Most fragrant - I have lots of them, and of different types. I'm going to mix moderns and olds here: Firefighter; Grandmother's Hat; Yolande d'Aragon; Lemon Spice; Felicite Parmentier; Cymbaline; Strawberry Hill; Golden Celebration; William Shakespeare 2000; The Generous Gardener; Mary Rose (exceedingly fragrant to my nose); Tamora; La Reine; Mme. Plantier; Scepter'd Isle; Abraham Darby; Evelyn; Mr. Lincoln; Jacques Cartier; Mrs. B.R. Cant; Glamis Castle; Pope John Paul II; Tahitian Sunset; Jude the Obscure; Brother Cadfael; Double Delight; Roberto Capucci; Mystic Beauty; Eugene de Beauharnais; Francis Dubreuil; Devoniensis; Carding Mill; Yves Piaget; Sweetness; Secret; Young Lycidas; Old Town Novato; Just Joey....all these roses are very powerfully fragrant to my nose. I have just planted some new ones that I have read to be fragrant or have smelled myself, but did not include them because they're just brand new planted in the past week or so: Munstead Wood; Lady Emma Hamilton: Princess Alexandra of Kent; Tea Clipper (which is very fragrant to me); Gentle Hermione etc...I try (with the exception of the Teas - which are too good to pass up - to only purchase very fragrant roses. Still some of the Teas are powerfully fragrant - Devoniensis is so fragrant I can smell it about 15 feet away (and folks, I don't have the keenest sense of smell) and Our Lady of Guadalupe (which I did not mention because the fragrance is not powerful in itself) wafts its fragrance all around. Great fun these roses. Another one Forest Ranch Purple Pompom. Very fragrant.

Hi Ingrid, Yes, I like a wide variety of roses. One of my (many!) rosie weaknesses is fragrance, and it just got me again.;) I went to my local botanic garden's plant sale at the beginning of November. I had the plant list all printed out. It had multiple species roses on it (another weakness), but I told myself I didn't *need* any more roses. I went to the sale armed with a shopping list of other plants to buy. That was the plan at least. I kept repeating "you aren't buying any roses, you aren't buying any roses." All was going as planned until I made the mistake of turning down the aisle with the roses. I was doomed. The most intoxicating fragrance permeated the air. I had to look to see which rose was such a super wafter. It was Rosa californica 'First Dawn', the only rose blooming. The rationalization began! I knew I already had Rosa californica 'Los Berros'. First Dawn although the same species was a different selection, and it looked quite different. Los Berros has much bigger and darker flowers which open flat and are borne either singly or in a cluster of maybe 2 or 3. First Dawn is light pink and the single flowers are cup-shaped. It blooms in multi-flowered clusters. The perfume has an additional elusive element I don't smell in Los Berros (it too packs a wallop in the fragrance department). I managed to resist the temptation to buy any of the other species roses as none of them were in bloom. However, I must admit that my resolve lasted less than a week before I was back and visited the garden's native plant nursery and brought home 2 pink/violet Rosa minutifolia (one upright growing, the other more lax) to add to the white-flowered one I already had. Next to Rosa minutifolia in the nursery was R. woodsii ultramontana. It looked lonely, so naturally I had to bring it home! I'd previously seen this rose in all its glory at Eurodesert, and whenever I was in its vicinity, a very powerful, sweet perfume pervaded the air. No way to miss noticing this rose when it is blooming. It may be a once bloomer, but who cares! Melissa

Leava, What a wonderful harvest those butternuts gave you and Jeff. They store very well too so y'all will be able to enjoy them for a long time. Your experience with the plants that grew in the compost pile emphasizes just out how much we all can improve our soil just by adding compost every year. In gardening, it all starts with the soil, and compost-enriched soil produces high yields even in tough weather. After 14 years of adding compost to the veggie garden beds every year, the soil we have now bears very little resemblance to the dense red clay we started out with in the beginning. My experience with butternut is that the vines do run rampantly everywhere and the vines are very productive. I only planted a couple of butternut squash plants, a couple of Seminole pumpkins, and 1 Tahitian Melon, which actually is a winter squash (not a melon) that is similar to zuchetta, which normally is used as a summer squash. These vines took over every available inch of space, and beyond. All of them ran all over the ground, climbing trellises, fences, tomato cages, etc. and some of them escaped from the north side of the garden and grew out into the adjacent woodland. All three of these are on my list of favorite winter squash to plant because they pretty much won't die until a hard freeze gets them, and you cannot kill them. They laugh at squash vine borers, and while I have seen squash bugs near them, the squash bugs do not harm them enough to kill them or even enough to slow them down or hurt their productivity. If these particular varieties of squash are grown in poor soil, they still produce, but the better the soil, the better they produce. I can imagine that plants grown in a compost pile would produce huge harvests as yours did. What the butternut, Seminole and zuchetta/trombocino types have in common is that they all are Cucurbita moschata, and moschatas have solid vines instead of hollow ones, so the squash vine borers cannot easily bore their way into and through the stems as they can with other types of cucurbits that are C. pepo, C. agyrosperma and C. maxima. I've taken out my Tahitian Melon and Butternut plants in order to use those areas for the fall/winter garden, but the Seminole vine is still going strong, still flowering and setting new fruit that are not going to be able to mature before frost kills the plants. These two plants cover about 400 square feet and I didn't even water them in the worst of the summer heat/drought. Before I took out the butternut plants and the Tahitian Melon plants, they covered about the same amount of space that the Seminole does. The Seminole plants wilted when I stopped watering but they didn't die. When it rained in August they perked up and resumed their rampant growth. The other day I thought about taking out the Seminole plants and putting a winter cover crop in that area, but all the little flying insects love the blooms so I left it alone. Also, ever since late August I've noticed that the songbirds sit on the winter squash trellis and catch grasshoppers that flock to the plants' leaves, so I don't want to disrupt the birds' good bug-catching work. Lisa, When I first grew zuchetta about 20 years ago in Texas, I didn't consider the fact that its name is Zuchetta rampicante and didn't give it nearly enough space. That's a mistake I haven't made since then. It is such a huge garden monster, but in a good way. I wouldn't recommend it for Square Foot Gardening though! Dawn

What a great opportunity you had to give her the snow globe! Even though we lived fairly close to both sets of grandparents and I loved them all, I didn't interact with them much in elementary years or as a teen; but had "snow globe moments" with them from time to time. My mom occasionally mentioned my maternal grandma wondered if I didn't like her because I usually went off to read a book. I just didn't know what to say to her. When I was 12 we moved next door to my paternal grandma to be where we could help her. I never felt close to her really. She tended to be critical and to compare me to, well, pretty much everyone, but she meant well. In college I moved into my mat. grandparents basement apartment to be closer to campus. In my whole life they had never tried to correct me (something I feel is always best left to the parents!). While I lived there they just visited with me, asked me about school and work, told me amusing stories, etc. Never once did I use the kitchen downstairs. I always ate with Gramm and Gramp and they always acted amazed that I would do all the dishes when I "should be studying" or that I could carry my book bag with so many big textbooks. They were delightful and brilliant and the least judgemental people I know! They met my husband long before the rest of my family did and made him feel welcome, too. He feels as close to them as I do. Gramm's been gone nearly 20 yrs now, Gramp has been gone for 11. I still miss them both with all my heart! I think you're wonderful for wanting a close relationship with your family! Just keep loving your little one and be patient. Don't push the relationship. Love her mom, too. Grandparents can be a safe haven when the time is right! Wishing you all the best! Kay