hi and welcome to garden web! it is kinda confusing about round robins huh? lol what you are talking about is 2 things. the round robin is the box that "flies" around to people. what happens with this is a group of people get together and decide that they want to do a seed round robin or something like that. there is somebody called a host who is in charge of getting everything together,making sure everybody knows the rules and everything. Ok...so let's say that there is a group of people doing a seed round robin. the host gets a box and puts some seeds in it and a list in it and address labels with the participants addresses and names on them. the list has who the box is participating and in what order the box is supposed to be sent. the host sends the round robin to the next person on the list. the person that the host sent the round robin to picks out some packs of seeds and replaces the same amount or more (say the pick out 5 packs of seeds...they replace 5 packs of seeds unless they want to place more in there). and then they send it to the next person and they do the same thing. in the end the round robin goes back to the host and the host gets the rest of the seeds and decides what they do with them. keep them or get rid of them :-)(sorry this is a little confusing but maybe somebody can come by and clarify it a little better :-)

The other thing you were talking about is a secret pal swap. this is when a group of people get together and decide to do a secret pal swap. they decide what types of things to include in the swap. it could be just things for the garden or anything or something like that. the host gets a questionaire out to everybody and they answer the questions on the questionaire and send it back to the host and the host matches them up with somebody in the group. only that person would know that they are sending stuff to the other person. (for instance if you were my secret pal I would send things to you and you wouldn't know who they were coming from. the host also knows that i'm sending you things.) you don't necessarily have to send a box every month. you could sometimes send a card or a pack of seeds or something like that to let your secret pal know that you're thinking of them:-) hope this helps!

There are also one time Secret (and not secret, too) swaps, usually with a theme--"Valentines Day Swap, Leprechaun Secret Swap, Memorial Day Swap, and so on.
The Host will post on this forum, inviting all who are interested to sign up. She/he will state the rules or purpose.
This are a good way to establish a reputation for being an honest trader/swapper.

If the Round Robin is already going, can you still join? Or is it best to wait until another starts? I think this is such a great idea!

depends on the host & if she keeps tract of where the robin is then she can sometimes email the person who has the robin and your name might be added to the end of the list .

Happy Gardening

sue

Chance~

You have a very healthy attitude about your diagnosis. I find that comendable. And I like the GW name! lol. Have you heard that joke about the Bi-Polar Bear? lol. Well, maybe you don't find that funny. Anyways, I think it's great that you let your traders know the situation.

~mgood4u

Thanks sue!

i want to join the round robin club i love the idea of haviny a secret pal each month

There is no round robin club, it sounds like you want to join a secret pal swap, just wait for someone to start one then sign up, or ask the host of one already going if she has an opening to consider you.