a look around

First, thank you everyone for all the wonderful compliments. It feels strange to be done. I've been working on that piece for months. Life has revolved around that piece for months. Almost four to be exact. I'm happy with it, happier than I thought I'd be. The only thing I would change is to make the box color a little lighter and less green. The little corals inside are loose, not glued in, in case the buyer wants to take them out.

So now looking around at what else is going on...

The red shouldered hawks have been very active around here the past several days. Marc was sitting out the other day when one landed in the flower bed about 10' away and then flew off. I saw two flying around from one tree to another in the yard the next day and later Marc looked out the window and one was on the bird bath. I love seeing them. I looked up Monday to see one perched on the T bar of the old clothesline and got this picture through the glass in the back door and on high magnification and then later saw it swooping low over the empty lot next to me. I haven't seen or heard any of the smaller Mississippi kites that summer over here lately so I suppose they've left for the season.

Besides the kites leaving and the cooler temperatures though by no means 'cool', still hot and humid, just not as hot, other signs of the turning of the season are showing up like snow-on-the-prairie in the pastures and the pampas grass starting to send out its plumes, the oxblood lilies popping up, and the porterweed blooming.

The Chinese fringe flower trees/shrubs are blooming again though not as profusely as in the spring and a paler pink. Still getting some zinnias but they are ragged. The phlox is still blooming and while the pink butterfly ginger is done, the yellow butterfly ginger is putting out its bloom cones, very late as it usually blooms mid-summer.

The squirrels are still stripping the bark off the branches of my ginkgo trees. They have stripped so many, the ground is just littered with 1/2” x 2” strips, that I fear all those branches will die or are dying. Food is scarce I guess. This is the third year in a row my pecans trees are bare of nuts. Neighbors' trees aren't faring much better.

We had a very large dead branch fall off the oak on the side of the house and onto our internet cable dragging it down to the ground. Fortunately it didn't disconnect from either the house or the pole. I got the ladder and pulled it up as high as I could (that fucker is heavy) and wrapped it around the thing on the house so at least we can get out of the driveway.

Granddaughter Autumn is here for a few days. Her mom dropped her off Monday afternoon. She brought a pile of little crop tops that needed tiny straps sewn back on and some pants that needed the elastic waistband re-sewn, another pair that needs the zipper replaced so we worked on that yesterday.