the good life

Do you see the little bee?

I was sitting out in the little fenced back yard Saturday around noon and the tree above me was buzzing.  Not real loud but definitely buzzing.  It’s a chinese tallow tree, not native and tends to be invasive as introduced species tend to be, and it is in full bloom.  It took me some moments to begin to be able to see the bees that were swarming around it and in it.  They were very busy. 

Friday I had to drive to Chappel Hill which is about an hour away slightly NW of Houston for an initial consultation with the committee of a church that is interested in some art glass.  You have to go through Hempstead to get there.  Hempstead is a small town farming community in the hill country.  I wanted to get some Texas peaches before they are all gone.  Texas peaches are the best peaches you will ever eat (OK, I may be a little prejudiced here), small, sweet and juicy.  Used to be the highway went right through Hempstead and the produce market was on the corner of the only light.  Now the highway goes around and I had to turn off.  Guess it’s been awhile since I was in Hempstead but the market was gone from the corner and there is more than one light now.  I  went back to the highway and passed a market on the roadside so stopped there on the way back from my meeting.  These peaches had just been picked the day before and they didn’t have very many.  Only 30% of the crop came in.  I mentioned having to go to Fredericksburg then if I wanted peaches.  “Oh, they don’t have any peaches either”, she says.  No peaches in Fredericksburg?!  “Nope, they’ve had even drier weather.”  Man, this drought is killing me.  No peaches.

This was our sunset Friday night.  Soft subdued pastel colors like a painting.

The farmer’s market started here in Wharton last weekend.  I bought 30 ears of corn and put them up in the freezer. Got another 15 ears today destined for the same.  Well, not all of it.  It’s so good, sweet and juicy, kinda like the peaches.  Also got potatoes, carrots, squash, cucumbers, kohlrabi.  We’re getting japanese eggplant and banana peppers out of our garden.  No tomatoes are ripe yet though. 

We got down here the previous weekend to find that my butternut squash vines were all in serious wilt.  They had squash worms (every single one!) so I picked out the worms with a toothpick and ‘squashed’ them and then buried the damaged portions of the vines near the roots and also buried sections of the undamaged vines further along (to encourage root development) and kept them well watered until we left for Houston last Monday.  I was pleased to see this weekend that at least half the vines have survived and two of them are putting on new fruit.