We stayed at the Barcelo (The Colonial, not the Beach Club - there are actually 4 Barcelo resorts together) in March. We went for a wedding (so left the kids at home) on this particular trip, but we have stayed at AI resorts with our kids before (they are 11 and nearly 8). Our friends' stayed at the Beach club, and it seemed much busier and noisier than the Colonial. It *was* spring break time though, so perhaps there will not be as many drunken frat boys when you travel, :) Personally, I love travelling to an AI with the kids (we have been to AI's in the Mayan Riveria, Puerto Vallarta and the Dominican Republic; we also have a timeshare condo that is not AI in Mazatlan that we have been to several times). The buffet restaurants always had lots of choices as far as food goes (my son is a picky eater ), with lots of fresh fruit. The beach front buffets tend to carry lots of "American" food (hot dogs, hamburgers etc) that can be a change from the exotic food overload. The fish is always excellent. The entertainment at the Barcelo ranged from hokey-lame to very good. Pick chairs up higher but in the first row for best air circulation and view - it can be really hot sitting with all of those people. There was some noticeable hurricane damage still in evidence on the ride from Cancun to the resort, but the grounds themselves are in quite good condition. When we were there, there was some construction noise as they were rebuilding the pier/headlands. A lot of the actual sand had been blown off the beach, so it was quite rocky in some areas. Bring water shoes or sandals for the beach. There are plenty of chairs everywhere. The 4 resorts together are *enormous* - they must have close to a mile of beachfront, so there is plenty of room to spread out. Personally, I enjoy beach time with a bood and no one bothering me, so it was easy to get lost away from the other people in our group. There were virtually no beach vendors, which I actually kind of miss. I did find the prices for souveneir junk quite high at the resort, and very high on the shopping day we took to Playa Del Carmen. The fancy jewelery factory (don't be fooled by their promises of seeing "jewelery artisans at work" - it is primarily a giant showroom) near the resort actually had not bad prices, but a very small silver selection in comparison to the gold (mucho $$). We probably would not return to this resort again, but only because of the price, as we tend to be three star travellers, LOL. I don't have anything bad to say about the actual resort itself. Carrie

I would not be that thrilled with travel to Mexico at all because of safety concerns. Although my friend is considering Mexico for a 50th birthday celebration and since we went to Australia for my 40th, I'd feel obligated to go. When we were planning our wedding, DH and I lived in separate cities, and our extended families were in two different cities. We thought about destinations, but my mother was in her 80's and doesn't really travel that well and doesn't have a passport. So, we went with my hometown since that was the largest group that would likely attend. DH's grandma did fly in, and she did great. MIL paid for her and two aunts' tickets so they could attend. We really didn't want to get married in place where our mothers and grandmother could not make it. OTOH, DH's cousin planned a destination wedding in the Dominican Republic because he knew his family couldn't really attend there, especially his mother, who has had some mental health issues. This was really sad. The aunt may actually may have some sort of autism, but since she's in her 60's she would have never been diagnosed with it.

The soil gets better every year if you're amending it as you should....and the gardener gets better every year too. It all works together. : ) Here in OK the thing that throws the wrench into the works and gums it all up is the weather, because we never know when we are planting exactly what the weather is going to do for the next 6 or 8 months---it could be drought and no rain for 3 months or it could be flooding rains, 12" of rain in one day and 24" in one month. How in the heck can any gardener plan ahead and be prepared for all that? I stay out of feed stores during baby chick time or else I'll bring home chicks we do not need. They are too little, too cute, too fluffy and just too adorable to ignore. The last time we were in Atwood's they didn't have chicks in the stores yet, but I figured that for sanity's sake I need to stay out of Atwoods for the next couple of months, and TSC too. Rebecca, You probably are on track with your succession planting, but with snow peas/pole beans it might be a little tricky. I like to plant pole beans early---before the peas are done---because we get so hot here so early that my pole beans need to flower and set beans in May in case the heat is about to crank up too hot in June, which often happens here. If only the weather were perfectly predictable. My English iris, ornamental alliums, red hot poker and some daylilies (but not all) have been up for quite a while now---maybe a month? The daffodils were really late, and some of the daylilies aren't up yet, but I really think that is because of the lack of moisture. The recent rainfall should help with that. The autumn sages are leafing out, so I need to cut them back soon. Most of the reseeding herbs and flowers are no shows so far, but I saw the first couple of larkspur (sprouting in a pathway, naturally) a couple of days ago. I am thinking everything likely will just explode now that we had some rain. I hope Travis Meyer is right about Spring. I'm never going to be unhappy about an early Spring because I dislike Winter's cold so much. The incredibly, horrifically invasive pink evening primrose plants are popping up all over the front half-acre, and in the garden. I pull them out of the garden the minute I spot them. I am considering hitting the ones in the pasture with a herbicide. Yes I am! One plant gives you a million more and they invade everywhere. I got rid of them in the drought years of 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014...but they staged a remarkable comeback in 2015, 2016 and 2017's wetter weather. I cannot stand them. If you let them grow and reseed as they will, that's all you'll end up with in the end. I might keep them if they'd crowd out Johnson grass and bermuda grass---but they do not---they just happily coexist with it. Do you have any idea which parts of Fort Worth they're looking at? Maybe by direction, like North, South, East or West? The DFW metroplex has grown so very huge (7.23 million people) and Tarrant County's population so large (1.8 million I think and I am not sure how much of that is Fort Worth proper and how much is the suburbs that surround it) that it is hard to talk about parts of Fort Worth, as many people now buy homes in developments in the many suburbs that ring the city. Most people who move to the area try to choose a nice neighborhood that will be a decent commute to their work so that they don't spend an hour or two commuting each way each day. So, if you can tell me where their new place or places of employment are located, maybe I can point y'all in the direction of the great places nearby to live. And, I want them to be forewarned, it is a seller's market and homes are selling fast and at inflated rates, so if they want to buy, they need to pre-qualify to know their price limit and find a great real estate agent. Many of our friends who once lived in Fort Worth have fled to the outer, outer, outer suburbs as it all has become too urbanized for them in their former neighborhoods. Some have fled north almost to Denton, to north towards Denton and then west towards Decatur and the like. Others have fled very far south---farther south than Burleson and perhaps as far southeast as Mansfield. My niece tries to keep me up to date on what's what in terms of the neighborhoods and housing developments, and it shocks me when she mentions a neighborhood that was perfectly lovely and highly coveted when we left Fort Worth in 1999, and she tells me it has gone downhill and is now "ghetto". I guess nothing remains the way we remember it once was. If Saginaw and the area northwest of it are near their place of employment, there's tons and tons of new housing developments and new shopping centers going up there---for at least the last 10-15 years, and the growth is never-ending. It used to be Denton was considered a long drive from Fort Worth and too far to move to live, but now people tell me Denton isn't far enough away. I think much depends on whether they want to love in a highly developed neighborhood with lots of homes close together, etc., or if they want to move further out and had a half-acre or acre lot or even more. The weather was gorgeous here today. I trust it was gorgeous where y'all are as well. It was a little wet and muddy, but that won't last long. It actually was nice to see puddles for once. Of course, we had a fire. Remember how I told y'all that when rain falls in a bad fire year, it can make things worst? It sort of did that today. Some vehicle on I-35 had a tire that was coming apart and a piece of flaming hot tire landed in tall grass beside the road and set the grass and trees on fire. This occurred less than 12 hours after our rain stopped falling and it happened maybe a half-mile from our fire station. I was wondering if the ground was muddy enough for the brush fire trucks to get stuck, and suspected it probably was. The answer, apparently, was yes, and I learned that when one firefighter was yelling "stop, stop, back up, back up, you're gonna get stuck" to the fire truck behind him. Sitting at home listening to him holler made me grin---not because I wanted for anyone to get stuck, but because it is just so predictable. So, now that we have had rain, the fires will continue on because dry, dormant vegetation reminds dry and dormant, and the fires will be harder to fight off-road because of the mud. As my son would mutter sarcastically "Great, just great." One thing that was odd(in a good way) today was that it was so warm that the songbirds did not have to spend every minute of every day eating nonstop in order to stay fueled up and warm. I didn't have to refill the bird feeders until almost sunset. The stores near us still have all the typical cool-season transplants on the shelves, but also more herbs that I think of as needing slightly warmer weather...and quite a few tomato plants. This was the first week I saw tomato plants, and I won't remember all the different varieties I saw, but among them were Early Girl, Better Bush, Roma, Better Boy and maybe Beefmaster or Big Beef. Most were the smaller transplants that cost $3.48 or $3.58 in 3" peat pots, but the Early Girls were larger and cost $5.88 in what was probably either a 5" or 6" plastic (not peat) pot. They also had flats of pansies. Last week they only had violas. I bet next week they'll have flats of petunias. It follows a fairly predictable pattern here. We only went to Wal-Mart and didn't go across the road to see what was at HD because their plants come on the very same trucks from BP, I think, and they tend to get the same plants in at the same time. Exactly the same, but sometimes HD does have pepper plants in about two months too early---and earlier than Wal-Mart does. It was ridiculous to stand there and look at those big monster plants, all of which could eat my tiny tomato seedlings in one gulp. It doesn't make me wish I'd started mine earlier---because our soil is still far too cold for tomatoes. I believe I started mine at the right time for my area given my weather and soil temperatures (even with the recent warm-up). I might feel differently if the soil temperatures start hitting and staying in the 50s while my tomato plants are still 2 or 3" tall and wide. Gardening is an imperfect science. I hope people didn't see those tomato plants and automatically assume it is time to buy them, take them home and plant them because we have some freezing nights in our forecast around mid-week. Dawn

Phone is giving me fits, so I'm having to break my messages into small bits. Working in Garden today. Dug up a crepe myrtle that's getting too much shade, pink flowers, I will bring if someone wants it. Also and bringing some irises that were marked in one place as spuria and in another place as Louisiana. Whatever they are, they will grow. Have mother of millions, Cast Iron Plant, false aloe, Lamb's Ear, trumpet vine, Pink four o'clocks, several pots of flame acanthus, comfrey, Jewel of opar that I accidentally broke and stuck into a pot just this minute, little bit of lemon mint, some red Yucca, just tiny babies that I started from seed. If anyone wants, I can bring some pecan and Oak seedlings. They are very heavy and take up room so ask if you want. At least one pot of pigeon Berry. oddly enough, I have some horse herb. I planted something, forget what, and horse herb came up. Have something that I think is white mulberry, and a bunch of seeds, some pots, to seed starting trays with pots, a pair of in-line skates, and ttwo Willow wreath for crafts.