Nothing Could Be Finer Than...

The out-of-state kids arrived safely from 3 states, but they didn’t fly to Texas. These seashells, farmstand tomatoes & Carolina peaches are souvenirs we brought back from a combined family reunion, vacation & anniversary celebration held on the Carolina Coast.

Philo & I drove east on Interstate 10 to meet with our four children and their families at a town where we’ve stayed 8 times over the past 30 years. We were last there in 1994 - it was always a magical place, and thank heavens, things have not changed much!

While our family jumped in the surf, made sandcastles, played beach volleyball, watched pelicans and dolphins, enjoyed seafood dinners and witnessed hatchling Loggerhead turtles make their way to the ocean, back in Austin our wonderful friends, neighbors and Divas watered our plants & kept our containers, young trees, shrubs and perennials alive.

Since we came home, instead of leaning over to pick up seashells on the beach, I’ve been picking up pecans by the bucketful from the ground under the pecan trees. Some nuts were undeveloped, shed by the trees in response to the drought, some were bitten, half-eaten and thrown around by the squirrels. I don’t think the trees themselves are in danger, since the leaves are green. These trees did the same thing last September - in the middle of the night we were wakened over and over by a hearing a thunk on the roof, followed by a rolling sound, then a thud as the nut hit the ground. It was unnerving at first, but it eventually became one of those comfortable, usual, recognizable sounds – your brain just says, ‘Pecan falling’ and lets you stay sleep.

One very nice and totally unexpected surprise was that this crinum-type lily put up a flower stalk which is just starting to show pink buds. It might be Amarcrinum 'Fred Howard' bought in March 2001 from Plant Delights Nursery, or it might be an unnamed crinum bought at an Austin Men's Garden Club sale in Spring 2000. Both lilies grew for years in large deck pots, where they developed into multiple bulbs. Once we moved here, the bulbs were planted in the ground, but the tags were lost and the individual bulbs were mixed up. Whatever the name, I'm thrilled to see it bloom!