Poisoning Prickly Pear

Our little 10 acres has an abundance of prickly pear cactus. Rita attended a special poison class and learned how-to kill the cactus. She called me this morning and wanted to come start poisoning the pear today. I was excited to tag along to learn the specifics of how-to spray pear. With no workmen at the house today this would be a good day to start. The dry wall work is scheduled to start on Wednesday.

Rita taught me how to mix the poison and provided all the supplies. It is an easy and painless job unless you find yourself standing right in the middle of a red ant bed like I did. You never saw anyone pull their jeans off so fast! Once those ants started stinging me up my pant leg modesty went right out the door I didn't care if all the neighbors saw me with my pants off, those ants hurt! Sorry, no pictures of me with my pants off.

I have learned how-to of spaying pear. Now I will go back and poison the ants before I start again.

Flag Pole Stubs

Saturday at lunch time we were surprised by a phone call from Rita informing us Sam Caldwell, the flag pole man, was at our place to install the flag pole-stubs. Sam had gotten ill when he made the poles and was unable to finish the job installing the pole-stubs. Rita had called him early Saturday morning to discuss the steps we needed to take to install the poles ourselves. During their conversation Sam said his daughter and son-in-law would be happy to install the poles for us while he supervised. We quickly went over to the property to see how we could lend a hand and found his family already mixing cement and pouring it into the holes. They were fast. In no time the first stub was in and they were onto the next one. We wrote our family names on the cement rings, dedicated each one to our little pets, Elmo, Ginger and Blue Boy. Then we all put our hand prints in the cement too.

Paul has been busy contacting people today who might have the equipment to lift the poles into the holes.

Flag Poles

Paul and I were talking about the flag-poles this morning and how nice they will look in the circle drive once they are installed. We had not heard from Mr. Caldwell our flag-pole contact in some time so Paul decided to give him a call. He learned Mr. Caldwell had been ill with heart problems, but was much better now. The poles were ready for delivery and Mr. Caldwell decided to drive them out to the property this afternoon. Now we have to locate someone who can set them in place!

Suggestions appreciated.

Prickly Pear Cactus

There has been no new activity on the gas line since my last posting. I hope their crew will be back this week to complete the gas line work from the road up to the house.
The next step in our building process is the framing. We are hoping the framing will also start this week.
The cactus are starting to bloom everywhere on the place, they are such a beautiful yellow. There will be many more flowers to bloom on this big cactus right inside our entrance.
Tomorrow Elizabeth's girls Bible study class is coming down to the River for a "Swim, Sun and Fun Barbecue," after church. We have been mowing, raking and sprucing up the River all week preparing for Sunday's barbecue.

Wild Flowers

Wild flowers are blooming all over the property now. This one is called an Indian Blanket. There are yellow wild flowers, these indian blankets, the bluebonnets and a violet flower known as dakato verbena.

We have one more week to go before the framing starts on the house. We are anxious to get started.

Little Oak Tree

We continue to try and spruce up the entrance to our place while waiting for the cement slab to fully dry. This is the second native oak tree transplant. The first one I planted two weeks ago and is not doing too well. We placed the little oak trees flanking each side of the entrance. I dug up both from the River where we are presently staying. I am really hoping these will take hold.

Smoldering Cactus

Back on March 26, 2007 I posted a picture of piles like these we burned. These piles of cedar and prickly pear were created by the bulldozer clearing a path for our entry road. The only way to get rid of these large piles is to burn them. Yesterday we were shocked to see one of the piles had rekindled its burn, it was puffing away. With all the rain we had since these piles were initially burned I was surprised by this one still smoldering. In this picture you can see the smoke about in the center of the photo.

Waiting on the Plumber

Each day when I am at our property it is hard to imagine I will actually be waking up there someday. It is so peaceful and quiet with birds singing the greenery sprouting and the many pretty bluebonnets all over the property now.

We were watering our newly transplanted cuttings of sumac trees today and noticed them starting to sprout new leaves. Rita dug these up and transplanted them this weekend. They will be a lush green tree in the spring and a vibrant red tree in the fall a perfect choice color for the entrance.

The plumber called last night and rescheduled our job for tomorrow. The rain last week put him behind schedule.