"jumping to the front of the line and elbowing Dan out of the way"...sign me up as a "newbie helper"!

Diene, I will be happy to send to a newbie. My plants are starting to show "end of season sadness" at this point so shipping by the end of September would be a very good thing for me. :O)

Hugs!
Tracy

***stepping out of Linda's way*** I think I'm going to watch this one from the sidelines. It would be my third swap this month if I signed up, and last time I did that I ended up scratching my watch and winding my butt. Funny, but not a pretty picture! Consider me as the requisite lurker, okay?
Have fun y'all!

Is this seeds or plants? I would be very happy to do seeds, but seems like you want plants if the postage is $13.

Seeds would be easy and that appears to be the old newbie adoption thread people were posting to.
Could you clarify?
Thanks, Alana

I was thinking plants this time of year and maybe doing seeds in February but at this point we do not seem to have any newbies so we may not be sending anything. If you are offering seeds, that is what a newbie would receive and it would be less expensive. I was planning on plants for myself as when I was a newbie (and still today) I am seed challenged.

I can do either one. I just wanted to be clear on what was going on. I've seen that adopt a newbie seed thread pushed up to the top a few times and thought that was what sparked this.
Alana

Oh Wow!
I wasmt dreaming this!. I have been here not 2 months and it is fun!
I need to take the time to figure out what I want. :-/
I am in need of veggies
and z7 flower gardens
can I play?

Maryann

Im so in!

Kamil

Hello MaryAnn;
I believe you are officially our first newbie and yes you can join. I do want you to understand that your sponsor will send you what they have to offer. This is not Santa Claus it is some very generous gardeners who were once newbies wanting to give back. I understand part of being a newbie is not understand everything that goes on here. Well be comforted in knowing that I still do not understand everything that goes on here and I have been on GW a long time.
Usually we ask our newbies to introduce themselves and a bit about them. Do not give out any info that would compromise yourself but generalities. You can tell us what you are hoping to accomplish with gardening or life or whatever and we will listen and throw our two cents in. That is what we do best around here.
After you do that, someone may let me know they are interested in sponsoring you, it may be because they have what you want or maybe you have common ideas or life circumstances and they want to get to know you better. I will try to honor all those requests but at the end of the swap I need to have everyone paired with everyone else.
So far I have Linda, Tracy, Alana & Kamil offering to sponsor and as I said you are our first newbie. I think that will change soon and I may at some point have to close this. I am thinking that a newbie should be someone here less than six months but if you have been lurking for a while, you may qualify.
Thanks for the support from the regulars, can't do it alone.
diene

I can adopt a newbie who wants veggie seeds...I don't do many flowers yet. I tend to disappear for weeks from GW but I still want to send so if you notice I do not respond after getting a newbie, could someone shoot me an email so I know who to send to. Kim

Add me to the list of people who are willing to adopt a newbie. I am still collecting tons of seeds.

Paula

Hi everyone! I would love to be apart of this:) I joined GW a month ago, and this site is so great. To introduce myself a bit..I live in Zone 5, Chicago suburbs, I work full time in the dental field and I am also a part-time student. I have always been interested in gardening, and finally had the space this year to grow some veggies and flowers. I really enjoyed my garden this summer, and I'm already excited about next year. There's so much I would like to learn, and I can't wait to try growing some new things!

Stephanie

Hi Maryanne and Stephanie! Welcome to the wonderful world of gardening! I'm curious to see if there are any particular plants that you have fallen in love with yet? I have a penchant for collecting many varieties of several different plants such as clematis, hosta, heuchera and echinacea. Any special loves yet?

I was never one to do well with seeds until I discovered Winter Sowing. I had nearly 90% success with germination when I finally tried that method versus my 100% failure rate with indoor sowing in early spring. I didn't make the time to do it last year but I will be winter sowing again this year. It was very exciting for me to watch my little seedlings turn into healthy plants for the first time. :O)

I'll be happy to send seeds or live plants.

All My Best!
Tracy

Well we only have two newbies so far, I will end this on Sunday and let people know if I need their help. Thanks to all the veterans who have offered to help. Have a great weekend everyone.

I would also be willing to adopt a newbie who is interested in veggie seeds and maybe a small amount of flower seeds. Don't have many plants to send at this time, but seeds would be simple for me to send. If you need an almost year veteran I'd be happy to help out :)

Where are all the newbies??? Maybe a post on the seed exchange thread? Just a thought.

Toni

Hello, I am new to seed swapping but not to gardening. I have been gardening since age eight and I turn 22 tomorrow!
I also love to paint and draw. I am trying to collect many pretty flowers which I will grow and paint from. I also grow as many veggies and herbs as I can pack into my garden. I love them all! I am a city girl but can't wait until I can live in the country-would love my own farm someday! Thank you to all you generous people who help out newbies like me!

Rebekah

I started my first beg. this summer. started waaaay too late. I had a lesson in humility and ate some fantastic veggies also. But winterSowing is the way I am going to try this year .I am turning 51 next month, I have 1 son and 2 fabulous grandkids. ... and I live in a barn (converted ) my dog keeps deer away and learned his lesson on skunks ... twice. I am so glad to have found all you nice ppl.
I want to make this place a real home, thus the gardening. Brings out my mothering insticts. (I know I spelled that wrong)
~peace~
MaryAnn
did I say I love to play in the dirt?

I'm a newbie--I would love seeds---flowers only I do not grow many veg. the cost is fine

Sue

Tracy- out of the few flowers I grew, I think my favorites were the sunflowers. They just make you smile every time you see them! As for winter sowing, I have been saving containers and I will be giving it a try!! :)

Stephanie

I would love to be adopted if someone will have me! I'm a special education teacher in Zone 4/5 and I bought a house last summer and have been trying to pretty up my back yard with flowers and edibles. I have a great husband who packs my lunches :) and an awesome cat who is super unhappy to be on a diet.
Jess :)

I would LOVE to be adopted! I would take plants or seeds. The cost seems more than reasonable to me. I am a mother of three teenage boys in southeast Georgia (obviously!). I have been married to my high school sweetheart for nearly eighteen years. He likes to work in the yard, but his idea of yardwork is mowing anything that he can to the ground, so all of my plants have been carefully marked to avoid a brush with the mower or weedeater. :O I teach high school English. I am relatively new to gardening. Both of my grandfathers could grow anything, but I had not really had much luck until this past spring.

I am a HUGE University of Georgia fan, and my secret pal from work gave me this incredibly cool concrete "Hairy Dawg" statue. It inspired me to try some flowers with him. I cut my teeth on red salvia and white petunias. They looked so pretty and did so well that I was hooked. I am really in to irises right now, but I am up for anything red, black or white (planted some red anemonies, White Queen cleomes, and giant black Danish hollyhocks in an adjacent bed). I also have a small herb garden, so edibles would be neat too.

Thanks so much for starting this and offering this opportunity to us "newbs."

I would like to be adopted. I have been on GW sense june mostly lurking. I am a stay at home mom in the pacific northwest.

I just stared gardening this year. After my husband lost his job I decided to put in a veggie garden to help with the food bill. thankfully he was able to find work again, partime but it is work and I was able to discover a fantastic new hobby. I was so thrilled the the success of growing a veggie garden from seed (sidenote :now I had to learn how can tomatoes, can you say tons of jars of salsa... yummy)

I decided that I needed to grow flowers as well. so after some research I discoved wintersowing which I am going to try this year. I hope it works because I don't have room in the house to start seeds inside.

I have been stealing seeds from my parents house, the park and have some trades.

After looking at the wonderful pictures on the winter sowing forum I have discided to turn my dead brown front yard into a cottage garden .. I just hope i can keep people out of it. If I am able to do it I just might with the nicest house on the block which is not saying much though because we live in a pretty run down area. Maybe I will inspire other people to fix up there yards too.

mostly I like cottage style gardens. I have part shade, full shade and full sun.

I hope that next year I will be able to help a newbie tranform their garden . you know pay it forward.

well now that I wrote a "book" sorry about that.
Thank you very much I would love to participate.

Well this is great news! I haven't checked in here for a few days and I am so excited to see that we have more newbies joining us!

Stephanie, I love looking at sunflowers too. I get that same grin on my face whenever I pass my neighbor's mailbox. I've never grown them but hers have convinced me that they are a must have for next year's gardens!

Happy Birthday and Welcome Rebekah! I am very pleased to meet you! We were city living until 5 years ago. We had only a 50 by 150 foot lot and I packed it with blooms. Finally we moved to a one acre property and I have been loving it ever since. I used to draw and paint when I was younger but haven't dabbled in it since the kids came along. I hope to get back to it someday. Gardening had been my artistic release for quite some time now.

MaryAnn, how neat that you live in a converted barn. I love watching those HGTV shows featuring homes in rustic old barns. How wonderful! We've been battling skunks here for the last two years. It hasn't been fun with some of the spraying incidents so close to the house. Blech! Your poor pooch. I can only imagine the ordeal in de-stinkifying him. LOL!

Sue, welcome to you too! I am a flower grower too and have only dabbled with vegies in the past. I wanted to do a vegie garden this past year but it didn't quite happen for us. Hopefully next year.

Jess, we're happy to adopt you out! LOL! That is wonderful that you are a special ed teacher. I have a friend whose son has benifitted greatly from his spec ed teacher. She has helped him and his family through some very tough situatations. What a nice hubby you have. I think I'm jealous. :O)

Miss Georgia Teach, welcome to you as well. I love what you did with your hairy dog. What a great idea! We're big football fans here. Unfortunately our pro teams let us down on a regular basis but we have an awesome high school team that keeps us going. Friday nights are a big deal around here.

Hi Ivy! I think you will love winter sowing. It completely shocked me at how well I did with it when I finally tried it. I mentioned earlier that I couldn't grow a darn thing from seed before I did the WS. Those folks on the WS forum were so helpful with answering questions and posting such great start up information that I couldn't go wrong. I have some wonderful large perennials now that came from that first batch. I'll definitely be doing it again this year.

Congratulations to you and your hubby on him finding the new job. I'm a stay at home mom as well, I have 4 little ones at home. Three boys and 1 girl. They are full of energy and make me laugh a lot.

It is nice meeting all of you. If I missed saying hi to anyone please forgive me. It is getting late and time for me to hit the hay. Goodnight everyone!

Tracy

Doh! I guess I told you everything but my name and blood type. It's Christan (pronouncd like Kristen) and A+. ;p Thanks for your kind welcome, Tracy. When I can figure out the picture posting, I will post pics of Hairy in his garden last spring.

Christan, thank you for my A+! That happens to coincide with my blood type (chuckle). I can't wait to meet Hairy. I can help with picture posting. If you're using photobucket, you copy the "html" link and paste it here in the text box. When you preview the message you should see the image. If you're happy with the size then go ahead and post it. If not then go back to photobucket, click on edit image, resize it to whichever size suits you and then save changes. Come back here and preview your image again, it should be resized. Then go ahead and submit.

Thanks, Tracy! I will move Hairy to Photobucket. He's currently on my Facebook page. Is it ok to post him here, or should I put it in "Annuals"?

Hello;

I have been lurking this yr on GW and was generously given some vinca by 'Ishareflowers' this summer. As a new gardener, she suggested I join in the Round Robin forum so several months later here I am! Not having very good luck with growing seeds indoors this winter and slugs that ate everything in the yard, looking into winter sowing instead to get a fresh start. So any adopting, mentoring, nagging and general advice would be greatly appreciated!

JD.

Hi Tracy,
Thanks for the welcome :) I love being a special ed teacher, its the perfect job for me. I always have an interesting day! My hubby is pretty wonderful. I don't think he gets into the yard and gardening thing like I do, but he pretty much lets me do whatever I want with our backyard though, so thats nice.
Ditto on what some of the other newbies said, I'm trying winter sowing this year for the first time also this year. I'm looking forward to it and wouldn't mind some mentoring too! Have a great day!
Jess

Christan, you are very welcome and please do post it here. We share pics with our friends here in the Round Robin threads on a regular basis. It is great because it enables more and more and more plant addictions. :O)

Hi JD! Welcome to the Round Robin side of GW! Ishareflowers/Lisa is a great gal and a good pal of mine. I think you will enjoy it here. We get pretty silly on a regular basis. Lisa and I are doing a RR in the Petal Pushers thread right now. We're just about ready to start sending boxes out for Halloween over there.

Jess, your hubby sounds like a great guy and I can only imagine some of the interesting times you have at work. Some of the stories that my friend tells me make me crack up. He's getting much more communicative these days and his imagination knows no bounds. It leads to some very interesting adventures for all of us. :O)

Many of the folks that are adopting you newbies have a lot of varied experiences and expertise. Feel free to ask any questions that you may have about gardening, hardiness, conditions, methods and anything else that comes to mind. I won't promise to have the answers but I am sure there will be someone that can help with some sage advice.

One thing I wanted to mention is that our hostess, Diene, will be busy for the next few days. I know she will be pleased to see all of our newbies and adoptees that have joined in!

Here are a few of my winter sown hardy geraniums from winter 2008.

Tracy

Ask and ye shall receive!

Hairy is still there, but I have raised the bed and surrounding him with red, black and white irises. I can't wait for spring to see if they all bloom. Love your geraniums, by the way. One question about winter sowing, would it be effective in a climate like mine? It is 90 degrees right now, and we probably won't have even a freeze until December, at best. Even then, it will probably be right at 32 degrees. Heck, it was 80+ degrees for Christmas last year.

Hairy Dawg looks great in his bed! I love all the red and white surrounding him. I think the iris will be awesome in the spring.

Yes, you can winter sow in the southern climates. You just need to pay attention to whether the seeds you are doing need cold striation in order to germinate. For instance, echinacea definitely need intermittent freeze and thaw periods. You would want to take your container with those seeds and pop them in and out of the freezer for 10 days or so several times till spring and then leave them out in the yard come March.

I don't usually put my containers outside until January. Many of the folks on the WS forum start their's in November and December. I'm way too busy through the holiday season to work on it that soon.

Thanks for the compliments on my geranium. I have many of them in my rock garden and over in my sun perennial bed.

Hello All;
I am thrilled to see all of you, thanks for covering for me tracy. I am back but very tired, I plan on figuring out what is going on tomorrow but wanted to thank all the veterans and welcome all the newbies.
Have a great night all.
diene

If you need another sponsor, I could send seeds and maybe some plants or cuttings.

I lost count trying to determine if you had enough sponsors.

And, just for Georgia Teacher, "Geaux Tigers!"

APL, we'll see next weekend...;) My Dawgs have been killing me with these last minute wins, but I think we can send those Bayou Bengals back with their tails dragging. LOL Playing in such a tough conference week after week has got to be tough on all those boys.

Thanks to all for the wonderful welcomes.

Hey Miss Diene, glad to see you're back! You know me, always happy to gab. :O) Can't wait to see what you have planned for us.

Hi Amelia! Between you and Christan I may have to start watching your Georgia Dawgs next weekend. I love watching those guys tear it up on the field.

Christan, I need to know where you found your Hairy. Our high school team are the Bulldogs and your pooch looks mighty fierce. I would need to give him a paint job though, our colors are blue and gold.

Have a good night all!

Tracy

LOL, Tracy, he was a gift from my secret pal at work last year. When I get back to work tomorrow, I will ask where she got him. I hope you can find him locally though, he weighs a TON, so I would imagine shipping would be a bear. UGA vs. LSU promises to be a great game and well worth the time, as long as Georgia wins, of course.

PS Sorry for hijacking the thread. :O

Tracy, I'm an LSU fan. For a couple of hours next Saturday, Christan and I will be mortal enemies. After that, I'll support the Bulldogs in most games since they're an SEC team. (Just 2 exceptions when they are playing other SEC teams.)

Christan - Looks like we have lots to discuss other than gardening! BTW, I was having the same problem deciding when to start wintersowing. We have those hot December days also. (I've gone swimming on Christmas Day.) A friend of mine told me to start the 2nd week of January. That should normally give about 6 weeks of cold (or at least cooler) weather.

Amelia, is there anything better than SEC football? Every game is a rivalry. I will cheer for any SEC team vs non-SEC, but otherwise, the Gators are public enemy #1. I can tell you it hurt me physically to root for them in the last two national titles, but I did it for the SEC. It's a shame that a kid got hurt, and I hope that Tebow has a full recovery, in January.

I am not a Vols fan, but I had a friend who was a huge, life-long fan. Literally. Her parents were season ticket holders when she was a kid. She passed away August 16 from lung cancer, so she did not get to see things under Kiffin. Until they plays my Dawgs, I am cheering for them in her memory. All bets are off on October 10 though.

Thanks for the tip on winter sowing, I will keep that in mind. I guess the first trick is to decide what I want to plant. I am going to have to decide on some shade-loving plants because most of the full-sun areas are in iris use.

Ahh, you guys are die-hard. I love it. :O) Can't wait to see the pre-game banter between you two this week.

Christan, thanks for checking into the statue. If I can find it then I will be getting it (if shipping isn't too astronomical). LOL. I bet that big boy is heavy.

One thing I wanted to mention with getting ready for winter sowing is the organization of it all. I found it really helpful to start an excel spreadsheet with the seed name, when planted, when it germinated, when planted out, oh and I always assign a container number to it when I first sow the seeds in the containers too.

I then numbered the containers with paint pen (not a sharpee) to match the spreadsheet number for each seed type as well as tucked plant name tags in there with the seeds. It was a double safety for me when and if the labels washed off or got knocked over and out of the pots. (that happened to me when I tripped over the trays I had the containers in, btw. LOL)

I did better with 2 liter containers than I did with milk jugs. Turns out that the soil was deeper in the 2 liters and the plants may have liked that better. That was just my humble observation.

No worries on going off topic around here. We all enjoy good conversations and it usually leads to great friendships. :O)

Tracy

my first time wsing was last year and I loved it! I liked the two liter bottles better too. Already stacking them up!

SEC football is life, Tracy. :P I wonder if there's a place to start a football trash talk thread?

Gardening goes high tech. I love it ! Now, I just have to decide what to plant. This is very exciting.

We agree!!! Florida is public enemy #1. But, it wasn't the last 2 national championship games. LSU won the national championship 2 years ago -- January 2008. (Not to mention January 2004) I also had problems cheering for Florida in the championship games. It just HURTS to cheer for Florida.

I'm also a Vols fan when they aren't playing LSU. That's one of the 2 SEC teams I favor over the Bulldogs. The other is Vanderbilt. I know; that's a strange team to choose. My cousin's son played at Vandy. Plus, they always seem to be the underdogs.

BTW, I have the same seats in Tiger Stadium that I had when I was in kindergarten. That's over 45 years in the same seats. I converted my H, an Ohio native, to a die-hard, bleeds purple & gold LSU fan. He didn't even have any mixed feelings when LSU played Ohio State for the championship. In fact, he kept calling BIL to rag on him during the game.

Another college football junkie here! I am a Notre Dame lover..........For years, my husband and I have bet "each other"....we check the lines every Wednesday and then bet every TV game. I am very pro the Southern teams. It is always good football! Yesterday, I had Georgia -12 1/2 vs Arizona ST...loser... and had LSU -12 vs Mississippi ST...loser. My Notre Dame won but I lost my bet. Tiz fun even when you lose. Not a good day for me...out of 25 TV games, I only won 10....pay up time!

I would love to adopt a newbie. I did not do a count of vets and newbies, so do not know if you need another sponsor. Let me know! Seeds only...don't think I will have plants to send!

Happy Sunday and welcome to all the newbies!

Annie

I meant the last two championships that UF won. UF won 2007, LSU 2008, and the UF again 2009. Vandy helps keep the overall GPA of the SEC up. Normally, I wouldn't root so readily for the Vols, but Terri was a tremendous person, so I am doing it for her. That is really impressive about the seats. Holy cow! I would love to have UGA season tickets, but I need my kidneys to live. The last time I heard, seats just for Georgia/Florida were at about $1500. Crazy!

Good Afternoon Everyone;
I have just gone through the post and I believe I have eight newbies:
maps31- Maryann
smpetrou- Stephanie
columbine21- Rebekah
carrlinesue- Sue
jessied - Jess
georgia_teacher
ivyp
jaydeeinma

For veterans I have
tracyvine
lindarudzkia
poisondartfrog
kamil
amelia_pepper_lady
diene

seed sending veterans
plant one on me- Kim
suecirish
paulan70
dirtdiggin

I am officially closing this post and would ask everyone to send me their addresses. Veterans that will help me figure out geographic regions.
We may not do a priority situation as my plants are barerooted and can handle a longer travel time. Plus at least one newbie is in Massachusetts which is not far for me. If I can pair us up so we can cheap on the postage, it will work well for all.
I will start a new thread when I have everyone's addy so I can pair people up.
You can continue your college football banter all you want ladies, we do not have the teams or the interest in my part of the world.
This is going to be fun.
Welcome to all the newbies and if you could give us your first names it makes it easier to communicate.
diene

Hello All;
If you have not sent me your address and you are an adoptee or adopter, I need it soon. thanks.diene

Diene,

Received your email...sent you off my address (via email, not GW). If you do not receive, please let me know.

I'll be a seed sending sponsor on this one. Thanks for hosting!

Annie