The info above is excellent. I use graph paper, too. FYI, most planners recommend that you orient your rows north to south so that all plants get maximum sun. Also, if you store your leftover seed in ziploc bags in the refrigerator, you can use it for two, maybe even 3 or 4 years more. If my seed is more than two years old, I sow more heavily in order to get a good stand. Still, it's better than wasting seed altogether. I would just point out that if your plot is four feet wide AND has an adequate path around it, you can plant the entire 24'x4' area solidly with plants (a la Square Foot Gardening). By standing in the path, you should be able to reach into the center of the bed without needing to step among your plants, thus eliminating the need for rows. (Seed packets might say plant seeds four inches apart in rows two feet apart. You can ignore the two feet apart if you don't have to walk among the plants.) If you have good soil and are feeding no more than four people, and not planning to can, etc., 3 or 4 tomato plants are probably all you will need. If you cage them, you can plant them 2 feet apart. So a 4'x4' square on the north end will accomodate your tomatoes and you still have 20x4' left for other things. Tomatoes must be rotated every year, so next year you get back to the shading problem. You might want to consider growing your tomatoes in pots so that you can change out the potting mix every year. This, of course, would free up sixteen more square feet for other things. Gardeners Supply has a garden planning tool on their website that you can use for free too. I enclose a link. (I don't work for them. I just buy from them.) Here is a link that might be useful: Garden Planner

I sit down at my computer with my transactions page for that account open, and compare it to my paper checkbook register. (you can check off cleared checks in your register with a translucent highlighting pen if you have many transactions, make all easy to spot) I fill in any withdrawals for cash I may have made but have not entered in the register and add any deposits I may not have recorded. My bank shows actual check number with the amounts, I don't know if all do. If I have check numbers missing from my checkbook that don't show online either, I may have to wait a day or two more before they show online as having cleared (DH will take checks and forget to tell me, just assumes I have enough :)). Other than those, the balance online and the balance in my book should match. I hope I didn't sound harsh earlier, I just listened to a friend rant about having to spend a whole day straightening out his wife's checkbook this weekend - she's 50 with a college degree and my sympathies for the week may have been used up. I know it doesn't come naturally to everyone and takes a little discipline, which then turns into such a time saver.

Sheilajoyce, your PTA doesn't either officially authorize the installation of matting on school property--the district does that. That's why you put quotes around the word "order"--because the PTA doesn' t order it. The district even does all the shopping around--the PTA just picks the scope of the project. The PTA president can't call up the matting company and say, "please come install the matting in this place"--she has no authority to DO so, and the matting company will only deal w/ the school officials, and will submit its bill to the school officials. and it may be "that easy" at YOUR school, but at my small private school, the PTA parents did the shopping around. Currently our money goes into a specialized account in the school's books. We do have to authorize the expenditure (well, as president I do, in writing, which isn't very formal), but the school treasurer keeps saying at board meetings "the money the PTA raises belongs to the school. you use school resources to raise it, and it's raised in the name of the school, so legally it's the school's." (what she thinks we're going to use it for instead, I don't know)

Treb- you are truly genius :) That was my 1st idea when they called - either have the seam match where the toekick lands - 5.25" from floor (it's stainless on the other 3 sides of island)... or get more toekick and run it all the way around. They weren't sure if they could hit it exactly at 5.25" and I didn't want to risk a delay (I have backsplash on a tight schedule next week - if we miss his window everything slips 2 weeks). In the end, we already spend so #*@(# much to get this quartz with this specific waterfall look, might as well do it "right" and stay on schedule.