IT IS SO HOT

Was driving home the other afternoon and went down this road toward the house and I saw this up ahead.

What is that?  Then I stopped and quickly got out to take a picture.

 

It had just rained but it was so hot, the rainwater on the road was steaming up off the hot asphalt.  I would like to have seen it when it was raining.

Gonna be a long, hot Summer for sure.

WE HAD RAIN

 A LOT of rain.

This was a couple of weekends ago. We got about 5 inches of rain in a couple of hours.

We learned where our low spots are.

The backyard has a low spot right here near the well-shed.

Here is the front yard toward the driveway.

Here is a little more of the front yard.

Here is the side of the house near the septic.  The water runs from this side of the property through the front yard and down the sides of the driveway toward the road and speaking of...

...the driveway is high and dry.  Glad they updated that for us during construction.  The water flows down the sides and with the culvert drains they put under it, the water flows under instead of over, so we're happy.

But we had a new thing happen.  This is where the OLD septic tank was.  It was one of those cylindrical ones, small, concrete.  They removed it and filled the hole.  Well, it has settled.  They are coming back out to fill in more dirt for us when everything is finished settling.

The good thing is that when they staked out our house, the surveyor told us we should move the house forward and over a bit so that this area wasn't under the slab (which it would have been).  So we moved it 10 feet each way and sure enough, if this had been under the slab, we could possibly have cracks in the slab.

Anyway, next step is to contact someone to have them see about what we can do for the water.  We don't want to add dirt and have the water move back toward the house.  As it is now, even though it does fill up, it flows away from the house so that's a good thing.

We shall see how things go...

GOOD FOOD AND FROZEN PICTURES

It's been cold again, mid-20s.  The other morning we had a LOT of frost and frozen water.

We've been staying in where it's warm and of course 2nd Man made us something good to keep us warm.

This is a bowl of pasta and white bean soup with ground turkey and three greens (turnip, collard, mustard).  We topped it with some warm and crusty ciabatta bread and it was hearty, filling, and warm on a cold day and freezing weekend.

The standing water from the rains a few days back was frozen solid.  I was able to (carefully) walk on this.  It was crazy.

But it sure was pretty...everything was covered in white and looked like a true winter wonderland.  It might be all we get this year (though February gives us a few more weeks of a chance).

Hope you all are staying warm!

IT IS COLD

It has been cold.

We got down to 21.

The house has been great.  We have temp sensors around and the house attic has stayed around 70 degrees (!) even as it's almost teens outside.

We got sleet, ice and snow flurries.  This was the radar Sunday morning.  We were right in the middle of it.

Monday, all schools were closed, and most businesses (my office included) had people work from home. 

We had ice all over everything.  The roof and the driveway were covered.

As were the trees and bushes.

The screen door to the back porch was solid ice from the rain that hit it and froze.

We had some icicles over the back door and when I went out to check the well house, I shut the door...

...and one fell off and hit me in the head.  Glad it was melting and not sharp and of course also glad that it didn't fall from two or three stories up, ha.

We had a light dusting of snow that didn't last long.  But it sure looked pretty.

Last night was another cold night and after a slight warmup the rest of this week, we will have another one this coming weekend and another chance of snow!

OUR FIRST HARD FREEZE AT THE NEW HOUSE

Well in years past, the big Winter storms we've had were while we were in town and the farm was out there by itself.  Many times, too many

Ice and sleet predicted for everyone, almost all the way to the coast...

Temps in the upper TEENS for us.  Brrrr!!

But the plants are safe inside...

We moved stuff around and got both cars in the garage so they'll be safe from the elements.

Bill will have to stay outside but I took him for a long drive to move fluids around, get it warmed up and charge the battery well.  Parked between the two buildings it stays sheltered from North winds.

Our attic is super insulated so we shouldn't have to worry about the few pipes that run through it.  We have temp sensor up there to keep an eye on things.

Now we just sit back in the house, cross our fingers the power stays on and enjoy the Winter wonderland we might have in a few short hours.

Stay warm. 

Stay safe.  

IT IS COLD

It's been a cold week (well, cold relative to our "usual" cold weather, ha).

In fact, it was colder this time around than during our snowstorm of a month or so ago.

This was Wednesday around noon at the farm...25 degrees with a feels like of 13 degrees.

But not to be outdone...

At 7:16am Thursday morning, it was 19 degrees with a feels like of SEVEN!  Single digits!  It was, as they say, dangerously cold for people, pets, pipes and...plants.

Speaking of, never fear...

...our well travelled mini-orchard is safe and sound in the parking garage at the apartment. Bananas, avocados, cherries, goji berries, an olive tree and two muscadine grapevines.

This was sent to us by a dear friend and it made us laugh.  Sorry Punxsutawney Phil, we'll take you seriously next year!

Stay warm!

THE GREAT HOUSTON SNOWSTORM OF 2025

Or something like that...ha!  It was a crazy day for sure but in the end, just beautiful and, for us, awe inspiring.

It started Tuesday evening...

This is the radar about 7pm, the red arrow is the farm and of course pink is snow, blue is rain.  It was freezing out there and snowing, Houston was still raining.

But that didn't last long.

During the night, it dropped below 32 while we were sleeping.  I woke up to check the weather:

It was finally 28 and snowing.

When we woke up:

It was near whiteout conditions in downtown Houston.  We couldn't see beyond about one block.

The entire city was shut down.  Almost no one went to work (except essential personnel of course), freeways were empty, virtually all stores and businesses closed, and even the two airports were closed, with no flights landing or taking off.

One it stopped, I went out to explore.  A lot of snow.  About 4" in Houston.  It was beautiful for sure.

It was a lot of snow, even on our balcony more than 25 floors up.  It was crazy and fun!

It was the soft, powdery type of snow.  We think this is the kind that people like for skiing.

At lunch, when the sun finally came out (but still below freezing), we went down downstairs to "play" in the snow and it was awesome.

I joined in an impromptu snowball fight with neighbors (epic fun at 59 years old) and then, with our first ever major snowfall, I just had to do this...

🎵Do you want to build a snowman?🎵

YES!

OK, so it won't win any awards but hey, I did what I could with what I had on hand.  Had to find enough clean white snow that hadn't already been scooped up for snowballs or had snow angels made in it, and then I used what was around in the flowerbeds to bring my snowman to life.  Several people took pictures so it was famous for a bit!

We were regretting that we weren't living at the farm yet to experience this, but "J" from 2nd Family surprised us by walking down to our end and taking pictures all around for us to have!

This was on her back porch/deck as she went outside to get some pictures.

This is one end of our driveway looking down toward the barn and shed.  In the Spring, this is one of my favorite spots to mow.

Speaking of mowing, here is one of our trails, normally a green winding path, now a white wonderland! 

This is part of our front yard, the view we will have from our future front porch.

The orchard is snow covered.  Thankfully the trees and bushes are freeze hardy (at least we hope!).

This is a pond, not ours, but one on the other side of our fence.  It's very pretty covered in snow and frozen over.  Looks like a postcard.  We wish he'd someday sell us that part of his land, it would be awesome, ha.

Barnabas looks cold and lonely in this picture, ha.  It's so wild to see this, the snow covers the weeds and trim debris and the things that sprouted up, so seeing it not only clean and white but trimmed and all alone looks so cool.  So much space for new stuff once we get out there!  We saved the best picture for last:

Just love this picture.  It might be great to have it turned into our first Christmas card to mail out next year from our new house!

We are forever grateful to "J" for getting us these possible once in a lifetime pics.  But hey, if it does happen again next year, we'll be there to experience it!

Sunday will be some Hobart snow pics, he didn't go outside but he had some snow fun nonetheless.

SNOW

 More update tomorrow, but just to let everyone know we survived the great Houston blizzard of 2025, ha.

This was on the balcony 25 stories up.  It was crazy.  

But beautiful!  The entire city stayed home yesterday and mostly today as it melts and becomes black ice on the roadways.  Tomorrow should be back to "normal".

Stay warm and safe!

HARROWING BERYL UPDATE

 It has been a crazy morning without much sleep.

Here is the radar at about 5am when the howling of the wind woke us up.  We're downtown, the red pin.

Four hours later, it was slow moving and we are in the intense part of it, the dirty side.

Here it is a bit ago, it's finally moving out.  The eye went over the farm.

We had winds of 90mph sustained.

There has been 10 inches of rain (and counting).

2.1 million people are without power.

Bayous are overflowing in some areas.

Airports are closed.

Many roadways are impassible.

2 fatalities so far.

A coworker sent this picture she took from her front porch.  She said it has been very scary.

And here are a couple of videos.

First up, one I took from our balcony (door open, hand outside, I didn't go ONTO the balcony, ha).

Wish you could hear the howling wind, it makes this eerie whistling noise. Like some end of the world movie.

Then there is this video that "J" from 2nd Family send showing how intense it was at the farm:

Yikes!  She said she is finally able to sleep and will be taking a nap...well deserved nap after the night she had out there.

The mayor just told everyone to stay home and shelter in place while they get emergency crews out across the city, they are still rescuing people and trying to get power back on to essential areas.

I think we might take a well deserved nap as well...