A Little of This, and A Little of That....

I could have named this post the same as the last one...

Summertime Blues.

It's been HOT.

And, DRY.

I'm really hoping this thermometer is not right.

It's pretty close to the one on the other side of the house, though.

The heat, and no rain, is taking a toll on the whole place.

The trees are dropping leaves almost as bad as fall.

Only good thing...less to pick up in fall.

Not much to eat, for these guys. 

Well....except for our landscapes.

Since it's so dry...

...why do I need so much of these?

I don't dare go out without it.

The mosquitoes LOVE me.

It's not all bad, though.

The early morning light still looks good.

Willow enjoys hanging out on the bridge...

as long as the sprinkler's not going.

Sweet Potato loves the heat.

And, so does the Firecracker Fern.

And, some of our recent sunsets, have been very nice.

I was worried about some fungus looking things on this

Golden Barrel Cactus.

It turns out it's new growth!

Yay!

And, this could be good or bad...

Our son-in-law is a safety consultant in the oil and gas industry.

The workers were clearing a site, and plowing up these.

If I read the photo right, they're Sotols of some kind.

He asked if I wanted some.  I said, of course.

So, he's bringing me some.

I hear there are ten..

I need to do some research to see how long they can stay out of the ground.

They live a distance away from us.

So, that's what's going on here.

Trying to keep things alive,

and staying out of the heat.

Tomorrow is supposed to be extra hot.

Then we have a "cold front" coming in.

We could be all the way down to 99!!

Hey...it's all relative.

Have a great weekend.

Happy Gardening...

~~Linda~~

Exciting and Sad...

...at the same time.

It's always exciting to see an agave put up a bloom stalk.

They grow fast and tall.  Then put on lots of flowers.

But, then...when the bloom is over...the plant dies.

This giant agave (not sure what kind it is) in my neighborhood,

is definitely a major centerpiece in this yard.

The stalk is already about 15-20 feet tall.

It'll be sad to see this giant die.

But, the show will be good.

I'll try to post more, as it progresses.

Hope you're having a great weekend.

I'm still weeding...

Happy Gardening...

~~Linda~~

You Can't Always Get What You Want...

This has been a wild ride winter.

We've yo-yoed back and forth, from cold to hot,

and back to cold.

It's been confusing to our bodies,

and our gardens.

One day recently, the morning started at 28F degrees,

and ended at 88F degrees.

Really? Sixty degrees?

Whew!

Shortly before that, we were below freezing for over 38 hours.

It turned the nice, focal-point agave above...

...to this.

In fact, all of this same kind of agave...

I THINK it's Americana...

were turned to mush.

I trimmed it up.

Maybe it'll come back.  

I'm giving it a while to try.

The Bicolor Iris was burned back,

but I trimmed it, and it's coming back.

A lot of things burned back,

are already coming back.

Maybe to soon...

I'll wait a while to trim this Sago Palm.

Hopefully it'll come back.

It moved down here with us, so it should be huge.

These winters keep knocking it back.

I'm waiting on the Oleanders, too.

They'll come back.

We had some high, high winds a few weeks ago, too.

No big limbs down, but lots of small ones.

It sounded like someone throwing rocks on the roof.

We stayed under cover.

Then, there was the clean up.  There were several cart loads.

But, one good thing is this rosemary blooming for the first time.

Happy things and sad things.

Happy with our new great grandson.

Sad that we lost our neighbor across the street.

He fought the good fight, against cancer, knocking it back once.

But, this time it won.

He was one of the good guys.

He was 89.

Things go on...

in the garden, and in life.

I hope all is good, wherever you are.

Happy Gardening...

~~Linda~~

Hello, Again....

Halfway through January, already.

It's been fun.

Today it's 75 degrees.

Last Friday, we didn't get above freezing.

A few days before that, it was 85.

Whew!

Too crazy a ride.

This was the morning it was 13.

If you look closely, you can see the ice at the edges.

We were in the 60s by afternoon.

All this makes gardening here verry interesting.....

I took this photo before the freeze.

It's worse now.

But, as you can see, the deer have done their thing.

My fault...

I should have put wire around it.

I usually do.  But, I let myself get lazy.

The bucks didn't seem to have velvet on their antlers, to wipe off.

And, you just can't cage everything.

They messed this one up, too.

Worse now, since the freeze.

And, this one...

they chomped it.  AFTER they moved this piece of wire off.

I put it back.  So far, they've left it alone.

I won't show you the lovely frozen plants in the rest of the yard.

I'm not sure what to go ahead and cut back. 

That might make them put on new growth,

and I know we're not done with cold weather.

I'll cut a couple of the agaves back, and try to keep them alive.

So, I'll just show you one of our Christmas gifts from our Son's family.

Pretty, huh?

It twirls in both directions.

We put a solar spotlight on it.

A nice view from the porch, on these warm evenings.

We got another garden gift from our Daughter's family.

There is some assembly required.

So, we'll show you that later.

And, oh....

This is our oldest granddaughter.

These two here, under the Wimberley Trail of Lights big tree,

are giving us a GREAT grandson, in just a few days.

We are truly blessed.

Hope your holidays were happy also.

This year is going to be a good one.

Stay safe and warm.

Seems we'll be warm, here.

Happy Gardening...

~~Linda~~

Blooms and Foliage...May, 2015...

I've been neglecting this blog for a while.  

Travel and weed pulling, have gotten in the way.

The middle of each month, though, is when we join 

Carol at May Dreams Garden

and

Pam at Digging.
for Bloomday and Foliage Follow-Up.

We've been having a lot of rain.
So, I got out between rains, for some of these photos.

Not much is blooming here.
My garden is way behind some others due to a late freeze.

But, this prickly pear has been showing off a little...one bloom at a time.

This one is in the Drive Bed.
And, it's really been growing.

The Feverfew bloomed this year, too.
The flowers are on long stems, and I'm not too crazy about that.
But, the blooms are pretty.

The Verbena Bonariensis is blooming.
Another one with pretty flowers on long stems.

I tried a Mexican Honeysuckle this year.
I really like it and so do Hummingbirds.

It seems the deer like it, too.
I'll be moving it to the Fenced Yard.

What we have most of here, is foliage.

The Japanese Aralia is finally taking off. Mr. Rooster might get covered up.

Lophantha

and Quadracolor agave are doing well.

The Inland Seaoats are finally filling in the way I planned.
They're loving all this rain.

This Japanese Holly Fern is coming back from the dead.

We got the weeds out of the front beds,
and put down new mulch.

I think some cutting back is in store for the fig tree....
which is in a very wrong spot.
It was here when we got here.

In the veggie garden, the grapes are putting on clusters of grapes.

And, even though they got a very late start, the tomatoes are putting on fruit.

There's more going on here.
But, the sun is out and there's gardening that needs doing...
before it rains again.

Be sure to check out the Blooms and Foliage this month.

Happy Gardening...
~~Linda~~

August!?!!......

Since last we met, we've been busy.

We did some traveling.

Back to Mississippi, to visit friends.

We go through Luling, TX, to get to I-10.

This time we stopped, so I could stand in the street and take a picture of this sign.

It's hard to tell in the photo, but it's 3 dimensional.

One of our friends retired, and he wanted to celebrate in Biloxi.

So, we went....again.

Back home, you can see we have been missed by the summer rains,

that have hit other areas around us.

The Grass Bed is doing ok.

Not as much growth as I'd like.

The Hyacinth Bean and zinnias are doing good.

The Pride of Barbados is finally blooming.

Love those blooms.  And, inside the fence, the deer can't get to them.

The tomatoes are blooming.

But, not setting fruit.  There are some that set earlier.  

Taking their time getting ripe.

For the first time, we had ripe figs.

Not many, and not big....but, they tasted good.

This Agave Lophantha had been chomped by the deer.

I took it out of the planter it was in, and put it in the ground.

Then, it started developing two crowns.  Very interesting.

We turned this firepit into a planter.

We put in a Soft-leaf Yucca.

Looks better than a bunch of limbs piled in there.

It's being protected by this resin Horned Toad.

So far, so good.

We'll soon put some wire up.  The bucks have lots of velvet to rub of their antlers.

And, last but not least.

Yesterday, my daughter and I went to Market Day, here 

in Wimberley.

I got two plants.

 A Dyckia 'Burgundy Ice'

And, a variegated agave.  I think Agave American 'Mediopicta Alba'.

There were no labels.  The seller just knew they were an agave and a dyckia.

Hope my research is right.

Now to find containers for them.

So...that's what I've been up to.

How about you?

Hope your summer is going well.

Happy Gardening...

~~Linda~~