Hi Marie!! So nice to see you!! I hope you are doing well and that your collection had rebound from your loss years ago. It was a hard winter again for us this year and I did have damage to a few Palm trees, but they finally made a come back.. Hoping they will again. You are so funny about my Plumeria collection! I do have it bad and I have been really good about trying to select and thin down, but its not working to well. I do have a few and thanks to LISA! ;-). She has called me out on how many I have since we had a fun contest over there at the Plumeria forum a few days ago. I had to admit how many I had.., It was a blast ! Lisa is a new Plumeria enthusiast and I'm trying to help her along .... We all remember those who come forward and help instead of lurking and being over helping out. It does mean a lot to them and it certainly makes me feel good. So Marie.. Are your trees doing well? Have you added to your COT collection too? I haven't been over to the Adenoum forum lately.. I really need to go over and say hi! I did count my collection the others day since we are changing up my backyard deck area. We made some benches to add to the side yard to place some of my trees on. Some of my friends call them bleachers LOL!!!! I'm really glad to hear from you. I haven't been on the forums to much and I try to get back to say hello to my friends. Just sent Pug a few trees last year and she just sent a pic of how they are leafing out.. I am so pleased.. Take good care!!! Laura

The Invisible One is finally reporting in. After last SundayÂs gathering, The Bug got me down, eliminating my ability to say anything the least bit witty, not that I could have matched the others at that, anyway. DH and I enjoyed everyoneÂs company immensely. It was wonderful to dine among GW celebrities Igloochic (the delightful, devoted mother of adorable Jesse -- I hope he is doing much better), Buehl (who I later realized is the Kitchen Forum FAQ compiler/poster), and cooperbailey (with whom I had several things in common). It would be fun to meet more GW folks, whenever and wherever. We are in Towson, MD, so I expect weÂll be headed south when it happens. Some have pronounced our kitchen "finished." Now, we all know that "done" is a relative term. I hastily took some pictures of our kitchen before last weekÂs dinner meeting, and the only thing really missing is a window treatment. However, I need to straighten up the counters, find the best angles, and gather all the spec details before preserving our kitchen for posterity in the Finished Kitchens Blog. That new project is definitely on my Someday List  another relative term. :-) Alice

ArcStone is not listed here but you might try there. They have their "usuals" but they often get new stuff that is pretty special. Of the ones mentioned, except Stone Surfaces, all are pretty darn good. I stayed away from Marva because they wouldn't let me just browse and wanted me to pick 2-3 stones and that was it. I need much more freedom than that. But, I did like their stones. But I do know that they,NSI and one other place in Frederick - Bramati, had great looking stones. Someone here didn't like Bramati because they have a family dog there that is on her last leg, and she was wandering around. That could be a problem - I was there, and saw her and she was really harmless. It kinda tore my heart that her age was getting the best of her because you could tell she had MUCH better days. But I did like the stones - some I hadn't seen anywhere. GranTops uses them a lot. They also have a great relationship with NSI (see Eric). I think if you go with either of the ones mentioned here, you should be OK. Take you time and go back if you aren't sure. I carried all my stuff with me to help match colors. After a while I just kept them in the trunk and only pulled them out if I found something that I thought would really work. Funny, when I finally did that, I found my stone - the light bulb truly went off and I ran to the car. It was just as I had imagined - a perfect match. Yippee!!! Anyway, as I said, take your time until you are comfortable. Also, you may want to call around to see who has what you want. I did that with AcrStone a lot and they were very helpful to check. Do you have a fabricator? If so, see who they have relationships with as sometimes you can get a discount.

Hope you feel okay to join us on Sunday pcjs! If others are bringing spouses, I will "drag" mine along as well. He would be very happy to talk to someone else NOT about kitchens :). I am going to do a new post to try to get a bit more attention to see if we can get any more confirmations. I posted a new thread- Here is a link that might be useful: Help from Marylanders thread