My trusty friend...

It is HOT right now. It is DRY right now. We've been having 100+ degree weather for a few weeks and not a whole lot of rain. Certainly more than other parts of this state, but not much, still. Here is how dry it is:
Here is how STILL the air is: See any movement on the pole?

Excuse the explosion of pictures, my Nikon decided to find new life, so I went a little nuts today.
Here is a picture of the project I REALLY need to let my hubby complete this weekend instead of whisking him away as usual. Those are some great bushes, eh? Looks a little like my eyebrows after spending 4 months in a guest house with no tweezers. HAHA! We might just lose our sidewalk to mother nature soon, too.
Here is a female who had BETTER start laying soon or she will find herself becoming dinner. I'm totally kidding, but every day the kids and I search longingly for the first eggs. This breed is supposed to start laying at 16 weeks and lay over 300 eggs/year. They're 18 weeks old and have NOT gotten the memo yet.
Here is the male and other female.
Here is what I love about the south...Even though it's BLISTERINGLY hot and even the bugs won't move during the day, there are still flowers! Our crape myrtles are gorgeous as ever this year. It seems like the hotter the summer, the more they show off. Summer beauties for sure!
The next few pictures are my kids' versions of quiet time. Rhiya loves to sit in her room, (the guest house), and read her book. She's working on the Twilight series and I love that it's gotten her to read. She used to have a phobia about books over 150 pages long. Now she's pouring over these books and I'm so thrilled that the wonderful world of reading has been opened up to her.
GraceAnne likes to watch movies. She was chillin' with Alice this afternoon. We had a long morning, so she needed to wind down when we got home.
Violet's LOVES quiet-time because that means she can get into crap. She is a HANDFUL and a half. She did end up going for her 2nd nap. She was tired.
This is the very first picture in our new house. We're still not moved in, (hey, it's HOT in that garage! No one wants to stand out there and clean/bring things in!), but every day we do little things that make it feel like a home. I LOVE that picture! I got a $20 g/c for Shutterfly by registering this little one at Target, so I managed to score the 20x30 print for only 2.35! The frame was originally a multi-picture frame and on clearance at WalMart for 12.00. Pretty good deal if you ask me!
Lots of people have been asking about our pond, so the last 2 pictures are about it. I've mentioned in previous posts that this is a bio-filtered pond. We had a problem with the pre-filter on the pump getting clogged first. When we got home from San Antonio the water was FILTHY and disgusting. The neighbor said he had cleaned it out several times while we were gone and the filter didn't work at all. Turns out the ducks were eating the filter off the pump. So Allan rigged it so they can't eat the stuff. Then it worked pretty good, but next thing we knew we had a mosquito problem in the top of the filter. So Allan taped the lid on. Then the water got murky, (but not stinky) and after a week of no improvement, Allan did some research and realized that we NEED the lid off or no algae will grow, which is necessary to clear the water. So we took the lid off and dealt with mosquitos for a few days. After the algae grew over the top, the mosquitos can't breed in there anymore. So here it is:
The water is a "rust" color. This is because we don't have enough plants in the top to eat the nitrogen. I put in some of my water irises. Right now they look a little rough, but hopefully they will perk up. They can be submerged in about 3-4" of water, so they're in an environment they like. Here you can see the algae and the irises on the top of the filter. It's still a work in progress, but it'll get there.
Thanks for stopping by, hopefully you enjoyed the photo dump. I feel bad not posting in so long. We love and miss you all!