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Inside this issue you'll find:
It's every garden buff's nightmare: you're cleaning the garage or porch and stumble upon a brown mystery bag. Inside, you find the mother lode of plantings: A sampling of nature's most gorgeous spring gifts: narcissus, tulip, daffodil, crocus, hydrangea and iris bulbs nestle inside. Ah, ha! So here are the bulbs you purchased last fall and couldn't find - even after searching high and low.
What to do? Outside, the ground is harder than ice cubes, but you haven't the heart to throw this bag of magic and color into the trash. Follow horticulturist Christian Harper's advice and "force" them by potting your bulbs inside.
Before you invest in containers and potting soil, understand that there's a good way to force bulbs and a bad way. We've got the formula for the former, so if you follow these tips, your likelihood of having an indoor garden that can be relocated in the spring is practically guaranteed.
First, closely examine the bulbs in your bag. If they seem too dried out, understand that there's a chance they may be too far-gone to salvage. Of particular concern are tulip bulbs. Of all the spring varieties, tulips are most likely to degrade fast so keep your hopes to a minimum if you decide to play Emergency Room Gardener to those that look particularly desiccated.
Despite the fact that those tulips may not offer your biggest ray of hope, you'd be hard pressed to find gutsier "survivors" than daffodil and hyacinth bulbs. Given their cellular structure, they seem to "keep" longer - perhaps because these bulbs are small to begin with, and smaller plants are often thought to survive hibernation better than larger ones.
When you've assembled your little plant hospital, forget some of the rules you normally follow when burying bulbs. Use any kind of container you like (as long as it has drainage holes) and forget what you've been taught about spacing and depth. Put these bulbs into the soil, as close to each other as you like - just be sure the soil covers them well.
Give the pot a good watering, then tag the container(s) with the planting date and plant types. Place container(s) in an environment that ranges in temperature from 32 to 45 degrees F for three months. Porches, sheds and such are ideal - as is your refrigerator - but if you store fruit in the 'fridge, you could be looking for trouble: Ripening fruit gives off gases that may destroy a plant's ability to flower.
If the refrigerator is out-of-bounds and you have no porch, you can still insulate your spring bulbs from a solid freeze by boxing them up with a thick insulation of StyrofoamT peanuts, then shelter them from the harsh cold. Mark your calendar at 14 weeks past your planting date. On that day, unpack and move plants to a location that's cool but bright (45-60 degrees is ideal), and you should witness a "normal bloom."
When the flowers are ready to "pop," you can bring them into your home to enjoy the final fruit of your labors. Left in a cooler location, they will last longer and be less floppy than those brought inside, but they're your flowers, so please yourself.
Don't forget to enjoy all of your hard work - and while you're at it, make a note on your calendar to move the bulbs from their containers to your garden in the fall so you don't have to go through the process all over again!
Speaking of nightmares, a study of homemakers expressing their worst fears produced results that might shock you. The list didn't include spiders, earthquakes and mice. Rather, "company's on the way" topped their worst fears list. If you sympathize, let us help you deal with it. When the news arrives consider your options: leave home or pick up. Since the first is rarely an option, we recommend sucking it up and whipping things into shape using the following speedy (creative) tips:
The Internet is the most influential medium in the world today so it's up to adults to make sure their child's Internet experiences are age-appropriate, safe and fun. One of the most delightful ways to educate a child is to expose them to other cultures. While abstract classroom theory is mind-expanding, it could never take the place of exploring a culture in person. For most of us, a month in Italy, Malaysia or Brazil is the stuff of which dreams are made, but you don't have to let money, time or distance rob your child of a healthy dose of cultural awareness. Pen Pals from around the world are looking for U.S. friends - and the cost to launch a long-distance relationship doesn't cost a cent. KidLink, an organization formed to promote international understanding between children across the globe, researched pen pal sites and found the following to be safe and popular with kids, parents and teachers. Since 1990, the net has linked 70,000 kids from 94 nations, so if you want to expand your child's universe and help them understand the wonder of diversity, check these out.
Kids Space ConnectioKConnection: This site offers children a place to post their creative projects and links them up with others via cool cyberspace clubs. www.ks-connection.org/
SAPE (Soviet American Penfriend Exchange) matches kids 10 and older with counterparts in Russia and the Baltics with similar interests. www.michander.com/sape
Girl's World Pen Pal Spectacular: Matches up girls ages 7 and 17 with the same hobbies. http://members.agirlsworld.com Student Letter Exchange: This site has been going strong for so long, over half a million kids are on its roster. This is perhaps the oldest of the pen pal services. www.pen-pal.com
Dave's E-Mail Connection: Are you in favor of kids learning languages early? Check out this site, established for kids over-seas who are learning English and want to write to English speakers their own age.
Kidworld: devotes itself to sharing artwork, writing and other creative endeavors between kids under the age of 16 across the globe.
International Kids' Space: This site has a unique home page that sorts kids seeking American pen pals by age, so children can meet and correspond with someone born right about the same time they were. www.kids-space.org.
ePals Classroom Exchange: www.epals.com. The world's largest and fastest growing online classroom community, this teacher-approved site has already matched up kids in 24,000 class-rooms located in 120+ countries. This site is so sophisticated, instant language translation is available, so if you've discussed the mysteries of Tibet with your child, don't let the fact that you don't speak Tibetan get in the way of further exploration!
On the front page of this newsletter, we explored how to whip your home into shape when company is five minutes away from your doorstep. This article takes you a step beyond - offering hope that you can organize your house so profession-ally, once and for all, that you never again have to become a whirling dervish at the prospect of surprise drop-in company. No need to get compulsive and adopt every principle, but the more you put into action, the more time you'll free up for the stuff you love to do more than you like to clean.
Your daughter is begging for a room makeover but the thought of extending your tight budget makes you cringe. Time to get into a Better Homes and Gardens state of mind and tackle an easy project guaranteed to spruce up any bedroom: a picket fence headboard.
Here's the beauty of this project: you likely have everything you need for the project in the tool box, so with the exception of picking up 11, 3.5"- wide untreated pickets at the lumber store, you're good to go.
Start by sanding and priming the pickets and letting them dry before sawing off the bottoms of 9 pickets into these graduated lengths: 50" (one), 46" (two), 42" (two), 38" (two) and 34" (two).
Measure the two remaining pickets from the bottom up, then cut each down to 41" - 42" to create cross boards for the headboard. Reserve leftover picket tops for another project.
Arrange all of the pickets on the floor, ¾ of an inch apart (the 50" post in the middle), with lower edges aligned. The complete headboard should resemble the roof of a house.
Position a cross board one inch (or 5-1/2" if bolting to a bed frame) from the bottom edge and another cross board 27" from the bottom edge. Secure both cross boards with two screws to each picket.
Paint the entire headboard with two coats of paint, sanding in-between. For a more distressed/weathered look, sand after the final coat, then bolt to the wall or bed frame.
Using this headboard as the room's redesign focus, you can follow-up with all sorts of garden-related touches that won't cost a fortune. Silk garland window swags, silkivy wound around the headboard, a floral bedspread and baskets of flowers transform a room into a comfy permanent garden - no matter how cold it may be outside!
Soft cheese mixture:
8 to 12 oz. of provolone cheese, thinly sliced
2 - 8oz. packages of cream cheese at room temperature
1/2 cup butter (one stick) at room temperature
Layering ingredients:
2 tsp. minced garlic
1/2 to 1 cup pesto, drained of excess oil
1/2 cup oil-packed, sun-dried tomatoes, well drained and chopped
1/4 cup pine nuts