What's Happenin'

[Buttons2]

just catchin' up here

wow,didn't know about the flooding & so much rain! do I dare write how hot it is here? can't think of the last time we had a raindrop! today will be the hottest day of the entire year & break another record.

[LaBella]

Ok, thank you all for your sympathy, It stopped raining Friday evening and it has not come back, Thank God, the roads are damage in some oareas but in general everything is back to normal. I called the insurance and they said that as long as the damage on the car was due to water and flood they will cover it under Comprehensive and they give us a rental. The mechanic called Saturday and said that the computer got damage due to water and he wanted us to call the insurance to get the approval right NOW, like we can control the inspetors from the insurance company with the snap of our fingers LOL. The inspector called me last night says he will go see the car today and hopefully will be fix by Wednesday. Let's just pray that no more rain comes tis way for a while. the ground is so soft that it has given out in some places and a lot of trees are on the verge of falling.

Hope everybody else is OK though

[lor]

Oh yeah dawn, your sore foot might be from your job, if you use your foot alot. I would mop the floor after work, yrs ago. I would squeeze out the mop firmlmly. After awhile my forearm started hurting. I went to the Dr & he told me I had a sort of tennis elbow (I forgot the exact name) and told me to stop using my arm for a year. I couldn't even straighten my arm & hold up a mug of coffee....was too week. Buttons is right.

[dawnmn]

Bella, I hated working with the insurance companies. Some of them make me feel guilty. Good luck and I hope everything with the car turns out ok.

I hope it's not from the work out equipment that I have at home. I really want to lose the weight.

[Buttons2]

Jeannie,thanks for the update on Jo,I was getting worried.

Bella,glad the rain has stopped & the car is getting fixed!

weather has changed here now & my body hurts all over,plus it's depressing to not have sunshine! I actually had 2 days being pain free so backs up my thinking how much the weather has to do with my pain.

Lor, hope you get a job!

there are 5 cocker spaniels @ the local shelter,too bad they are 11yr old or I'd be tempted!

[dawnmn]

Pati, poor cocker spaniels they will have a hard time placing those dogs. Wonder why someone would give them up after that long of having them.

Went to the doctor and I have deveopled flat feet and now he wants me to wear foot supports. That's not going to be hard to do.

Lor, have you ever tried Sangajob? It's a job site for hourly employment. I was surprised at the number of hourly jobs on there.

[lor]

Dawn, I used foot supports for several weeks once. I wasn't hard to do. You get used to them quickly. Yes, I've gone to Snagajob. Thankyou Dawn.

John & I were talking about the Trans Siberian Orchestra. We have seen them the past few years at Christmas time. He saw tickets are onsale for our city arena (I heard it on TV too). Earlier I was thinking maybe we should save the money & not go this year, but John wants to & now so do I. This morning they adverytised it in the newspaper that tickets go on sale at the arena on Sat. & because the tickets go very quick I got online & bought some on ticket master.

[zep4141]

Hey why don't everyone visit the hat room?

[zep4141]

lol the Chat room

[lor]

I go to the chat room all the time. Sometimes ppl are in it. I wish more would go...but it's new & some ppl are not interested yet & don't believe anyone else will be there.

[tic chick]

hey everyone !

cool and beautifully sunny day in detroit today.

i was outside from 2 until almost 8PM. i planted some perennials, my coneflowers and some coral bells that have whitish-tan flowers. this coral bell variety is called "blackout" cause it's leaves are almost black, with tinges of dark green and bronze along the edges. it's mostly grown for it's colorful leaves. i put it in front of the raspberry pink rose bush, which has tripled in size since i planred it and is really beautiful! i would like the coral bells that have the coral flowers cause i love that color. there is also this lime green leafed coral bell that has white flowers.

i planted the orange-red coneflowers in front of the rhododendrons. the flowers from the rhodo's will be gone before the coneflowers bloom, but they will have a green backdrop. i'm going to plant some purple alliums between the coneflowers. then i'm going to divide the purple irises up and kind of make them in a semi-circle connecting the coneflowers to the rose bush and then on the other side of the rose bush to the yews. i'll plant the neon yellow alliums in front of the irises, they bloom around the same time and i'm excited to see what that will look like.

i mix topsoil with a lot of peat moss to backfill the plants with, cause my soil is clay and with this years rain's, you can't even break it apart! i put a really interesting, textured light brown log on the ground behind the rhododendron's. it's from the big branch that fell off the tree in my front yard about a month ago. it has a nice shape and it's about 5-6 ft. long, so it's kind of nice looking behind there. i kept a few other logs, some with greenish scales to put elsewhere...prolly behind my hostas.

i am tired, but excited. all this stuff is on sale now and i got some good deals on black wrought iron fence borders, the kind you just stick in the ground. they have arches and curves and they're high enough to discourage nora from running on my plants. i have blocked off the whole area with wire so she knows she can't run there.

i don't know if i'm going to be able to plant my boxwood hedge this year. i don't know if the roots will have time to grow a bit more.

but, i think it's okay to do one part at a time. i'm just learning how these plants will grow in my yard.

thank you for sharing and caring,
jeannie

[lor]

That all sounds pretty jeanie. Thanks for the tips on planting in this clay soil (I'm not real far so we both have the same kind of soil). I'm thinking of planting some crocuses because they come up early & that makes you feel so much better to see flowers in the late winter with snow & grey skies still (anyone near the Great Lakes knows what I mean). I'm thinking of tulips around my magnolia tree also. It's a small tree & I put bricks arround it leaving room to plant. But I'm also thinking of some sort of thick ground cover flowers. I have a 5 inch 'doughnut' area around my tree (like an o area with the tree growing in the middle) my bricks are about 3 inches high. Do you have any sugestions on what kind of flower to plant?

Do you know what zone we live in? (I'm in Toledo)

[tic chick]

hey lor !

we are in zone 5.

tulips need bright sun to flower every year and you would have to dig them up and divide them every 4 years and i think the magnolia roots would get in the way of your planting the tulip bulbs because tulip bulbs have to be planted 6-8 inches deep. the crocuses would probably look better underneath the magnolia and they only have to be planted 2-3 inches deep, but i'm thinking they won't show much from far away if your bricks are blocking them 3 inches, causee thats usually about how high crocuses grow. they also have to be dug up and divided every 4 years or so. dwarf grape hyacinths are pretty also, they come up in the spring like crocuses.

ground cover is a good idea. pachysandra is nice as are lily of the valley. you cold also plant small hostas (leafy plants with different color variations of green, yellow, white or bluish). hostas need to be divided, put then you can plant them in any shady area.

you can type the name of the plant in google.com, then click images in the upper left hand corner and you'll see the different types of plants i've mentioned. you can also do a search under google.com, something like "what kind of perennials do best planted underneath a tree?"

hope that helps.

jeannie

[Buttons2]

Jeannie,your yard sounds real nice. we have sun today after a weekend of grey gloom.

[dawnmn]

Jeannie, you will have to take pictures of your yard for us next spring. I bet it looks beautiful.

I want to tear out our english garden and plant all tulips but the dh won't let me. I tend to need to have things organized and not clumbed together.

Weather has been cool but I love the fall weather. I want to see the leaves changing up north. We might go.