Happiest Birthday Wishes to you! I hope your day was as lovely as your birthday cake! Sending along more birthday wishes to your son. Sol

Really, Geraldine? If you do them scrappy you can chain them sooooo fast from just strips and trim as you go. You can do a pile of blocks in a day and then it's just play getting to see how to set them. I suppose that, the charm, plus the simplicity of construction with so few seams to match is why I fell in love with them 40 years ago. Of course, that's when you're not doing a complicated layout and design like the one rosajoe is doing.

My gosh, I can not even imagine handling everything that they are giving you. I have been active in PTA Boards, Aquatics Booster Club Board and Scouting. Aquatics is probably closest to what you are doing. For several years I did Registration and then Secretary for a number of additional years. We asked for voluntary contributions for our sport, basically just enough to cover our costs, but in California public schools it was determined that it was illegal to require payment to join a team a few years into my involvement. Not that we ever required payment before the ACLU became involved, but once we had to announce that payment was voluntary the donations took a nose dive. Depending on the team we had payment of 95% to 50% of cost from our athletes, apparently boys parents value sports more as the boys teams always had much better donations . In addition to our snack shack which was our biggest money maker, similar set-up to legomom23, one of our favorites was a car wash. We would ask a parent to head up the car wash each season and request that each player sell 10 tickets at $5 each. Most sold the full 10 tickets, plus we would get locals that saw the car wash signs come through. We were able to hold the car wash in a grocery store parking lot. We picked a date and a back up date in the unlikely event of rain, I understand in some areas of the country this would not be practical. Another successful fund raiser was a taco man at the game. No money out of our pocket and we received 50% of the profits. We sold the tickets prior to the games and at our concession stand. We did this every home game, it was very successful with basically no work on our end. Strangely enough it did not really cut into concession sales. We also did the restaurant deals, a couple of times each season. They were not huge money makers but the families enjoyed them and every bit helps. About the time I was leaving the Board, the remaining Board members and coaches were putting together a Tournament, this can be a huge moneymaker. Every team has to pay to play, I think about $300 and then you make extra money on the concessions. The last two years that I was involved our Booster group moved our apparel purchases to MyLocker.net, for everything except swimsuits and parkas. This was so much easier than doing it ourselves. and we made a bit of money. When we did our own ordering we just charged our cost. Others have given you great ideas on things to sell, we tried to stay away from that as the school itself seemed to have cornered the market on the cookie dough/magazine/chocolates and such. Good luck, if it were me I think that I would want to consider this position as one to coordinate other volunteers, that is just too much to expect one person to do.

It IS a unique and pretty rose, isn’t it? I’ve always liked tan/coffee/mauve roses like Pam’s Choice. I also have and enjoy ‘Silver Cloud’ Ralph Moore 1990. The blooms are similar in size and they both bloom (for me) in clusters. The blooms are the loveliest color in the cooler temps of spring and fall. I wish I had a good pm shade spot for Pam’s Choice, but those are in short supply, thanks to the new neighbors big tree removal. I agree with Straw and Kristine, “unique, antique and romantic” describe Pam’s Choice well. It makes a nice cut flower, although I sometimes struggle to find something (from my garden) to use with it in a vase. I really appreciate a rose that doesn’t get too large, sin since I have limited space. My plant is at least 5 years old and still a manageable size, 3-4 feet with pruning. It never throws out crazy long canes, remaining compact and tidy. Your picture is lovely, Feiy Lo! Pam’s Choice puts out lots of blooms, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, I was out of town before I cut these. I came home to find most of my Pam’s Choice blooms already spent. I’m glad there were still a few left to enjoy. Paul, I’m truly sorry for the loss of your sister. I actually wondered who Pam was as I took the photos yesterday. I too, am glad she got to see this one and know that it was named for her. I’m also happy to finally know the story behind this special rose’s name. Lisa