cooler weather, impending yard work, fall blooms, and a great score

A cool front was supposed to come in on Wednesday and bring us some rain. It did bring rain but not on us. I swear there’s an invisible dome over Wharton. While the temperature did drop a bit Wednesday eveningish we didn’t get the full effects until Friday morning, cool enough to have the doors open in the mornings. And the sun is shifting into prism casting mode through the crystals hanging in the windows, little rainbows across my hand and keyboard. When the tallow finally loses all its leaves they will be cast all over the room.

The white Philippine violet has suddenly come into full bloom 

but the fall blooming orange cosmos have yet to be putting on buds. Very few oxblood lilies this year I suppose because it’s been so dry. My friend Cora says the same at her house. And the surprise lilies that gave me 14 blooms last year only put up one though I did get two in a different spot that didn’t bloom at all last year.

I don’t know what this plant is but it’s taller than I am and it freezes to the ground every winter. My sister planted it beside her shed. It blooms sparsely in the fall and has the most wicked thorns. Some of those are over 2” long.

I’ve spent the last several days sketching bamboo and willow leaves for two more cards, not well satisfied with either composition so far though I think maybe a second look at the first sketch of the willow may work if I shift it over to the right. When I get those two done, I think I’ll be done with the whole project. Here’s the most recent completed one. Wasn’t particularly happy with it at first but I think it’s ok.

More yard work planned for this weekend especially now that we are having a little break in the heat. Need to finish weeding that back flower bed and trim the yard, mow the little backyard. I’ve been picking up the bad fallen pecans still in their husks, the ones that got that fungus earlier in the year, so I won’t be fooled later on when the husks pop off and the mature good nuts start to fall. I’ve picked up almost a five gallon bucket’s worth so far. I think, hope, I’ll have an adequate crop from the looks of the nuts high up in the trees. 

Thursday at SHARE right before we were closing up for the day someone brought in two cast iron skillets, old, well seasoned and no crud built up like many old ones, bottom and sides milled smooth which they don’t do on new ones anymore, one large, one medium. I have two old large skillets, a small one, and a bigger but still small skillet. The medium was a nice intermediate size between my smallish and large skillets. I snatched that baby right up, put $5 in the can and brought it home.

Now I have to adjust the hooks to make room for the new one, shifting them over to the left and a little closer together. My large RevereWare skillet usually hangs on the right end hook. I know the new one on the far right doesn’t look much larger than the one on the far left but it has a much larger bottom surface area because the sides of the one on the left slant down instead of being straight up. (My smallest one is not in the picture.)