When we put up our deck, we rented a motorized sod remover to tear out the sod so we coudl lay a stone bed. This was some of the best sod in our entire lawn. So I went to areas that weren't looking all that great, pulled up that sod and replaced it with the good stuff from where my deck was going. I had to water it every day until the roots took and held the sod in place. Now you really can't tell I did anything to the lawn except fix it. There are a few little valleys along the edges of the sod. For those areas I filled them in with compost prior to overseeding. They did still fall down a bit, but they look better. I figure I'll be leveling that gradually over time. I'm glad I did reuse the sod. The entire project was completed in an afternoon. I must say, the sod remover was a GREAT tool. Very easy to use and very quick. In any case, good luck with whatever you choose to do.

To my understanding you only need two bud eyes to go below the soil level and two above. Hope that encourages.

Glassquilt, that is a really beautiful quilt. Thanks so much for posting. Jennifer, what seems like it would be the hardest part is the positioning of the hexagons into an artistic and pleasing pattern. It will be for me anyway. I do have a piece of the fabric for the backing. I'm glad the person at the quilt shop suggested that. Theresa, I had a little too much time on my hands last winter. It's hard being away from your toys for so long. I hope all these quilts keep me busy. I have to get a knitting project to take too for when I don't feel like taking the ironing board and sewing machine out and putting them back.

I hope its safe to post links. Apparently, Magnolias are pretty tough to root. Below you'll find a few links. It looks like mist & bottom heat are necessary. Softwood cuttings generally fail. Sources differ on semi-hardwood or hardwood giving the best percentages. For Magnolia virginiana 'Santa Rosa' "The best rooting (83%) was achieved with semi-hardwood cuttings collected once terminal growth ceased (mid-November, Clayton, N.C.) and treated with 24.6 mM (0.5%) IBA in 50% isopropanol for 1 sec." // http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/fletcher/mcilab/publications/SNA/griffin-etal-SNA-1998.pdf Magnolias "For example, rooting for M. virginiana var. australis ‘Santa Rosa’, a deciduous to semi-evergreen cultivar was 445 optimized at 83% from November semi-hardwood cuttings treated with a 1-s dip of 5,000 ppm liquid IBA in 50% isopropanol (Griffin et al., 1999) while cuttings from M. laevifolia ‘Michelle’, an evergreen species, rooted from 88 to 96% from softwood cuttings take in early June with no significant effect of a 5-s dip of K-IBA in water ranging from 0 to 50,000 ppm (unpublished research, Gillooly and Ranney). These observations suggest that we may need to reevaluate our approaches and look more closely at timing and rooting windows including softwood cuttings for evergreen species, particularly in section Michelia. Might general cutting propagation protocols apply to taxonomic sections? Some propagators are also reporting good success treating certain magnolia cuttings with very high rates (10,000-50,000 ppm) of IBA (Ethan Guthrie, pers. commun.; Sharma et al., 2006) which deserves further study." // https://www.ces.ncsu.edu/fletcher/mcilab/publications/ranney-and-gillooly-2014.pdf Magnolias in general "Magnolias are usually propagated by semi-hardwood stem tip cuttings taken in the summer. Rooting should occur in 9 weeks with IBA Quick Dip 12000 PPM, intermittent mist, and soil temperatures of 75-80 degrees F." // http://lake.ifas.ufl.edu/agriculture/nursery-production/documents/Magnolia.pdf