Tired of holiday shopping! Then, take a break by working in your garden. There's a host of chores from spraying and pruning to even planting!

Now is the time to prevent fungus diseases and over wintering insects. The cold weather doesn't take care of all things like we hope and we still have challenges. Spray fruit trees roses, and other deciduous flowering trees with horticultural oil (no, not oil that you put in your automobile), and kill aphids, mites, and scale.

To control peach leaf curl and peach blight, use a dormant spray of fixed copper or lime sulfur. Spray a minimum of three times now through February. If it rains soon after spraying, treat the trees again, and do not count the spray before the rain in your triple dose. For complete cover age, spray the undersides of leaves, as well as branches, trunks, and the ground out to the drip line. Fallen leaves and other debris should be raked and cleaned before spaying. In January or February, when your fruit trees are dormant you may also prune the trees to save on spray.

Plant your winter veggies, bedding plants, and spring blooming bulbs now if you haven't already done so. Plant any spring-blooming bulbs immediately, except tulips which need six to eight weeks of a chilling period. Stagger bulb planting every two weeks and you will extend the blooming period for six weeks or more.