I've gotten 1/2 inch, finally. It has been going around me all week. My dad's in the hospital and I have not had time or energy to do anything but water the seedlings in the laundry baskets. I also fell the other night and my leg didn't want to do more than walk out to close the chicken pen. Just got through running tomatoes through the Weston. We had a lot of tomatoes on the counter. I didn't get to look at the cukes before the rain started because I got to sleep late this morning.

I am going to get depressed (on behalf of the garden) if some of that rain doesn't find us soon. It is sunny here with a current temperature at our house of 102 and a heat index of 108. Clearly it is too hot to do anything outdoors, except my grilling maniac husband is going to grill steaks for dinner tonight. I think he would enjoy grilling even if it was 120 degrees out there.

I'm glad y'all are getting rain. I just wish we were getting some too.

Amy, I understand. Just try to stay off of it, if you can. I fell this morning, and I had to drag myself to the back door. It was very early, and the neighbors all sleep late. I'm used to it, I guess. I live alone, and it is what it is. I am very sorry to hear about your dad. My thoughts are with you.

Dawn, grilled steaks sound divine;)

Mary, are you okay? I hate that you fell. At least my husband was there when I fell.

Mary, I hope you are alright, and Amy I hope you are alright and that your dad is recovering well.

One or our neighbors (Fred's wife, Jo) fell and broke her pelvis one day and laid there in their driveway (which is off a private road used by only one other family) for several hours until the neighbor found her. That was quite a few years back and it was scary to think what could have happened if the neighbor hadn't come along because it was a warmish day, though not a dangerously hot one. I try to always, always, always carry my cell phone with me just in case something like that happens, but it is hard to always remember it.

The grilled steaks were heavenly. We drove to Muenster, TX, (across the Red River from the SW corner of our county) to buy beef on Saturday. They slaughter the beef there in a slaughter facility directly behind the Fischer's Grocery Store. It is locally raised beef and tastes superb and has spoiled us for beef purchased from any other place. If we can't eat beef from Fischer's Meat Market, we'd just as soon not eat beef at all (and we are beef lovers). We always buy a lot when we go, and fill up the freezer with it. They also make their own hot dogs, various types of German sausages and such, smoke their own chickens, process their own bacon, etc., have their own line of cheeses, etc., so a trip to that store is like visiting Disney World for us, minus the mouse ears. They also carry locally grown produce (some of their stuff is local, not all) and have tons of private label canned food just like what we can at home, but a much larger variety of it. Oh, and kolaches and strudels and specialty fruit breads and more. We go there about once or twice a month. I love that store! Tim loves their fried pies and I really like their strudel. This weekend they had locally grown watermelons, so we got a Desert King melon and also a couple of locally grown cantaloupes that look like Hale's Best Jumbo. My cantaloupes and melons aren't ripe yet, though the first watermelon will be ready probably by the end of the week.

Tim's on vacation this week (a staycation to get stuff done at home) so we are grilling a lot since he likes doing it and I like not heating up the kitchen.

Dawn

We've gotten rain 3 days out of the last 4 or 5 here just N of Edmond. I was so excited!! I always think it's so amazing how the plants perk up when they get the "natural" stuff. My peppers are really starting to produce now and I have loads of blooms. My tomato plants have quite a few blooms if I can keep the darn hornworms at bay. I killed one yesterday and 3 more today. Those things get so big so fast. How dare they!!!! Lilo (the new pup) really loves checking out the garden and even beats me there when we head that way.

I was at Home Depot yesterday and was looking for seeds on sale but there were none. But, I still grabbed about 6 packets of seeds; some herbs and a couple flowers. I couldn't find any dill seeds though so I guess I'll just have to wait. I have an onion set that I bought at Ace Hardware a couple weeks ago for 49 cents and I thought there were only 50 in there. Double checked and there are 100!!! I don't have room for 100!!! Thinking about just keeping about 25 and then giving the rest to my neighbor. I need to start saving containers as I'm going to wintersow this year since I don't have anywhere to do grow lights inside sadly.

I sat outside this morning and watched the sun come up. It was just beautiful, cool, and peaceful. That is until I found 2 of those stupid hornworms lol. But......I love just sitting outside and can't wait to get the backyard planted up the way I want it so I can just enjoy it. I bought a crepe myrtle that is from black diamond so I gotta get that planted today since it's a bit cooler this morning. We were going to put in a fish pond but things just prevented us from doing that this year so that'll have to wait till next year.

Have I told you all how much I love reading everything from this group lately?!?!?! Well.............I DO!!!!!!

Happy gardening!

We were so disappointed early in the week, getting only a half inch Tues and Wed when my cousin 15 miles east of us got 2.7 inches. But then while we were in Tahlequah Saturday morning it poured over there and when we got home--18 miles east--we had .6 inch in the gauge. So YAY! The rain makes it even more humid and means that the grass will need mowing again, but still YAY. The garden needed it.
Our melons got ripe all at once this year and the figs did too, so we are eating a lot of both. The tomatoes have really slowed down though. Not many of the big ones have ripened this last week. And the rain split out a lot of the cherry tomatoes. So right now there isn't much to harvest at all. A few banana peppers, some Anaheims, a few cucumbers--they are showing a lot of disease--and summer squash and okra.