Pup, Growing roses takes lots of trys, and lots of patience and most roses need at least 3 years to see if they really work. I have Constance Spry near Westerland and Tamora and Belle Storey underneath. Belle is one of my favorites, but she is not a cutting rose and probably needs some time to gain strength. Once she is established, she is a great producer. A lighter pink rose that might work for you could be Compassion, a newer Harkness, or Hybrid Musks Felicia or Cornelia. Both of these are not fast growers, but once they establish are incredible. I think you could think about a yellow on the other side of Westerland like Crepescule. Hoov has a picture of hers in the Gallery. I love Royal Sunset. It is a beautiful rose for our foggy area. It produces an abundance of fragrant blooms. But, it is not a cutting rose, the blooms do not last, but there are so many of them, it doesn't matter to me. And I do not think the colors would go with Westerland, they are very different on the color spectrum. If you live in the East Bay, you are welcome to come over and see mine. Have you thought about adding some clems for variation? One of the things that attracts me to English gardens is the way the gardener can add in companion plants and produce an incredibly serene palette. BTW, different strokes as they say, I love petals on the ground. Carol

Mollie I like keeping up with all the questions you have as most are something I'm running into on my redo of an old 1920s home. My whole house has long length wall to wall pine floors and we are about to begin working in the kitchen which has been moved around so many times that there are some major problems with the pine floors. The rest of the house except for the kitchen has real nice salvageable floors. We thought about the tile route but were determined to find some pine flooring that matched the stuff all ready down and not have the problem with a change in height between the kitchen and the rest of the house. By the time you put down cement board and whatever else you might need plus the adhesive and then the tile---well pretty soon you'd need a ramp for the grandkids to get over it on their roller skates. We were lucky (if you can call it that) I was busting out a wall to get behind the upstairs toilet to replace our main cast iron vent pipe and I ran into our flooring on the wall. I know, I know what you're thinking --that's not flooring --that's your old wood walls with the tacked on gauze and wall paper. Well we have that on all the walls downstairs. All of our second story walls are the same as the floor. Just better as they've never been walked on. I guess the builder got a better deal on the flooring than on the wall boards which are 1 X 6 and the flooring is 3 and something inches. So look around for more pine. I still believe it would be better than tile "ONLY" because of the transition in floor heights. And by the way our old house has a claw foot tub in the upstairs bath. We haven't been able to use it because of the plumbing problems but I will climb in it this weekend and let you know how easy it is to get in and out.

Went to the see my vet yesterday and after a good exam and I had also brought a sample of her urine, my vet told me that for her age her heart was not bad at all. She suspects an infection in the bronchials and a bit of water on her lungs or foam if I remember well what she told me. She is on 2 different kind of medications and we should see an improvement. The medications are for a short period of time. Now I can concentrate on a stray cat, a big tomcat, that I want to trap and have neutered. Anicée

After skimming and sanding, the paint will show on the high spots but the low spots will be filled in by the mud. Make sure he vacuums all the sanding dust off the walls, ceiling, and floors before he primes and paints, or the new paint job will look even worse. Most smooth (but not perfect) walls will use a 3/8" nap roller. He may have used a 1/2" nap to begin with if you thought it was too lumpy. You won't be able to use anything less than 3/8" now since even after skimming and sanding the walls aren't perfect. Good luck - maybe you want some other painter to check it out and sand some more if necessary, finish the job instead of letting this guy do it again?