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Friday, April 30, 2010

Winter Rains in TX Bring Spring Flowers

By late April, our yard is showing off to nice effect a welcome result of the El Nino rains of this past winter. The bluebonnets look the best ever, and the bright yellow of the Engelmann's daisies provides a fine backdrop. The circle of blue color from the Blue curls and Mealy blue sage around our native persimmon tree in the back yard is at its showiest this time of year. The Prairie primrose natives have settled on a hilly spot in our back yard to showcase their delicate, pink beauty.

The twisted-leaf yuccas in our front terrace have bud stalks as tall as Raleigh. Their creamy white blooms will appear in May. Our red yuccas' stalks of coral buds are stretching up nearly as tall. The spineless prickly pears have oodles of baby pads forming, but I haven't noticed any flower buds yet.

The majority of the terrace blooms are being provided now by the purples of the Deosperma ice plant and the Prairie verbenas, the small daisy-like whites of the Blackfoot daisies, the bright yellow of the Four Nerve daisies, the spikes of blue claimed by the Mealy blue sage, and the occasional show of coral gracing the Salvia greggii.

The roses are looking the best we've seen them in a long time! Their scents fill the rooms of the house when the southern-facing windows are open.

Now, when more rain is forecast, we pray that strong storms don't follow. I suppose we should be grateful for what we have - when we have it. For now, our yard is filled with colors, including freshly bright greens, that refresh our spirits. Life is good!

For a peak at our spring blooms, click on the title above.

Cleaning the Cobwebs from the Bunkhouse

I thought I'd better write something so you devoted followers of this blog won't give up. I had hoped that by now, some of you writers who jumped through the hoops to get your independent posting credentials would have added your two bits worth and, therefore, kept it active for me, but the ol' bunkhouse has stood empty since my last posting of 3 March. Apparently the blog is "out-of-sight and out-of-mind."

Terry and I have been keeping rather busy since then. We decided to paint the interior of the bunkhouse and have made a valiant start. For those of you who have painted, you know that the easy part is picking up the roller or brush. The hard part is moving all the furniture, cleaning the surface, filling the dings and dents, masking the trim, cleaning up and moving everything back. We painted a couple of bedrooms and bathrooms and then our project was taken over by other events.

My 93 year-old step-mother, Alice Emry, caught an 18-wheeler to Dallas, Texas where we picked her up and brought her to Austin to stay with us for about three weeks. We had a fine time showing her the sites and wearing out a deck of cards playing Kings on the Corner.

We then took Alice home to O'Neill, Nebraska in time to celebrate my mother, Ortha Emry's 87th birthday in Ainsworth. We spent a week plus the two bookend weekends in the Middle of Nowhere.

We are now back in Texas and catching up. We may reinitiate our painting project although the great outdoors has now taken center stage on our chore list. This spring has been one of the best. The long-overdue winter rains have really touched off a colorful show of wildflowers this year - but with those came the fast growing weeds and grass.