went to bed in my teenaged daughter's bed....and when daughter came home, we had to wake her so my daughter could go to bed, and the time that our pastor and his wife who invited to our new years Eve party, came after another party at 4 AM....because there were lights on and they knew we were up. And the time the dog drank the drippings from the keg and got so drunk she almost couldn't get up the steps into the house, or the time I bought cheap plastic watering cans to fill with flowers for table decorations....and a couple of them leaked...luckily that was an outside party....and the wedding shower where the groom had to be helped out the door. And the time I decided I could make pizza for 45 kids and had crusts and pepperoni and a vat of sauce....and grated 10 pounds of cheese by hand!!..Took me 3 days to clean the oven after that!