
Haven't had much worth updating recently. It's been hot, and very very dry, and we've been busy, but not interesting.
The garden is down to only the hardiest things blooming, and the rest dormant or limping along. Zinnias, morning glories, a few marigolds. The perennials are mostly dormant; the daylilies are completely dormant, down to dead leaves. It's quite sad. Oh, the maypop is still blooming, mustn't forget that....it's 12' up the tree, silly thing, but I've been watering it. D's mystery clematic is blooming, a tiny, white, four-petaled flower, like virgin's bower but more delicate. Once D get moved and unpacked, I need to borrow her clematis book and try to look it up.
Still haven't mowed. Might, in a week or two; the north field is a little shaggy with lespedeza and queen anne's lace. Even those are only knee high on me, so it's not urgent.
Went to Mom's last weekend, for a quick visit before we all went back to school. Her first day back was Wednesday, same as for my kids. We had a good visit, and By and I got her yard pruned for her, and a neighbor hauled the mess off. We brought Grandma over for one day, so she could see the kids, which was nice.
Mom's really looking forward to being retired at the end of this school year. She's counting down the days. She'll be just as busy, I think, but she'll be busy in the ways she chooses, and away from all the politics of education policy that's been wearing on her the past few years. There are substitute and full-time teachers at her school already circling for her job, some of them rudely so. Jobs are always scarce out there, but she'll be glad to be out of that.
The monsters are in the afternoon section of preschool this year, still 4 days a week, and still on the bus. They were thrilled to see their teacher again, and seem happy about the bus rides. It's taking a little adjustment; their school times is when they used to take afternoon naps. So no naps most of the week, and short ones on the weekend. On the up side, we've moved bedtimes earlier, and they're going to sleep with less fuss.
D has to be out of the house her late husband built by the end of the month. She's starting to panic about getting everything done, naturally. Especially moving the things she loves out of the garden....the dry hard ground makes that slow and difficult. By's going over there today, to help her with stuff in her late husband's workshop. I may or may not go over, depends on how long his part takes. She's got someone who'll take stuff to the new house all week, if she'll pack it and have it ready. And that's great, except she's still got to do that, and then unpack and put it away at the new place.
She's got a contractor lined up to do repairs and some updating on the new place, but he's giving her a runaround about getting prices in writing. He's not good at showing up when he says he will, either; the work should have been done by now, by the original schedule he gave her. I'd be looking for another contractor by now, but I know she's short on time to do that sort of chore, so she's kind of stuck.