It won't take long... so curious to se LJ's firs't flower. At this moment i'm pretty sure it'll be a real LJ because this flower stalk has 3 buds and not 4. Colour of outsite of bloom is kind of soft salmon orange.

Well my goodness what a welcome wagon we have here. I was shocked to see the post with my name on it, and then read all the sweet greetings from you all. Thank you Ron for posting. All I have in the house is midget toosie rolls, but your welcome to them. Or I could make some yummy brownies. lol Okay, a little bit about myself. I was born here in Alabama but left the south when I was two and moved to Michigan. Where my husband and I owned a automotive business (manufacturing) in the suburbs of Detroit. After his death I sold everything and moved back to start anew. But that was about fifteen years ago, oh my. About five years ago I bought an historcial home here in a small town much like Mayberry. We have festivals, parades, eye contact, and homemade everything. I never had children, but they say, "You don't miss what you never had". But I do adore them. I love interior design and I am mad about antique's. I joined because I was starting to grow antique rose's but lost interest. I am turning this into a novel, sorry. Now your turn. ....Jane Susan I did read your email. I thought my house was old, geez. Your house is so sweet. As soon as I fiqure out how to post picture's I will do so.

Persuasion is my favorite, too. I love the theme of second chances in a life that has turned out to be disappointing. It has a bittersweet quality that has always appealed to me. Having said that, I really do like them all. Mansfield Park is fascinating to me. Some of the moral issues that are being weighed in the book seem trivial to modern sensibilities, others are timeless; but I like its exploration of what it is that makes a good person, and how easily the world overlooks these true qualities. Northanger Abbey is the lightest novel she wrote. If you grew up reading Victoria Holt and similar writers as I did, you will laugh at this wonderful spoof of the gothic novel, popular in Austen's day as well as the 1960's and 70's. Sense and Sensibility is a story of two sisters who embody the extremes of a debate going on in Austen's own time. Marianne (Sensibility) stands for the Romantic movement, all emotion and aesthetic experience and the sublime experience of nature. Elinor (Sense) expresses the values of the Enlightenment, self-discipline, prudence, knowledge, and moral virtue. Each one has something the others lack, and in the story, they both learn this. I love this book, too. Emma you already know, a story of just how wrong an intelligent, overly confident young woman can be. And Pride and Prejudice you are reading now. I'm thinking that pretty soon it will be time for me to re-read Austen yet again. Rosefolly

Yes, I suppose Mary might not have been quite pliable enough for Mr. Collin's purposes. But I mean is that she would have been good as a preachers wife because she WAS moralizing and followed her 'duty'. She would have been a good schoolmarm or missionary. She probably just ended up a spinster though. Do you think she could ever make a living for herself (such as the main character did in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall?). I wonder how many of us would have been considered 'blue-stockings' back then? I do remember, in the last chapter of the book, Austen mentioning the fates of the two unwed sisters. Let me see if I can find it.... It says that "Kitty, to her very material advantage, spent the chief of her time with her two elder sisters. In society so superior to that she had generally known, her improvement was great. She was not of so ungovernable a temper as Lydia; and, removed from the influence of Lydia's example, she became by proper attention and management, less irritable, less ignorant, and less insipid." And it also says this "Mary was the only daughter who remained at home; and she was neccissarilly drawn from the pursuit of accomplishments by Mrs. Bennet's being quite unable to sit alone. Mary was obliged to mix more with the world, but she could still moralise over every morning visit; and as she was no longer mortified by comparisons between her sisters' beauty and her own, it was suspected by her father that she submitted to the change without much reluctance." That would be terrible to be constantly told that you were not pretty in comparison to your sisters and that you were not an interesting person to be around. CMK