New Blooms in the Garden

Top to bottom - Cherub's Smile Iris, Ixia, Amaryllis

Lots of Tree Triming Done

Our back yard and parking area look a LOT different now. Just this evening we had a lot of triming done and it's really been opened up. The plants and lawn will get a lot more sun now. One of the immediate benefits was this picture. If the trees hadn't been trimmed I wouldn't even have seen him. We were hearing a Great Horned Owl but this appears to be a Barred Owl. (We saw at least four owls this evening.)

Maxine's Wisdom

Greg's 45th Birthday

Greg and family just before Greg blew out the candles on his 45th birthday cake. We all hardily approved of Jill's selection of individual servings of Blue Bell ice cream. (That funny stack of yellow things on the table.)

Glynda and I spent the night before at their house and on Saturday we worked with them in their backyard implementing a landscaping plan I'd done. It turned out OK!
















At the party, Lillie got her first taste of some of that Blue Bell ice cream and she decide that it was good stuff!

It was another time

One of the things lying around here from mom and dad is a collection of old post cards from or to family members. One I just read was written by Granny to her husband Charles Walmsley Flanders. The card is dated January 27, 1939 and it was mailed from Winnsboro. It was sent to 3221 Wendelkin St. in Dallas, which was Aunt Maude's address - so evidently Granddad was in Dallas for a few days and was staying with Aunt Maude (his half-sister). The message was:

"Dear, I forgot to remind you to bring flour, no bacon, ??, or meal. If you want to get a few baby chicks I will try them under the hen that is setting. I must hurry and mail this so, Good bye till Sat. Yours, Verlie"

That says a lot about the way they lived! (The postage was one cent.)

A New Roof for the Deck Gazebo

The old and rotten canvas covering of the deck gazebo is gone now and Justin and Daniel are putting a new, permanent tin roof on it. They've got just a bit more then a forth of it done as I post this and it's looking good! (Maybe I'll do an all complete photo later today when it's done.)

Here it is - all done! Thanks Justin and Daniel!

Austin mini-vacation

Waterfall at the Prehistoric Garden at the Zilker Botanical Gardens

We just spent a few days in Austin! Julie provided accomodations for us as well as a list of suggested Austin attractions to visit. Her list included the few things we knew we wanted to see so we pretty well took care of the list and had a great time doing it. The Austin food was great! We had some enjoyable time with Julie and with my cousin Peggy. I think Julie needs to get acquainted with Peggy who is flying up to Pennylvania to work on the Hillary campaign there. (This is because I think Hillary will be less of an opponent.)

There's a new "Lefty" at Wildernest

Over the years there have been several stray cats show up here. Some have stayed for extended peiods of time - some didn't. (It probably gets boring when we're gone for a couple weeks at at time.) I've named all of them Lefty - because of Willie Nelson's song "Pancho and Lefty" which has a fetching lyric and melody. . . so our cats are Pancho and Lefty. I think this one will be here for a while. He was sort of a Reyes cat before we got here.

I said it's Willie's song but it was actually written by Townes Van Zandt - an old Texas music writer and performer. The link here is a video of the song with Willie and Merle Haggard. Townes has several cameos in it including the guy playing the guitar in the diner towards the end of the song.

If you like the song you should listen to this Emmylou Harris version too. The 1993 version by Townes Van Zandt has some great guitar as well as the song being sung by the man that wrote it.

This week -

We celebrated the closing of the sale of the condo with a sorta formal brunch on the deck, complete with mimosas - a favorite from our favorite brunch place, Terilli's on lower Greenville.


And we also cashed in a couple gift cards for boxwoods for the walk to the Gazebo!

Glynda's new rose

It's called a Bengal Tiger Rose. (Purchases of this rose helps the Save the Tiger Fund, established to support conservation of Asia's wild tiger population.) We're planning on buying only Earth Kind Roses now because of the low maintenance, earth friendly characteristics but Glynda really loved the color of this one. We did also buy a Belinda's Dream that is an Earth Kind Rose.

Retirement Report #2

Practice, practice, practice!!

Retirement Report #1

This flower, a "Gazania" is a new discovery from Hughes Plant Farm south of Tyler. This is a great place to buy plants and we filled up the back of the Ranger on a trip there earlier this week. I still don't have everything in the ground. Approx 1/2 to 1/3 of Dallas prices.

We're enjoyng the daily discoveries walking through the plantings from last year. Everyday something else pokes it head through the dirt or a blossom appears where that was none yesterday. We are working hard in the yard and there's a lot more to do. By Sunday evening we'll have another 50-60 shrubs to plant and some other amenities to add.

We are feeling like retirees in a small town. We drove into town today so I could get a haircut while Glynda was doing the same. We topped off the activities by checking out a new cell phone plan, getting library cards, and making arrangements for a trailer to bring back the last of what's remaining in the condo.

We visited with Bev and Alex Wednesday evening while enjoying a glass of (really good) homemade blueberry wine!

I've taken a couple bike rides and today did the four miler around the block (hay ride route).

Highlights of the day include walking to the mail box to see what Kathy (the mailperson) has left and watching the noon news after lunch.

The vegetable garden is in. Tomatos, onions, bell peppers, red bell peppers, green beans, okra, zuchinni squash, yellow squash, carrots, turnips, and I'm going to try some lettuce.

We are staying very busy!



And thanks to everyone for coming to our retirement party. It was a great afternoon weatherwise and a really great family gathering. (I'm using this picture to get even with Jill for her failure to delete a really bad picture of me. Don't forget to click on it so you can see the large image!)

$300 an hour for digging ditches

The satellite dish for the HDTV needed to be moved 33 feet from the old location. Direct TV charges $3/foot for digging ditches and I'm too cheap to pay that! In the East Texas sand it took me less than twenty minutes. That's more money per hour than I've ever made before! What a way to start a retirement!

OK - so it really did happen!

We did actually leave our jobs and move to Quitman!
We did actually sign a contract to sell the condo!
We do actually have HDTV and DSL installed at our new home!
It's 9:30 om a weekday and I'm sitting in my study having coffee and a piece of coconut pie that Glynda made yesterday.
The agenda for the rest of the day is really open!
I think I'm going to like this.

First Spring Flowers

We pushed back the mulch and found the crocus. The daffodils are blooming too!