Oh my, Steve. I'm glad that your sis let you know they are bringing a list...to be forewarned is to be forearmed. I'm sitting here trying to imagine myself in your situation...being that your sis is in such a delicate place right now, I don't know what I'd do for sure. Probably bite my tongue a lot, excuse myself from the room a lot and go into my bedroom to punch a pillow and pray! I wouldn't tell them their faults, because they aren't the least interested in the first place and all it's going to do is hurt them and drive them further away. I'd swallow my pride/pain/anger and thank them for coming and working on our relationship. Honestly, I would do that. When they left, I would throw myself on my bed and cry for hours over all of it...but never let them know. I would do my best to be blameless while they were visiting so there was nothing they could hold against me..."be wise as serpents, but harmless as doves". Besides that, it will ruin their plan and they wouldn't know how to respond! "A gentle answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger." Anyway, that's what I would try to do, or at least what I imagine I would try to do.
I feel bad that you're in this situation. Please keep us posted.
Hugs,
Heather
Miracle Grow add - Chapter II: The Experiment
I agree with you Heather. Steve, Dont give them the satisfation of showing how much they upset you, especially the BIL! and your sister dont he need the additional turmoil either. Just be nice and pretend you understand. Nothing you can do say or say will change their feelings anyway, one of them will have to come to terms with themselves.
Been there...
Sylvia
I forgot to mention in my last post but thanks everyone for your kind words!
Heather, Sylvia: Thanks for responding! My Sis and BIL came on Saturday night and she really cut into us about how unsuppotive of her marriage we've been and how whenever we make a joke it's with a hurtful intention and basicly issues that we feel aren't the real issues. Most of the things they brought up aren't even true anyway. BIL didn't say much but, OH, does he play the sides well! We just did alot of listening and apologized alot. There was a number of times we could have shoved their own words down their throats, but we didn't.
And before they showed up my other sister called to inform us Sis and BIL were on their way over and that she had told them things I confided in her about the situation! Ouch, another stab in the back! I guess she was feeling guilty.
So now it looks like we can have a 'relationship' with my Sis and BIL again but it will just have to be very fake. Thats the way they want it. BIL says he "misses doing things with me" but just couldn't cause of the way Sis felt. He is SO full of crap.
We still believe the real issue is him and Sis is just in denial so she directs her anger at us. They are so insanly mismatched. She's very smart and he's just.......dumb. You should be able to talk about something other then comicbooks when you're 30+ years old! And when you get married your supposed to "leave your father and mother and become one flesh". Sis has for sure done that but he hasn't. His family's just so wonderful!!! If they make a joke or laugh at someone it's meant in a kind loving way, whereas, if we do it, it's meant in a nasty hurtfull way. Thats what Sis says anyway.
Steve
Glad to hear you made it through Steve. That had to be pretty rough. Sounds like you all handled it exceptionally well, God bless you. At least you have some relationship with your sis....so you can check on her well being. Even if you can't say anything you can still monitor things. If the day would ever come where she's in danger you can step in....and when the day DOES comes that things change -- however that may be -- you can be there to help her through the changes without having to re-establish a foundation. It may not seem like much, but it can be a lot. I know it's not all that you want, but it's a place to begin and grow from. Don't despise small beginnings! =^) Remember too that one day she'll realize what she actually did in this little meeting that she called last weekend...and she'll love and appreciate all of her family so much more because of how all of you handled it.
I'm not going to even touch the BIL thing right now. LOL. I've had too many of my own run ins recently! I did a boo-boo today....I'm still kicking myself. It still amazes me how we think we can know someone, and we find out we don't know them at all. I thought my SIL's tension and anger was aimed at me, that's how I read it for two weeks now. Today she broke down and cried and told me the whole story of what's been going on w/ her brother. Of course, it had nothing to do with me...she'd been tense and a bit angry at the world in general, I just picked up on it and thought she was miffed at me for something stupid. I wish she would have told me sooner, I really could have been helping out more...she didn't have to carry all this alone. Her brother is making trouble and she's worried about her parents, who are wonderful folks....they always invite us for holidays. So, with my recent score on the in-laws chart I won't be offering any advice!
Hang in there, you made it through the hard part for this week....and this can be a good start. I would be very careful of what I said to whom if confidences are being betrayed....but at least she was big enough to tell you before they showed up and hammered you with the info, most folks wouldn't do that.
Steve I can just imagine how hard it is to keep quiet. My Brother passed in March three days before I left for Italy. After my SIL called me to tell me Mikes cancer had returned with two weeks to two years to live I immediately flew from Texas to Florida to assess the situation. I stayed with them for four days. My SIL is a very sweet person, but a ding bat ... I learned. she was trying to tell me it was not as bad as the doctors put it. My brother was his jovial self, but I know something was wrong with my brother, he was so confused at times. I was telling my girl friend about all this and what I thought needed to be done. She told me I needed to stay out of it because my brother had a wife now( married five years) and it was her call. Well he was going thru the VA and had no second opinion. I work for a group of Doctors so naturally they were giving me input. I suggested to my SIL to take Mike to another Hospital and see if there was another TX. I even called the cancer center in Tampa to see how to handle it. I told her what I had learned and what to do, she said she would take care of it the next morning. She procrastenated and was telling me he didnt have Medicare... and he would be sixty two in June, so he would be elgible for Medicare ... and she would take him then. I told her as calmly as I could that mike did not have that much time. At this time Mike started forgetting things, at one point he didnt know who she was. ... then she was going to let Hospice handle it ... then my cousins started telling me she was his wife and to let her handle it. All my life, it was just the two of us ... and Mike was my baby brother ... and Connie was just married to him for the last five years of his life. I guess what I am trying to say Steve is that it just hurt so bad to relinquish control of a sibling's well being. ...but we have to let go and pray to God for the best.
Sylvia
Heather, Thanks once again for your kind reply! My and my sister have patched things up and are getting along just fine. As for Sis and BIL, thats about the same, haven't really talked to either of them much(avoiding BIL as much as possible) but Sis seems to be doing a bit better I heard she's started taking meds so maybe things will start to get better. I'm trying not to be to hopeful though. I'm glad for you though that things worked out with your SIL.
Sylvia, Thanks also for your kind words. I'm so sorry to hear about your brother, after going through what I'm going through, I can understand how difficult that must have been for you.
Take Care,
Steve
I'm posting to issue an apology to everyone who has been watching this thread waiting for results of the MG test. I'm so very sorry, but I've let all of you down. I was unable to care for my Impatien plants well enough to get good results from this test. However, I do have short term results, but no pics. I will also be doing this test again next year. I don't want to appear to be making excuses but this year I have had a lot of troubles with my back and there have been other personal matters going on. Whatever the reason, I'm sorry to disappoint everyone and I feel horrible about it.
The best results that I saw were with my base mix with the bunny poo added. The Impatiens were larger and a darker green color. At first they didn't have as many blooms as the other plants, but they caught up in that area very quickly.
The SuperThrive did seem to make a difference. As much as I hate to admit that, it did seem to make a difference!! LOL. Again, I noticed the best growth with my base mix with the bunny poo added and then the ST on top of that. There wasn't much difference, it was a slightly larger plant, but the same results as without the ST otherwise. If the test had gone long term who knows what would have happened. Sorry. All the other plants with ST showed no difference, so it could be argued that it was just the bunny poo...but I won't go there. I was really against the ST at the beginning of this test, so I'll just let it go. =^)
The MG really didn't do well at all. I was very surprised. It could have been the conditions for the plants, although all the plants had the exact same conditions. Go figure. It was a spindly plant and not as dark green as the bunny poo. It wasn't sickly looking, it just didn't grow as fast and it's coloring wasn't as dark.
All the plants with the cheap potting soil did horrible, with the exception of the one with bunny poo. All of them, except bunny poo, looked stunted and light green. The bunny poo was a much bigger plant than the other PS ones and had a deeper green color, it looked like a normal Impatien and filled the pot in normal time. The biggest problem with the PS was bad drainage, even though they were the only pots I added stones to the bottom of for better drainage.
My base mix did better than I thought it would. At first I was afraid it was draining too fast and wouldn't hold enough moisture for the plants, but it seemed to do just right. These are the plants that did the best, some better than others depending on what was used to fertilize them. As I said, bunny poo did the best. Very unfortunately the Alfalfa Tea never made it into the test. Sorry again.
In my opinion, and I'm doing my best to be unbiased, the bunny poo did the best. Of course I'm glad to see that an organic did the best. However, this is all short term info. I don't know how things would have done long term. Also, the bunny poo was very easy to use, just mix in the soil and I was done for quite a while. Other ferts needed to be reapplied every ten days (SuperBloom). That's a lot of messing around sometimes. I'm still not crazy about SuperThrive, and I still don't understand their labeling, lol.
I'd also like for everyone to know that I did take this experiment very seriously, and I'm as disappointed as anyone else. For the test next year I'm going to do more and better planning. I'm also not going to use Impatiens. I think they are a great plant to use because they show almost immediate results of the ferts, but they are just not a good plant for me because they are too prissy. lol. They don't want too much sun or shade, not too much water but they sure can't dry out, and they certainly don't like heat. I just need an easier plant! Maybe Petunias, we'll see. Any suggestions are more than welcome.
Sorry again,
Heather
Heather, don't apologize! I think it's great that you cared enough about this to keep trying even with back problems and other stuff going on in your life, I know I personally would have probably let the whole thing drop in a similar situation! So please don't feel bad that you didn't get all the results you'd hoped! The results you do have are very interesting and I think it's great that you made the effort!
Thanks so much. I do think next year's test will go better. I've already bought a drip irrigation system and that should help a lot.
HOORAY FOR BUNNY POO! ROTFLOLPMP!
Heatherjoy: I'm sorry for diverting off-topic, but what kind of irrigation system did you buy, and do you like it? I'm working on putting together a DripWorks system. . . .
GG, you always crack me up. What would we do w/out those bunnies? LOL
Happy, every thread I'm on seems to somehow go wildly OT, so no worries! We haven't installed the irrigation system yet, we are waiting for spring...one less thing to do before winter hits and I've got a lot to catch up on. We got ours off of eBay and the name is "Pit Bull". We were more concerned about price, since they all looked about the same quality. I'm sorry I can't help you more...but...
I bet if you ask over on the Garden Products forum http://davesgarden.com/forums/f/products/all/
someone there may be able to help you out more. It's sure worth a shot!
Heather, I just saw the results of your test. Thanks for doing it. I'm glad the bunny poo came out on top, because I have a bunny and she poos alot! My impatiens are going to be great this year!
TTYL,
Steve
Hey Steve,
How you doing? Thinking about any experiments this year? I'd like to but we'll see how it goes. I've had two surgeries since Oct, so hopefully that means I'll be feeling better soon. If I do get to revisit this experiement I haven't decided what type of flower to use, Impatiens were too finicky here. Any suggestions?
Good to hear from you,
Happy New Year,
Heather
Hi, Heather! I'm alright. For plant suggestions....what about petunias? Or annual geraniums? I hope you feel better soon :)
Steve
Thanks so much Steve. I'm on the mend, that's for sure. DH is off this week and he's helping me clean out my plant room. It was taken over by 4 ferel kittens last fall. Totally trashed, and it's sat that way because of all of the surgeries. I'll be starting seeds soon, hopefully. I've got some Wave and Tidal Wave Petunias to start from seed. I also like the idea of Geraniums.
Hmmm, decisions, decisions!
Oooh, your lucky, you have a plant room.......Mine are all crammed under various windows around the house :) Have you ever grown geraniums from seed? Their really easy, so if you haven't don't be intimidated by any technical instructions just grow them like you would anything else. I soaked mine for a few days between damp paper towels and got excellent results.
Steve
I've done both geraniums and petunias from seed, so that doesn't affect the decision at all. Geraniums are cheaper from seed! LOL! I do have more experience w/ Petunias though. I think pots of Geraniums would look nicer along the front walk though....less messy and sprawling, less reseeding into my beds when they get out of hand, because they will get out of hand...let's just face the facts here!
I may just go w/ the Geraniums. I'll have to do some more thinking about this, but so far they sound better. Any thoughts?
I think the geraniums are the best choice too. And like you said their SO much cheaper!
I'm going to try growing the ivy type this year and also the Orbit series. Any tips?
Geranium tips? Hmm, not yet! When I finally do research them if I find any good info I'll let you know. I really like the Ivy ones too. I had a red one I rescued from Lowe's at the end of the season one year...got it looking really nice...overwintered it...took it out in the spring and killed it, LOL!! My DH thought that was funny...as soon as I got it back outside it died, like it was allergic to sunlight, lol!
The other nice thing about Geraniums is that they can so easily lend a bit of a formal look to any garden. I think it'll be Geraniums this year. I'll have to pick up some seeds. When I get around to looking up any special care they take I'll send along any good links I happen to find.
Thanks for helping me decide! =^)
No problem. I'm going to be starting my geraniums outside, wintersowing or something like that, as I have nowhere inside to start seeds. I'm just kind of nervous because I've got 2 kinds and theres only 10 seeds per package so I want to try to avoid casualties. I remember seeing someone wintersowed them last year.
Steve