The End of 2016

      I can't believe another year has flown by, but it has.  Our turnips finally got big enough to eat.  We've been eating greens only for awhile so the addition of turnips is great.  We prefer mustard with a few turnip greens mixed in.  We discovered we aren't too crazy about turnip or collard greens only.

   The mustard patch isn't that big but we have eaten a bunch and put up a lot.  We also give a lot to some of our drivers.  Some of them are our age and grew up eating from the family garden, so they appreciate fresh produce.  As long as it doesn't freeze, we'll keep sharing.

I picked my last two oranges.  I have been getting oranges for about 3 years.  I am still shocked at how much better they taste than store bought.  If you freeze them, they get even sweeter.  I was worried about storing them and read about freezing them.  It works and they are great.

   Well it's time to get back to crocheting.  Plus back to work tomorrow.  We really enjoyed our 3 day weekend.

 

We had another long weekend and so enjoyed it even though we had more rain.  For some reason parts of Texas are drowning year after year.  Rick had the garden planted and now it's a pond again.  We so love growing our food but year after year the rain is destroying it.  We know we need to bring in soil and try to raise the area but with so much to do it's low on the list.

We planted two olive trees a month or so ago.  It would be fun to cure a few.  Or maybe crush some

to make our own olive oil.  Mostly it's about satisfying our curiosities.  I was the weirdo who spent my adult life doing what I was suppose to do.  I never did what I wanted.  I didn't dream or explore.  Now on a limited budget I'm having fun and hubby is coming along for the ride.  He's so sweet and fun.   

Mom's lily's were beautiful again this year.  Rick has been spreading them throughout the yard.  I think we have them around 4 trees now. 

I waited to long to take this last pic because they are starting to wilt.

Mom's gardenia bush didn't bloom this year.  It's still in sad shape.  The 3 other bushes we have planted have bloomed.

Mom's bush was at the corner of the house by me and my sis's bedroom.  We didn't have a/c so the windows were open when the bush bloomed.  It smelled so good thru the whole house. 

I know I promised to slow down on puppy pics but I couldn't help myself.  Miss Molly is just adorable. 

 



Daisy, the black lab, is really interested.  Molly has the cutest face.  As you are probably guessing, she's part pit bull.  That's one of the reasons we decided to keep her.  Unfortunately with the stigma attached to that breed she would probably be put down.  Sunshine too.  We had a pit many years ago.  Beau was a beautiful sweet animal who adored our daughter.  Every breed of dog has different traits and we must all be diligent pet owners.  Jack, our cairn terrier, bit Rick when he was giving him Benadryl for a bee bit.  Rick ended up with a serious infection.  Does that make him dangerous?  No but it could have been life threatening.

I guess I should close.  Thanks for stopping by.  Have a great week.

Okay, one more blog of puppy pics and I promise to move on.

 Look at that face.

She'll be 2 weeks old tonight.  Her eyes are close to opening.

Moma and baby.  She is a good mom to be so young.  I wish I could say I was as good with my first baby. 

This is Miss Molly getting over the pool worm and getting out even though she can't see.

Mom doesn't know how to pick her up by the nape of her neck and put her back in.  Thus, our problem of keeping baby in and mom being able to come and go. 

  Many years ago when our son was around 10-12 we adopted a pup from work.  Our son named him Lucky.  Beautiful black long haired dog.  Really sweet and loving.  A week later an orange kitten showed up at our house.  We took him in too and our son named him Sunny.  I have pictures of that big black male pup carrying that little orange cat by the nape of his neck.  Somehow that male dog knew what to do.  Go figure.

Thanks for stopping by.

 

 



A Long Weekend.

 

We took a couple of days off to have a long weekend.  We always have too many plans and then fall off the wagon pretty much from the beginning.  Our back fence is bad so we've been slowly cleaning the fence line so we can come behind it and put in a new fence.  Since we have all of these precious dogs we can't risk an escape.  Speaking of dogs:

 

Please meet Sunshine.  A one year old pup who was living in our parking lot at work.  And, of course pregnant.  I took her to the vet on Friday a week ago.  Surprisingly she was really healthy.  No heart worms, no intestinal worms, a little undernourished but nothing serious.  She was due in 2 weeks.

Well the vet was wrong.  We had secluded her from the other dogs to start their introductions.  We hoped to have her acclimated before she delivered.  No such luck.  She gave birth the next Tues night.

Meet Miss Molly.  Molly had a brindle sister.  We didn't know until Wed morning that Sunshine had given birth.  Unfortunately little brindle sis was cold.

I don't know how people with mom's with many pups do it, but this one little pup is really hard to keep up with.  We have tried may ways to block her from getting out of the doghouse while mom being able to get in.  So far it's Molly 6 us O. Yesterday I was sewing and Rick comes in.  He's like, do you have the puppy?  I'm like, why are you asking?  I wouldn't take the pup away from her mom.  It seems the pup was missing again.  The ground is green and brown so it's hard to lose a gray pup.  He had searched all over.  I followed him out to look.  We are covering the yard again and I happen to look back and see movement under the dog house.  Lord help us. 

 Keep us in your prayers.  We would like to keep both even though we already have 5.  But we are going to need a few small miracles.  Sunshine and the others are going to have to learn to get along.  And Miss Molly is going to have to be that special pup that loves all her aunts and uncles.

It was fun to spend our long weekend working around our home, enjoying each other, and lots of puppy holding. 

Nothing better to close with than halo's, yellow flowers, and an embroidered scarf for the table.

Have a great week.  Enjoy the simple things and ignore the things you can't change.

 

 



SPRING

  Who knew we would have an early spring.  Texas is tough but we usually have a bit of winter.  This year there was none.  We have used the a/c off and on all winter. That's sad because winter is when we can save on electricity.

We planted 2 apple trees last fall and both have blooms.  They also have worms.  We've picked off several.  We have dealt with worms in the garden but never on our fruit trees.

For the first time all 4 lemon trees have blooms.  The oldest tree is blooming for the first time.  I got mad a few months ago and cut it back drastically while telling it to do something or it was gone.  I guess it listened to me.

The front sidewalk is almost finished.  The 16 x 16 blocks are super heavy.  We just do a few at a time but it's great that we're getting close. 

We were chilling out last night drinking a beer.  We saw this lizard and then noticed the baby behind it.  Maybe it was mom and son.

Speaking of sons, ours came by today.  Even though in our heads he's still our little boy, we are so proud of the man he has become.  Here he is telling me how to take a picture of a ham his dad had cooked.  The reason for this info was because he and his dad had been picking and eating the ham before I got a picture of the beautiful complete ham. 

We had to turn it around for the pictures so you wouldn't see the chunks missing.  Yep, like father like son.  But I have to admit, our daughter is exactly like them. beautiful kids.

 

Have a great week.  Thanks for stopping by.

 

 

 

We decided to add more trees.  So we chose 2 olives just for the hell of it.  Yep, I know, we're crazy but we like watching things grow and if we get lucky we get food and/or olive oil.  This was last weekend.  I'll catch you up on this weekend next week. 

 

 

1. Hubby is the best.  I can no longer do what he does. 

He's a special guy.

And finally a peach.  We have a bunch of peach trees that were given to us but the peaches are very small and not worth the hassle.  In fact the squirrels get the peaches before they are ripe.  We bought a new peach that we hope will produce a few peaches.  We bought a couple of apple trees on sale last fall and they survived the winter. 

 

So far, our figs produce.  We are up to 6 new trees and 2 old mother plants that we get the babies from.  Plus the huge tree at our old house that our son has not chopped down yet.  We have one navel orange tree and one "halo" tree that has produced the last 2 years. Plus a lemon tree that produced for the first time this past fall. 

 

As I have said before the gate and arbor must have been a  dad's gift for mom.  Mom wanted beautiful roses growing over the arbor.  They just didn't want too.  Mom had a green thumb every where else but for some reason roses did not want to cooperate.

 

 

 

 

 

I do not have a green thumb, but I was told these plants were indestructible.  They are tough and perisistent, so maybe we'll have something beautiful to look at for awhile.

 

 

 

My little house.  I love where I am.  It may seem silly to others, but most of my adult life was spent just trying to get by.  Raise the kids, clean the house, go to work, etc.  I'm finally slowing down and just "being".  It's wonderful.

Look at those pretty yellow flowers.  If you look real close you'll see Rick on his tractor.

Yep there he is.  Others do yoga, he rides his tractor in circles.

 

Thanks for coming by.  Enjoy life. 

Hubby has been making sausage and smoking it for a while.  A couple of weekends ago he decided to smoke some chickens.  They were delicious.  This weekend he smoked some ribs.  Sadly I never slowed down long enough to take any pictures.

 

 

I enjoy feeding the birds.  Of course the squirrels help themselves too. 

Again, more pictures of the arbor and it's yellow flowers. 

Catching up the blog

 

As our family moves away from heavy meat meals for the holidays, we embrace new ideas.  Sis held the Christmas holiday but is a vegetarian.  Hubby and I offered meat but let family select.  Nephew wanted red fish on the half shell and generously offered us his bay house to catch some.  It was a great weekend.  Sis and BIL was able to be at their bay house thus making it a great time.

 

 

 

So you see the fish and we added shrimp for variety.

 

My nephew and husband.  I am lucky to have so many men in my life that I admire.  Don't get huffy on me ladies, we know we are fantastic but finding great men is hard.

The day was fantastic.  I so love my beautiful family.  I'm kind of the underachiever screw up but they love me anyway and treat me well.

I don't know how mom got this arch when daddy was doing the fence at their house.  I know they were didn't have much so this arch and gate had to be a special treat for my mom.  I remember her planting roses and they always seem to fail.  I tried something simpler (I have no green thumb) and they are thriving.  Simple little yellow flowers and I feel momma smiling.



This is my tiny house.  My childhood home and now my last house.  I didn't come home to relive my childhood (I don't remember much) or to have this special connection.  I moved here to simplify my life, to have a little land to grow things, but most of all to have some peace from living in a subdivision.

Feeding the birds. 

 

Thanks for coming by.  Have a good week.