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“It’s raining, it’s pouring…”

Well, let’s not get carried away, shall we?

But it IS raining. A slow, steady, very light rain. And has been for a few hours. .05 I think. That may not seem like much, but it’s manna from heaven for us here.
And while there was no old man snoring here, I did close my eyes for a few minutes after taking Kallie to art camp and the sound of the rain on the roof lulled me into a quickie nap!

Just had to show you my beautiful Anniversary bouquet from my sweetie. Isn’t it awesome? AND he came home from the grocery store with several bunches of flowers, too. Wow.
And these are the formerly-beautiful Sedums — Autumn Joy — that WERE going in the back bed. That is until I left them outside the garage in my “holding area” where my precious little deer decided they were another treat I’d put out for her along with the birdseed! Ooops! I think they will survive and I’ll plant them anyway — but INSIDE the fence!

By |2016-04-14T02:44:33-05:00June 30th, 2009|anniversary, Blog, rain, sedum, Sharing Nature's Garden|0 Comments
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Crispy, tender and slinky…

Well, the Death Star continues its relentless torture of people, pets and plants in Austin, Texas.

CRISPY
It hit 106 today and that’s 16 days out of the last 17 that we registered more than 100 degrees. Sheesh! And it’s still June. I guess we are in for a repeat of last year, so I’m gonna hang onto my hat and my sunscreen and put on my big-girl panties and deal with it. (don’t hold me to that!)
See my poor Toad Lilies — I was amazed that they even came up, but I think it’s just too much to hope that they will actually grow, or, heaven forbid, bloom. Many things in the garden are getting crispy. And I pulled out all of the snap dragons from the fall — they were all dead and gone.
This is sad, though — this is my first Heuchera, and I was hoping it got enough shade to protect it. I sure hope it wasn’t my fault, watering when it was too warm out and burning the leaves….
This Kangaroo Paw hails from Australia and was supposed to love drought conditions. Apparently not!
Patches of grass come an go in between watering. I’m trying to keep it to the bare minimum, but it’s not easy. We have irrigation, but I’ve taken to spot sprinkling a few bad places where there must be some huge slab of rock underneath.
Tender
Here is my sweet little friend of the season. Emmy and Lulu have moved on and this little girl has come calling almost daily. I have lots of fresh water out every day – 5 birdbaths and one giant deer water bowl — and I know she’s hungry. When I was worrying about her last week, my dear husband went and bought a protein block for deer at the local feed store. In this 3-year drought, I hate to see them starve to death.
Slinky
Sunday morning my DH took this picture of one of our smaller garden friends who thought he might like to read the papers in the driveway! My sweetie said, I’m going to take his picture for you to post on your blog!
What a great husband, huh? And today is our wedding anniversary. I’m such a lucky gal, he loves me and he loves my garden and my garden friends. What more could you ask for?
By |2017-11-29T23:27:42-06:00June 29th, 2009|106, Blog, deer, drought, Sharing Nature's Garden, snake, weather|0 Comments
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Things that haven’t fried yet

With the 100+ degrees we’ve had for the last week and 100+ days forecast for the next week, things are going to start frying here, even though I have an outrageous water bill. Lots of the tomatoes are ripening right now, along with a few other things.

I picked:
  • tomatoes
  • okra
  • strawberries
  • leeks
  • Genovese and Black Opal Basil
  • green beans
The basil is in two vases in the kitchen and permeates the whole house — hey — free air freshener! Since there isn’t enough okra for a side dish, I’m going to try to pickle them — refrigerator-pickle style so I don’t have to mess with canning. Cross your fingers!
I’m thinking of making tomato jam or marmelade — any suggestions? And I am not sure these green beans are worth cooking. They seem very faded and not very green again. The last ones I made were tough and chewy. It may just be too darn hot for them to grow tasty any more.
And the leeks are going to be in a potato leek soup. I’ll eat it all by myself if I have to! You’ve gotta cook fresh stuff when it’s fresh. I’ll try to stretch it — cooking them Wednesday to eat with my DH for dinner on Friday. Yumm-o!
By |2016-04-14T02:44:33-05:00June 22nd, 2009|Blog, Sharing Nature's Garden, Uncategorized|0 Comments
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They’re as big as her head!

We have this saying in our house … we describe things, like large pieces of food, by saying:

“It’s as big as your head!”
Like, that eggplant is as big as your head!
But today, it was true.
The amazing Hibiscus I’ve been posting about proudly displayed 7 blooms. 7 Gigantic blooms. (We think it is a Moy Grande, named after the San Antonio man named Moy who found it.)
I know it’s hard to get a frame of reference, so I dragged my 6-year old out there this morning, in her night gown, and made her pose for me.
(Can you tell how excited she is to be out there performing this favor for me early in the morning!)
And, as you can clearly see, the blooms are, in fact, as big as her head!
Stunning, they are. And happy in the hot sun.
Good thing, because we are going to get more of it next week…sigh. I’m tired of summer already and it isn’t even summer yet!!! (Just kidding — that was only a little smidge of pseudo-whining. The reall whining will come later!)

Wishing you blooms as big as your head!
By |2016-04-14T02:44:33-05:00June 21st, 2009|Blog, hibiscus, Sharing Nature's Garden|0 Comments
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A preview of tasty morsels and, oh No … It’s BAAAACKKK!!!

Some more green beans are growing in my garden. These little blooms are a foreshadowing of a side dish to come.
And this pale little strawberry will soon be ruby-red and ripe and juicy — ready to eat while I am standing right in the garden. (But be careful, the juice will run down your hand and get all over you if you’re not careful! These strawberries are NOT white and hard inside, like those in my grocery store.)
The variegated lemons are small but powerful — a few more months and they will be delicious and ready to pick.

But WAIT.
Oh NO!
As I was picking weeds in the pathway, what do I see?
Do you recognize this little leaf?
It’s the EVIL Malabar spinach that threatened our very existence with take over last season.
It crawled up the house wall, scaled the garden and tried to come out into the yard. You can check it out on my pulling my hair out post, “Ok, don’t laugh!”
It was a heck of a lot of work to keep it from taking over and smothering the rest of the veggies in the garden.
And then I had the epiphany. I would rip it out and feed it to the deer, who were suffering last September from the drought and 40+ days of 100 degrees.

So, here’s the deal. We’ve had about 10 days at 100 already. It’s dry as a bone and the drought is STILL going. And the last few days I’ve seen a yearling doe in the woods looking for bird seed and her waterbowl.

My DH bought a protein block for the deer today.
And now I am thinking I might let that evil Malabar keep growing in the path and use it to feed the deer.
What the heck…
By |2016-04-14T02:44:34-05:00June 20th, 2009|Blog, deer, malabar spinach, Sharing Nature's Garden, vegetable garden|0 Comments
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