Over the years, your old Aunty has tried many times to root rose cuttings. I have what I’d call a ‘nostalgia rose’ bush at Chez Siberia. When the DH and I got married and rented our first house, my mom went out to the garden with a spade, whacked off a chunk of the old rose bush growing there (it was probably put in when the house was built in 1917 – a very old rose). No one knew what rose it was – it’s has flattish blossoms with a gillion little petals on it, once a year, in June. The fragrance is definitely ‘knock your socks off’. It throws off long canes with huge thorns. But they reminded me of home. When we move to Chez Siberia, we dug the thing up and took it with us and put it next to the deck. It’s not in a very good spot – it’s very exposed, so many times, if we have a bad winter, I end up having to prune it almost to the ground to get off all the dead stuff, but it comes back. (more…)