Okay, I got THAT done. I really did read up on the stuff and visited the appliance forum AND took suggestions. So here's what I came up with: Frigidaire Freezer for the pantry (White)- Manual defrost. I'm either going to go with a 20 cu.ft or a 17. I have to measure the space I have. Right now, I have a small chest (freezer that is!) that I am also going to move into my garage in the new place. We have to buy meat and frozen stuff from the mainland and freeze it to cope with prices here! Washer and Dryer: Miele with stands (White). The guy sold me on these. They use very little water and soap and they have a honeycomb interior too, which will really save on the wear and tear of clothes. And they have a pretty huge rebate and energy cash back deal going right now on these. Refrigerator: GE Profile French Door w/ icemaker. (S-Steel) Really nice if you have lots of refer traffic (kids!) like we do. And it's got a nice freezer bottom drawer like my old SubZero, which I loved. (but...I HATE SUBZERO!--arm and a leg to repair! And a ROYAL pain to replace!) I'm also not buying ANYTHING built-in ever again! I got the one with the ice maker in the freezer. They have one with an icemaker and water deal on teh door, but that, for me, is a pain in the neck. The little ones think the water and ice maker are a TOY and I end up cleaning up the mess! No thanks! Microwave: GE Profile Spacemaker (Blk and Stainless): This is such a honey of a microwave!!! You can stop the turntable on it and it fits a 9X11 casserole dish in it or a 20 oz. cuppa coffee! And takes SO little space! I got 2 of these because we are microwave crazy in our house. I'm putting them on a shelf, side by side. Range and Oven (S-Steel) Dacor 38" 6-burner propane and electric: This thing really COOKS! And has convection too. I've had JennAir, Hotpoint, Thermador, etc and this tops them all and is SO easy to clean! Thermador and JennAir are the ones I would NEVER buy again---way too many drawbacks and the downdraft system just drives me NUTS--I will never do downdraft again! Range Hood: 42" Vent-A-Hood (S-Steel): Really SUCKY (and I mean that in a GOOD way!) and QUIET too! Nice design. I got it a little bigger than the stove because that's supposed to keep food smells, etc from wandering out of the kitchen area. Miele Dishwasher (S-Steel): Very cool. Love that the flatware rack is on the top and has its own spray thingy on top and has the ability to wash at 170 degrees. I got the one with the hidden control panel because the babies LOVE to tap, tap, tap on and buttons within their reach! So, anyway, that's what I chose. I'm so glad to be done with that part-my most unfavorite so far. Thanks for the help! It made a difference!

"People coming from Russia at that time did not often want it to be thought they might be communists" maifleur, I've read dozens of books on 20th century US and European history and this narrative you keep repeating differs from what I've read. The US didn't immediately warm up to the new Soviet Union for geopolitical reasons as much as anything. When Lenin took power in 1917, he withdrew the country from active conflict. That allowed Germany to concentrate its forces on the Western front (where the allies and ultimately the US were fighting). On the other hand, anti-German sentiment was quite strong some time earlier because of the war (started in 1914, renaming of Kitchener was in 1916 just as one of many examples). The Soviet regime was new and in the early years, few Americans knew much about it. The Germans were severely punished by the Treaty of Versailles and not forgiven by the western powers anytime before WW2 started. If you had a choice in the teens to 40s of being known as having German or Russian ancestors, most would have chosen Russian. It would be wrong to not mention that Germany (West Germany through the fall of the wall) was the bulwark of the West during the Cold War and has served as the anchor point and foundation of European recovery, peace and prosperity for the last 60+ years. And continues to function as that foundation.

The soil gets better every year if you're amending it as you should....and the gardener gets better every year too. It all works together. : ) Here in OK the thing that throws the wrench into the works and gums it all up is the weather, because we never know when we are planting exactly what the weather is going to do for the next 6 or 8 months---it could be drought and no rain for 3 months or it could be flooding rains, 12" of rain in one day and 24" in one month. How in the heck can any gardener plan ahead and be prepared for all that? I stay out of feed stores during baby chick time or else I'll bring home chicks we do not need. They are too little, too cute, too fluffy and just too adorable to ignore. The last time we were in Atwood's they didn't have chicks in the stores yet, but I figured that for sanity's sake I need to stay out of Atwoods for the next couple of months, and TSC too. Rebecca, You probably are on track with your succession planting, but with snow peas/pole beans it might be a little tricky. I like to plant pole beans early---before the peas are done---because we get so hot here so early that my pole beans need to flower and set beans in May in case the heat is about to crank up too hot in June, which often happens here. If only the weather were perfectly predictable. My English iris, ornamental alliums, red hot poker and some daylilies (but not all) have been up for quite a while now---maybe a month? The daffodils were really late, and some of the daylilies aren't up yet, but I really think that is because of the lack of moisture. The recent rainfall should help with that. The autumn sages are leafing out, so I need to cut them back soon. Most of the reseeding herbs and flowers are no shows so far, but I saw the first couple of larkspur (sprouting in a pathway, naturally) a couple of days ago. I am thinking everything likely will just explode now that we had some rain. I hope Travis Meyer is right about Spring. I'm never going to be unhappy about an early Spring because I dislike Winter's cold so much. The incredibly, horrifically invasive pink evening primrose plants are popping up all over the front half-acre, and in the garden. I pull them out of the garden the minute I spot them. I am considering hitting the ones in the pasture with a herbicide. Yes I am! One plant gives you a million more and they invade everywhere. I got rid of them in the drought years of 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014...but they staged a remarkable comeback in 2015, 2016 and 2017's wetter weather. I cannot stand them. If you let them grow and reseed as they will, that's all you'll end up with in the end. I might keep them if they'd crowd out Johnson grass and bermuda grass---but they do not---they just happily coexist with it. Do you have any idea which parts of Fort Worth they're looking at? Maybe by direction, like North, South, East or West? The DFW metroplex has grown so very huge (7.23 million people) and Tarrant County's population so large (1.8 million I think and I am not sure how much of that is Fort Worth proper and how much is the suburbs that surround it) that it is hard to talk about parts of Fort Worth, as many people now buy homes in developments in the many suburbs that ring the city. Most people who move to the area try to choose a nice neighborhood that will be a decent commute to their work so that they don't spend an hour or two commuting each way each day. So, if you can tell me where their new place or places of employment are located, maybe I can point y'all in the direction of the great places nearby to live. And, I want them to be forewarned, it is a seller's market and homes are selling fast and at inflated rates, so if they want to buy, they need to pre-qualify to know their price limit and find a great real estate agent. Many of our friends who once lived in Fort Worth have fled to the outer, outer, outer suburbs as it all has become too urbanized for them in their former neighborhoods. Some have fled north almost to Denton, to north towards Denton and then west towards Decatur and the like. Others have fled very far south---farther south than Burleson and perhaps as far southeast as Mansfield. My niece tries to keep me up to date on what's what in terms of the neighborhoods and housing developments, and it shocks me when she mentions a neighborhood that was perfectly lovely and highly coveted when we left Fort Worth in 1999, and she tells me it has gone downhill and is now "ghetto". I guess nothing remains the way we remember it once was. If Saginaw and the area northwest of it are near their place of employment, there's tons and tons of new housing developments and new shopping centers going up there---for at least the last 10-15 years, and the growth is never-ending. It used to be Denton was considered a long drive from Fort Worth and too far to move to live, but now people tell me Denton isn't far enough away. I think much depends on whether they want to love in a highly developed neighborhood with lots of homes close together, etc., or if they want to move further out and had a half-acre or acre lot or even more. The weather was gorgeous here today. I trust it was gorgeous where y'all are as well. It was a little wet and muddy, but that won't last long. It actually was nice to see puddles for once. Of course, we had a fire. Remember how I told y'all that when rain falls in a bad fire year, it can make things worst? It sort of did that today. Some vehicle on I-35 had a tire that was coming apart and a piece of flaming hot tire landed in tall grass beside the road and set the grass and trees on fire. This occurred less than 12 hours after our rain stopped falling and it happened maybe a half-mile from our fire station. I was wondering if the ground was muddy enough for the brush fire trucks to get stuck, and suspected it probably was. The answer, apparently, was yes, and I learned that when one firefighter was yelling "stop, stop, back up, back up, you're gonna get stuck" to the fire truck behind him. Sitting at home listening to him holler made me grin---not because I wanted for anyone to get stuck, but because it is just so predictable. So, now that we have had rain, the fires will continue on because dry, dormant vegetation reminds dry and dormant, and the fires will be harder to fight off-road because of the mud. As my son would mutter sarcastically "Great, just great." One thing that was odd(in a good way) today was that it was so warm that the songbirds did not have to spend every minute of every day eating nonstop in order to stay fueled up and warm. I didn't have to refill the bird feeders until almost sunset. The stores near us still have all the typical cool-season transplants on the shelves, but also more herbs that I think of as needing slightly warmer weather...and quite a few tomato plants. This was the first week I saw tomato plants, and I won't remember all the different varieties I saw, but among them were Early Girl, Better Bush, Roma, Better Boy and maybe Beefmaster or Big Beef. Most were the smaller transplants that cost $3.48 or $3.58 in 3" peat pots, but the Early Girls were larger and cost $5.88 in what was probably either a 5" or 6" plastic (not peat) pot. They also had flats of pansies. Last week they only had violas. I bet next week they'll have flats of petunias. It follows a fairly predictable pattern here. We only went to Wal-Mart and didn't go across the road to see what was at HD because their plants come on the very same trucks from BP, I think, and they tend to get the same plants in at the same time. Exactly the same, but sometimes HD does have pepper plants in about two months too early---and earlier than Wal-Mart does. It was ridiculous to stand there and look at those big monster plants, all of which could eat my tiny tomato seedlings in one gulp. It doesn't make me wish I'd started mine earlier---because our soil is still far too cold for tomatoes. I believe I started mine at the right time for my area given my weather and soil temperatures (even with the recent warm-up). I might feel differently if the soil temperatures start hitting and staying in the 50s while my tomato plants are still 2 or 3" tall and wide. Gardening is an imperfect science. I hope people didn't see those tomato plants and automatically assume it is time to buy them, take them home and plant them because we have some freezing nights in our forecast around mid-week. Dawn

Susan ... OMG osh ... THANK YOU very much for all the FUN gifties you sent my way ... You did not need to send all those, but I really appreciate the thoughtfulness and generosity, very much appreciated! a lovely card and note ....LOVE the beautiful FLAMINGO hand towels, those are already out and hanging, the fantastic assortment of seeds in the cutest little bag, wow! I plan to get these sown probably Monday ... seasoning, flamingo luggage tag, journal, crossword puzzle book, trident gum, handcream, lip gloss set, honey vanilla chamomile tea bags - cant wait to try this! THANK YOU so much Susan .... I had lots of FUN with your herbs and spice swap Susan and enjoyed learning from your postings!