Is it summer yet?

Actually I'd settle for just Spring. This picture is my peach tree, blossoming in our most recent snowfall, which was March 20th. I was at a meeting in Chicago on this day and it snowed all day there. When I returned the next day it had snowed here and this is what my poor little peach tree looked like. Luckily, it didn't drop below freezing so it doesn't look like the blossoms or tree were harmed by the snow.

Unfortunately despite all these blossoms, and now new leaves, the limbs on the back half of the tree are dead. You can't tell from the house because the house side looks like this, but there are no blossoms or new leaves on the half of the tree facing away from the house. I'll have to either cut them off or hire someone to come and do it.

My aloe vera also were snowed on. Yes, the ones I had saved by dragging them into my garage. I left them out when I went to Chicago, and it snowed! Maybe I should pay a little closer attention to the weather forecast, especially when we've been having such a cold year. They also look like they'll be okay, probably because it didn't freeze.

The forecast says it will probably get up to 80 sometime later this week, which apparently will be the first time in about five months and is close to another record. That should reinforce how cold this winter has been for us this year, although they say it's only about the 8th coldest year on record. I'm not sure how they determine that .... most cold days in a row? Lowest temperatures? Lowest temperatures for longest period? *shrugs* Don't know, but this year has seemed pretty cold to me.

My roses are just starting to put out good leaves again after being frozen earlier in the year. And my grass is just starting to grow ... *laughing* just in time to be nice and long by the time I get back from vacation. I'm taking a week starting next Thursday and going to visit a friend in a hot and sunny place. I'm seriously looking forward to it. Which reminds me, I've got a lot of house-cleaning and packing to do before I go, so I'm making this short today. Just wanted to post the picture of the peach tree in the snow.

Starting to warm up

This has really been a much colder year than usual. I was looking at last year's posts and at this time last year I had planted a rose bush and on March 17th I mowed my lawn for the first time of the year. This year, here it is the 13th and the grass is just barely starting to come up in front and not yet showing in the back. My roses started to leaf out and got frozen in the snow. They're beginning to leaf out again, and the peach is just starting to bud out. We've had 2 days that hit low 70s, but it's been generally mid-60s during the day and 40 at night.

It's also been a lot wetter. The news says all the reservoirs, lakes and rivers are at capacity, so we'll have to watch for flooding. *laughing* It's always something, huh? I'd rather have the water than drought, I think.

I've made some progress with the yearly shrub trimming. Mid-60s is actually pretty perfect temps for outside work, though it's cooler than I like for outside stuff in general. I was 'helped' by the snow, in that I trimmed back those big yaupons while they were half-uprooted and laying in my front yard. Saved me having to get on a ladder to trim them. Then I tried to get them back in the ground and upright. The one close to the door should do okay. The other one will survive I think, but it's hanging so far out into the yard that I may have to take it out (or have it taken out). *laughing* My Colorado sister, Monica, called me during/after the snow saying, 'you need to shake that snow off the shrubs/trees or they break'. Too late!Shaking heavy wet snow off of foliage is not knowledge that we usually need down here, just like owning snow shovels isn't something we do. It was pretty amusing watching people shovel snow with dirt shovels.

Monica, her son Brian and his wife Jordan and my grand-niece Julia came down in February to help celebrate my Mom's 80th birthday. We tried to keep it a surprise and the whole Colorado gang descended upon east Texas with me. We had a blast. The weather cooperated mostly and my parents got to play with their kids, grand-kids and great-grand kids. It's amazing to think of four generations. We had a pretty nice group there, with all five of us sibs making it. So we had us five siblings and our parents, plus parts of the siblings families that could come. Besides Brian, Jordan and Julia, we had my brother Gordon's wife, Susan, and youngest son, Ben, my sister Caryn's husband, Rob, and my sister Lynne's son, Jason. It was a nice gathering.

My grand-niece is 21 months old, so she's on the go constantly. We had lots of fun with her. My parents feed a very friendly feral cat and Julia wanted badly to pet it. They were pretty shy of each other, but after some mutual maneuvering around the yard, Julia got to pet it with her Dad's help. Soooooo cute. She gets that curly hair from her Dad. Brian had a mop of thick curly blond hair when he was a toddler.

I have two business trips next week. Tomorrow I'm leaving for the one in Anaheim, then I have one in Chicago at the end of the week. This is going to be a fairly busy year, so I should be getting a bunch of frequent flyer miles.

I'm taking a week of vacation time and going down to Grenada the first week in April to visit a friend. *happy sigh* It's nice to have friends in exotic places. That way you have an excuse to go there. You not only get to visit with someone you haven't seen in a while, you get to see a place you might not have seen otherwise. We should have an amazing time, and I'm already seriously looking forward to it, even though I can't spend much time planning for it until I get these other trips out of the way. *laughing* Okay, that's a lie. I'm already thinking about what to take to Grenada, what I'll need, what to leave here, who to get to check on the cats, etc, etc.

Speaking of the cats, I grew some grass for them. Really. They've been going out and searching for grass along the patio, but because of the cold year, there's nothing growing out there, not even weedy grass. So I got one of those 'grow-your-cat-some-grass' things last weekend and planted it on Saturday afternoon. Yesterday afternoon the grass was three to four inches tall! So I put it down where they could reach it and it's a tremendous hit with them. They both chewed on it for a good while and still periodically go back and chew on it. And no, they're not throwing it up around the house. Apparently it's good grass. Hmmmmm. Maybe if I periodically grow them their own grass they won't go out and eat that weedy grass with the black seed stalks and come in throwing it up on my new carpet. Worth a try.

Anyway, I should start putting things together for my trip tomorrow.