Morning, Everyone, Pet...AWWW, Mr. Frog sounds adorable. Yep, I'm sure the frog is used to warm areas. A FL native. Too bad you couldn't keep it as a pet... :) A. fasciatas are beautiful Broms, and will live forever, if babies are removed, placed in seperate pots. Neoregelia's are also gorgeous, but I've never had luck removing their children. Do you see babies? Is it flowering? Good luck, Pet.. PrairieMoon, The thing about lemon is, the scent deters insects, including ants, roaches and fleas..and of course, house plant bugs. Lemon won't kill bugs, however they dislike the scent. One site advised squeezing lemon juice in holes/cracks where insects hide out. lol. Lemon is used for cleaning, whitens laundry and supposely kills mold, bacteria and germs. Which is also beneficial to plants.. Listerine works like lemon..deters bugs..Optional. Before my plants are brought indoors, I add generic Listerine. Believe me, I HATE insects..plant bugs and outdoor types. Spiders, Earwigs, etc. I don't know if EW's dislike lemon and mouth wash, but spiders can't stand it..BTW, vinegar kills spiders on contact. I'd rather not use chemicals, so when a spiders get inside, I grab my vinegar bottle and spray away. Spiders roll up then died. Sorry, to all you spider lovers.:) Do you purchase plants at different nurseryes/green houses/stores? I've seen employees spray, 'surely not plain water.' A local gh has sprayers that lightly mist plants every half an hour. Ever notice residue on leaves? You can bet the residue is from insecticdes. I wash plants off ASAP. Can't stand touching chemicals. Eggs are hard spotting, especially if ones vision is not 20/20. Still, when I buy plants locally, I check upper and lower leaves, stems and near plant base. Sometimes, mold is present. You're lucky you have a room to isolate..Don't worry about proper light the first 3-days to 1-week. I've done a LOT of online ordering. 98% of the time, an info sheet is included. So far, every article I've read says the same thing. Place new plant in shade the first 3-days to 1-week. After the plant is situated, it can go in its permanent location. So, no need to worry about light while plants are isolated. Write a note to yourself reminding you to water. lol. Does 'g' stand for grin??? Cheeseclothe is a great idea, but I can't find it. lol. Can't tell you the number of sprayers gone bad when I chopped garlic and placed in mixture. Even tiny hot pepper clogged the nozzel. I had to remove cap, then wash and remove particles with a tooth pick. lol. That's the reason I now add a clove of garlic the night before spraying Still have difficulty with red pepper, 'when smaller misters are used,' but it's worth a few seconds to clean ut. To top off misting, I buy inexpensive, crushed hot pepper. .99 a bottle or two for 1.00, then sprinkle outside plants with hot pepper. Also, when I mix soils/mediums for repotting, I add Cayenne Pepper in the soil mix. lol. Prarie, we've had ants problems 4-5 years. I spray with vinegar which kills on contact. Remember ants and mealy work together. I also add 1-2 drops of dish soap in plants kept in shallow saucers w/pebbles and water. One last thing. I have 15 or so old, 'cleaned' milk and vinegar containers filled with water. So, when a plant needs a drink, water is room temp, ready to go. When containers need refilling, I add a couple drops of dish soap. Please don't think I spend a million dollars on dish soap. lol. I buy generic soap for 1.00 sold at Jewel Grocery Store. Considering the amount of soap and vinegar used, the cost isn't much....safer than Raid, etc. Prarie, when my Hoyas had mealy, I dumped every last piece of soil and pots. Once winter arrived, plants inside, mealy returned. Yep, Rhizo knows about spiders. She found a Black Window in her LR this last summer. GROSS and SCARY.. Don't like spiders, pedes, or small bees..think they're called Honey Bees..those stingers got me good one day when I turned a window-box filled with water, over another plant. I didn't know bees made a home in the drainage holes. After water was dumped, those stingers were everywhere. Other bees don't bother me. Not really. I used to be terrified of all bees, even though I was never stung. As far as spiders and pedes, I've been terrified of those long legged pests since childhood. And will to the day I'm in heaven. :) PM, Good luck. I hope thie recipe works. You may need two applications, one week apart. Toni

LOL mike. :D I'm sure your mites were the same as mine! Two-spot spider mites are the bane of everyone! Predators must be used correctly. The most common and effective predator mites are tropical. They like high humidity (70% to 90%) and temps (80~ F). If you can't provide them with these conditions, you have to go for a different species of mite, and up until recently the other species were hard to find and even more expensive than the tropical ones. You see, the sucking mites gain their moisture from the plants they're biting. The predators don't have that moisture source and can dry out fast. You should also buy many predators and blitz the mites for fast control. 1000 predators for 4 trees at the first detection of mites was definitely overkill, but I prefer overkill to underkill. The ones I used last winter were from Nature's Control. They sell a "triple threat" package with three different species, on the theory that at least one species can match your environment. I bought a humidity meter and turned up the humidifier and the thermostat for about three weeks, and that seemed to be long enough to do it. The predators I applied to the raspberries this summer came from Evergreen Growers Supply. I bought 2500 Amblyseius fallacis and 100 Stethorus punctillum and released them in the yard. The Stethorus punctillum is a tiny (and unbelievably cute) black ladybird beetle, while the Amblyseius fallacis is a type of predatory mite that can handle a low-humidity situation, like what I had in the back yard. They don't work as fast as the tropical predators, which is why I used a ton and supplemented them with the beetles, but in theory they can establish a colony in the yard that can survive a Kentucky winter and depress pest mites next year, too. Indoors, in a controlled environment where I can raise the humidity easily, I would go for the tropical predators, which work fast and are cool to watch. If you are concerned about mites, they would probably work well in your greenhouse!

Megan, Congrats on the little sprouts! My first pepper sprout was a "Biker Billy" jalapeno, and he beat every other pepper plant by two days. With a name like Biker Billy, you expect to be "first", I guess. I grow hundreds more tomato plants than I need to grow as well, but never have any trouble giving away the extras. Some of them go to friends in her our neighborhood and others go to work so Tim can share them with his coworkers, but many of them make the trek to OKC in April for the Spring Fling. I had potted up most of the tomatoes from my first round of seedstarting and those are the ones basking out in the sun today. Yesterday I potted up the rest from that round, and today I started seeds for the second round. It always freaks out people who stop by the house for one reason or another in the early spring and see hundreds of cups of seedlings lined up on the patio, on tables, on the sunporch, etc. It is fun to have extras so I can say "would you like some plants?" My poor little plants were shivering in the cold wind when the cold front came through at mid-morning but now that the front, the clouds and the heavy wind have passed, they're sunning themselves and enjoying a beautiful afternoon. Now, if only the soil temps and air temps will hurry up and get to the right level so we can plant them in the ground! Dawn

I have a small house. Small baths. You don't like housecleaning nor wiping down after kids. One thing I did was I got rid of the ceramic tile tub surround and had white swanstone panels installed. I never want to clean mildewed grout again. I love tile and put it above the panels. Yes, I prefer, way prefer the look of tile but not at the cost of cleaning it. The swanstone looks pretty good. Sorry no pics. I have two Americast tubs and I think they are acrylic..I love them. Had cast iron before. They are shiny, sparkly, fresh and white. I think my cleaners use a spray to clean them. I am glad you are thinking this thru before you do extreme drastic measures. 1000s f is not going to be better with the addition of windows. Editing, building up, and up going storage will help, not windows. Natural light is overrated. Look at small space solutions and not at glam or cliched luxury sites. We built closets onto our bedroom walls instead of new dressers. Up to the ceiling. Think California closets. With drawers and cabinets. Not pretty but functional. We have ikea Brimnes headboards with under bed storage drawers in our new house. I am an ikea slave. Your family is always going to take a lot of time and energy and that's just the way it is. A 1000sf house will not be easy but it's home. And I love love your kitchen. Think about the life you live for now. Think first before acting.