haha, Dawn, you must have not seen my post right before yours. I'm cold and it's not warm here at all. My outside plans have been cancelled.

I am so happy you are enjoying your warm day...someone should be enjoying a warm day. Being blessed with a day like that just energizes a person.

Dawn --

Lucky you with 74 degrees today. At almost 1:00, I'm at 43, cloudy, north wind...just yucky! I caught David Payne on my Facebook this morning and he was giving the month forecast. He believes we will be below normal temperature for the month of February and into the first half of March. So I think we are all wise in holding off planting.

Dawn, I need to get inside your brain for a bit. I spent most of the Super Bowl last night going thru old posts trying to find answers to my questions. Found some, but not all.

I have the room inside the house to set up shelves to start seeds, but have two cats that can open doors! haha. So, I'm setting up a set of shelves out in my garden shed to start seeds. I have a thermostat controlled space heater in there and on low, it's keeping it around 55 degrees. So Dawn, here is how I "think" to start seedlings - please correct me if I've got something wrong:

you put a heating pad under the seed starting container, cover with plastic until the seeds germinate and then remove the bottom heat and plastic cover and turn on the lights just as close to the seedlings as possible. And it doesn't matter if you use fluorescent or LED lights. Is this how it's done?? I don't have a heating mat and will need to order one. Do you have one you'd recommend? Does it need a thermostat? Dawn, do you still use the 3 oz dixie cups to start your seeds in and grow them up in those same cups until you transplant them out into the garden?? How long can you safely keep them under the lights? A couple of weeks?? Longer?? As I've said - I've never tried my hand at starting seeds - just always bought transplants.

I heard about this guy on one of my Woo-woo stations. His name is Theodore White, a Philly based weather predictor/astrologer. For fun, I signed up and get his newsletter on Facebook. In his April 23, 2017 post called Global Cooling: 2017-2053 What to Expect and What to Do he is predicting we are going into a little Ice Age-based on a whole bunch of data (that I've heard from other scientists also) regarding the sun and that we are in the beginning of the world getting colder and wetter with reduced growing periods. I'm not saying this guy isn't a bit touched, but instead of Good-willing any extra winter clothing for a while, I'm taking a wait and see approach. So check him out and see what you think.

I'm venturing outside to my garden shed to move some stuff around just to get a taste of spring - inside my heated shed:-)

Patti

I don't want to rub this in too much, but maybe just a little bit.....ultimately we made it up to 80 degrees officially at our Mesonet station and 81 degrees at our house. It was hot when I came into the house in late afternoon (when we currently were at 81 degrees at that time) so I turned on the air conditioner to cool down the house. Oh, yes I did. On. February. 4th. Make a note of that. lol.

As it got warmer, I got more and more cautious because I was worried about copperheads. I had that unpleasant encounter with one very early in the season last year and I don't want a repeat this year.

I got a lot of work done in the garden, but could tell I was not in prime gardening shape and bet I have some aches and pains tomorrow. Its all good though because I got to work in the garden.

In other big news (at least for our vehicles), the very last puddle of standing water, present pretty much nonstop since September, finally dried up today. Now, the two or three puddles that still had water this morning are still really wet, gooey mud, but there no longer is standing water. We still are supposed to be in the 70s tomorrow and Wednesday, but rain pops back into the forecast tomorrow morning so the puddles may refill. Rain is in the Tuesday-Thursday forecast, but the freezing cold doesn't arrive until overnight Thursday after the rain has ended, so winter precipitation isn't going to be an issue here like it possibly could be for some folks a lot further north in the state. At least some of us may have thunderstorms, possibly severe, as a possibility for a couple of days. I wish the cold wasn't coming back but, for us, it is just 3 days of cold after having had at least 5 warm days, so I think the 3 days will be bearable. The thing about the weather here is that no matter what it is doing, we know it will change in a few days at this time of the year.

Jennifer, I'm sorry your day out was cancelled by the cold. I have noticed that I no longer enjoy working too much in the cold either. I'd prefer to wait for warmer days, though not necessarily days that are warm enough to be snakey.

There was an unusual medical call for a person who supposedly had heat stroke. I don't think that seems realistic in February but you never know, and then there also at just about the same time was a good-sized fire north of us. I didn't have to go to either because we weren't paged to them, but I stopped and sat in my chair in the garden for a while and ate two sugar-free fudgesicles while listening to the fire radio so I'd know when the fire was out and if the person was okay. It still is a quiet fire season so far. I know I should be glad, but when it starts late, it tends to start in March, right around the time I'm hardening off or even planting tomatoes, and I hate that.

Our local TV met is mentioning Tstorms here twice in the next two days. I hope he is wrong. I'm not ready for thunder, lightning and all the rest. I'd be happy if the rain misses us altogether.

I'm tired. I'm too old to work as hard as I worked today, and I'm going to do it all over again tomorrow.

Dawn

I wore short sleeves into work at 9am, when it was in the low 60s, and at 5 I ran to the car because it was in the low 40s and I hadn’t brought my fleece inside with me.

Looking at the forecast, I have no idea if I will get anything done outside Wednesday. I also have no idea what to pack for DFW this weekend. Might need a parka, might need a swimsuit.

Patti, listening to woo-woo stations is entertaining for sure. Interesting about the 'little ice age'.

All of my seeds are here now. Just need my onions.

Rebecca, do I remember you commenting about receiving some free trial seeds? Did you order from Totally Tomato and did you receive Lime Green Salad tomato seeds and Picklers Pride Mix cucumber? I got those with my order.

Dawn, happy that you got so much work done today. Maybe try soaking in an Epsom salt bath tonight. It helps but doesn't take the soreness away completely.

I found where the hens were getting out and did a quick temp fix.

I'm going to talk about chickens again. Just a warning for those who want to skip over chicken talk. SO, I have this hen Marjorie. She was one of my first four. She was the first to lay an egg. She laid giant double-yolkers often. She got sick about 3 months after her first egg. I brought her indoors and fed her plain yogurt and water for 3 days. She healed and went back to her sisters. However, I'm fairly sure she has never laid another egg. She'll sit in a nest and cluck from time to time, but I'm almost positive she doesn't lay. She seems to be Jean-Luc's special helper. He doesn't try to mate with her. I wonder if he senses that she is infertile. However, she stands near him when he mates with a hen...and she talks to the hen. And when Stella or another is out in the yard and is returned, she will give the wayward hen a peck. Jean-Luc doesn't like it when the girls are outside the pen and frets about it. Anyway...I think her role is interesting.

Still don't have the light shelf cleaned off. Do have office type of supplies organized in the desk. For the first time since living in this house! Just need to go through the important paper stash. Yuck. So not fun. It will have to wait until Thursday probably.

It does seem weird to have nothing started. All seed trays are empty.

My lettuce and cilantro have sprouted. I feel like an expert already.

Wasn’t me, Jen.

Jennifer, Comfrey leaves are great for the compost pile---that is what I do with them. Or, sometimes I leave them on the ground as mulch for the newer comfrey plants as they resprout from the ground. Yesterday I noticed my comfrey plants are putting out tons of new, small leaves. I wish they'd slow down, but with this weather, I think the slowing down ship has sailed.

I eat the figs fresh. If there's too many to eat fresh, I make fig jam, which is delicious and not something you can just walk into the store and buy either. Tim and Chris don't like figs (horrors!) so I just laugh at them and say "more for me!"

No fruit trees are easy in Oklahoma, but the easiest probably are native sand plums as they tend to get caught by late freezes less often than any of the named cultivars we plant. Second easiest is figs. They will freeze like everything else, but make a strong comeback and can set two crops in one year. If the first crop freezes out, you generally get the second one. I have found plums to produce more consistently here in our climate than any of the other stone fruits, even though they are more prone to bloom early. Research your variety selection carefully because some plums need a second variety as a pollinator, or you'll never get fruit. Peaches produce a good crop for me one year out of three, a medium crop one year out of three and no crop one year out of three. The problem with peaches is that squirrels love them, birds love them, deer love them, so you have to fight the wild things for every fruit you get. Apples have recurring issues with cedar apple rust and preventing it means the use of something like Immunox every single year. To me, with abundant cedars all around us, apples aren't worth the bother. You also have to spray fruit trees consistently to avoid losing the entire crop to various fruit-loving pests, and it is really hard (but not impossible) to get a good harvest organically. Cherry trees are wonderful and will produce well some years, but then you will have to fight the birds for every single cherry. OSU has a great fruit tree spray schedule and a person should follow it precisely because various insecticides must be sprayed at specific stages in order to be effective. I've grown organically for 20 years but doing this means you must be willing to lose more fruit to pests in our climate.

Our fruit trees are being shaded out by larger shade trees nearby, except for the fig trees out back, which are being invaded by the persimmon grove out back. I'm about ready to cut down all the peach and plum trees, except the native sand plums along the south fence line, and just be done with growing peaches and plums. Our land is a lot shadier now than we were 20 years ago and I knew the day would come, eventually, when growing fruit would become very hard. It is here now. I could start over with new peach trees and plum trees in the back garden, but voles tend to devour fruit tree roots back there, so I don't think I will. I face the same issue with shade increasingly encroaching on the front garden. It now is less than half the size it once was, and the shade encroaches more and more every year. Someday the front garden will be all shade-loving flowers because someday that will be all that will grow there, and that day is coming closer and closer to arriving.

Patti, Thanks for the weather update. We can't pick up OKC stations down here, so I'm never sure if your weather up there is anything like what is going on down here. Our local TV mets are very experienced---they are great at giving accurate forecasts---but they focus only on the Texoma region so I rarely hear forecasts for any area further north than Ada or Atoka.

It is hard to explain the gut feeling about weather that I've come to rely on, but I have found that if I listen to what I laughingly call 'the voices in my head', they rarely steer me wrong weatherwise. I suppose we could refer to these gut feelings as intuition. All I know is that it serves me (and my garden) well to listen to that intuition and to speed up/slow down the pace of early season planting as needed in any given year.

I am not overly fond of the roller coaster weather pattern we've had this winter, but it is what it is and we appear to be stuck with it, so I plan to proceed with planting plans and seed starting very, very cautiously.

So, with your seed starting (I have cats who open doors too, and who think everything we do is all about them and only them), I think your plans sound good. The most important part (and I know you know this but I'll say it for less experienced gardeners who may be reading this) is to remove both the heat mat and plastic covering as soon as the seeds sprout. Keeping the heat mat in place can fry plant roots from the bottom and leaving the plastic on too long just leads to damping off. In fact, I so abhor even the prospect of damping off that I skip the use of plastic/heat domes altogether and my seeds sprout fine without them. I also rarely use a heat mat indoors, but will use it for pepper seeds if they're being slow to germinate. Having said that, I haven't used my heat mat in 6 or 7 years and rarely feel the need to drag it out of the closet. So, you don't really need one at all but it can be helpful if you're germinating seeds in a cool room. Since heat rises and I raise seedlings in an upstairs bedroom, the room they are in stays plenty warm without a heat mat underneath the seedling flat.

Oh, and I am envious of your heated shed. Mine is well heated in the summer months, but pretty cold the rest of the time.

I use normal shop lights with fluorescent lights. We have had them forever and forever, dating back to our earliest years here, so they might be considered antique lights by now. I haven't switched to LED lights, but I'm sure I will someday.

What I do with seedlings varies in any given year depending on the weather and how quickly the plants are or aren't growing. I start tomatoes in a 72-cell flat, with the seeds of each variety in one cell no matter how many of any given variety I am growing. Thus, as soon as the plants have two true leaves, I need to pot them up to give them room to grow. I usually pot up from the starter flat to 3 or 5 oz. Dixie cups, and then in the next round of potting up,which often is just 2 or 3 weeks later, I switch to 16 or 20 oz. SOLO cups. This is one area where I'm not picky about using Miracle Grow soil. It simply works better than anything else I've tried for growing on seedlings to a plantable size. It is a better quality than the MG organic soil-less mix, which was horrible junk when I tried it, seeming to consist of nothing much more than chunky pine bark (not small enough to be called pine bark fines) and chicken manure that stinks and burns plant roots and kills your plants. I tried it one year, had horrible results and swore never again.

Some years I have mixed up Al's 5-1-1 mix using an organic fertilizer like Mater Magic mixed in with it, but haven't been as happy with it as I thought I would be for raising seedlings, so I just buy a bag of MG Moisture Control and simplify things. I have found the Moisture Control works really really well with seedlings in our warm, windy Spring weather as it retains moisture well for them when they're outdoors hardening off in sometimes strong wind. Of all the things that are important to me as an organic grower, I try to avoid the use of all herbicides, synthetic pesticides as well as most broad-spectrum organic pesticides and chemical fertilizers in my garden, in that order, but I don't worry about the short amount of time that the plants are growing in MG Moisture Control. It is just more practical for me to do what works. When I grow seedlings on in a soil-less mix without a pelleted fertilizer, I have to water once or twice a week with the organic fertilizer of my choice (generally that would be Neptune's Harvest) and/or top dress the soil in the cups with Espoma tomato food, and in a bad fire year, I don't have the time or energy for that. When we are having a bad fire season, my seedlings are lucky to survive my neglect and I'm just happy if I can manage to be home long enough to water them. Sometimes it is hard to even find time to pot them up properly, but I don't think this will be one of those years as long as we keep getting the little rounds of rainfall. All bets are off, though, once the strong March winds arrive.

Jennifer, It sounds like your chicken, Marjorie, may have had an infection that destroyed her ability to lay eggs. That is odd, and isn't it strange that Jean-Luc picks up on that and doesn't 'bother' her?

Rebecca, I hate the weather at this time of the year. This weekend I kept going out in short sleeves and lighter weight clothing that seemed like it would be weather-appropriate, and then we'd come out of a store or restaurant or whatever and I'd feel like I was freezing to death. Tim was fine, but he likes cold weather. The minute we hopped into our vehicle I'd turn on the heater and the heated seat on my side of the SUV, while he had the AC on over on his side. lol. I would turn off the heat and heated seat as soon as it warmed me up, but then we'd get out of the vehicle to run the next errand and I'd be freezing by the time I got back into the vehicle again and would go through the whole thing one more time. It probably would have been easier to wear long sleeves and heavier weight clothing and just be too warm during the brief periods the sunshine was out shining and warming up everything.,but that wasn't what I did. At this time of the year, it is like we have to dress for winter most mornings, and then shed layers when the weather is spring-like by noon, and then either shed more layers if it heats up a lot like yesterday, or put more layers back on if a cold front blasts its way through. This sort of weather certainly makes getting dressed daily a real challenge.

I'm being as productive outdoors as I can now before the cold returns, and then I can spend the cold days indoors doing other stuff. I just look at the weather and shrug. It the weather isn't good for getting outdoor work done this week, then the worm will turn again and it will be good sometime next week. At least we aren't stuck with endlessly cold, endlessly wet, endlessly cloudy and icky winter weather like folks in some parts of the country are at this time of the year. We have a chance every week to have some good weather days, so then the whole issue becomes whether the good days align with your days off from work.....and I realize that often they do not. That was one of my biggest frustrations before I gave up my career to be a stay-at-home mom. (Ha, and a stay-at-home gardener.) We all just do the best we can to work with whatever we've got at any given stage in our lives. I'd go to Fort Worth and have a lot of fun and just worry about getting stuff done some other week.

I used to be the sort of person who was out in the garden all day long from sunup to sundown every single day that it was possible, and I worked outside even if the high was going to be 20 degrees. What happened to that woman? Ha ha ha. She got older and hopefully wiser. I do a better job of pacing myself nowadays, mindful that this body needs to be treated more kindly as it ages and that I need to do my best to avoid wearing out my body to the point that it no longer enjoys gardening. I certainly feel more aches and pains now than I used to, and I tire out more easily than I once did, and that is inevitable as we get older, so I'm trying to learn to work smarter, not harder. That doesn't mean that I don't want to be outdoors all day every day because I do, but I'm no longer willing to pay the price in terms of how long it takes to recover from days like that. This is normal---obviously a 60 year old body is going to react differently to long gardening days than a 40 year old body does, and I expect that I'll find the same thing true when I hit my 70s and my 80s if I am fortunate enough to live so long. I have seen Fred deal with a lot of frustration as he ages because he expects to be able to do the same things in his mid- to late-90s that he did in his mid- to late-70s and mid- to late-80s and that just isn't realistic---he just cannot push himself as hard as he once did. I do understand his frustration and am grateful his son lives with him and helps him with the physical chores.

I have found it is virtually the same way with food preservation. I've always grown hugely excessive amounts of all produce and spent tons of time filling up three deep freezes with everything possible in addition to doing lots of canning and dehydrating. Well, like everything else, one's body pays a price for long, long days spent in the kitchen doing food preservation, so I'm trying to grow less and preserve less while still managing to preserve enough. Having grandchildren makes this process easier because they and their activities remind you that you no longer can garden and preserve food 24/7, and I even happen to think that's a good thing. For so long I focused mostly on the garden and food preservation and the rest of my life had to fit into the time and space left available, but slowly I'm shifting to where the focus is more on the girls, and the gardening and food preservation just have to squeeze into the time left available. It is a monumental shift for me, even though it is happening slowly and in a manageable way. I want for the girls to enjoy gardening and enjoy having fresh food that we've grown ourselves, but I also don't want for them to feel enslaved by the garden when they'd rather be going to the playground or playing with their toys or even just following the chickens around the yard. Different ages, different stages and all that, I suppose.

Dawn

Well, Madge and I felt like getting out for a while today. Madge worked on cleaning a flower bed and I gathered some mulch. It is still too wet to do anything, but, I think that I may plant some radishes, lettuce, and maybe cabbage and peas. One thing about buying seeds at the Farmers Co-op is that you get them cheap enough that you can be a little careless with them. There is a knoll south of the house where I harvester the mulch that is dry enough that I can work the soil, it should be a good place to toss some seeds. I expect that the deer may eat the plants ( if any come up ) because they are really hitting the green food hard this time of the year. I have plenty for them to eat without them getting anything new that might come up, but they dont seem to see things just as I do.

It's still too cold to be out working; our high today was 46 and it has been drizzling all day. Rain for tomorrow, perhaps, and near 60, maybe. And then cold again. I got the greens in one of the large totes greenhouse style like Rebecca. And I've got lemongrass and the asparagus ferns started. Until I finish with the seeds that are getting stratified, no flours to plant, since rest can be sown directly into the beds (the new colorful four o'clocks, zinnias, marigolds, nasturtiums.) I'll start tomatoes and peppers in another week or 10 days, more greens outdoors, along with carrots, Swiss chard and kale.

I'm waiting on onions, another order of potatoes, and the live plants I ordered (that I won't get until April.)

I am antsy to get things planted but what makes it easier is there will be that much less time watering them once or twice a day. So that is a good thing.

GDW had run his truck into one of those low yellow concrete barrier posts (those are such a pain in the neck, and so easy not to see), and it dented the black "plastic" guard below the bumper. That thing was going to cost about $350 to replace. The guy at O'Reilly's told GDW it would come right out with a heat gun. So Garry bought the $28.00 heat gun, brought it home and fifteen minutes later his plastic bumper guard was good as new.

Eileen's NY's spread on Sunday was so amazing. What a great cook she is. I hadn't realized.

That's about it from here. Sitting here twiddling my thumbs. . .waiting. I have no excuse to be twiddling my thumbs. I will either paint tomorrow or quilt. Swear.

Larry, I'm glad you and Madge were able to get outside and enjoy yourselves some today.

Yes, deer don't see things the same way we do! I know that they think anything green they see is meant for them.

At least our standing puddles dried up, though the ground remains heavily saturated. So, we had a day or a day and a half without standing water, and then it rained a little last night and is raining now. The heavy rain is not expected until this afternoon and evening, and then again next Monday and Tuesday.

While cleaning up the garden yesterday, I pulled out 8' metal t-posts used (with Hortnova plastic trellis netting attached) to form trellises for vining crops. I pulled the posts because I rotate the trellises from one bed to another every year so I can achieve proper crop rotation. Those t-posts were about one foot deep in the ground. When I got them out of the ground, the bottom 6-8 inches were coated in heavy, heavy mud. So, whatever small amount of drier soil I am seeing in the raised beds still has tons of heavy mud beneath it. If we didn't have raised beds, I think I wouldn't be able to plant for months yet.

Nancy, This is my last warm day to work outdoors (maybe), so I hope the rain moves on through and lets me have some warm time in the garden. Monday we topped out at 81. I think the forecast was for 75. Then yesterday, the forecast was for 73 and we made it up to 76. Today's forecast is for 72. The cold comes back, and comes back hard, tomorrow, so I've tried to do what I can and I'd like to be out there doing something today, weather permitting. However, mindful of the cold and the fact that I have lots of annuals sprouting too early, I've been careful to avoid pruning back any perennials no matter how cold-damaged they are right now. I want for that damaged top growth to protect the new foliage coming out below. I've also lightly piled garden debris, like dead marigold plants, on top of the young emerging annuals to protect them from the cold. Normally I just rake up and clean up all the debris in February, but with so many foolish little seedlings popping up too early, I thought I'd use some of it to mulch over them before we get very cold Thursday night.

There's a lot of autumn leaves at the lower northern end of the garden, having fallen there from trees in the adjacent woodland. I am dying to rake up those leaves so we can shred them and put them on the compost pile, but it has been so warm that I dare not touch them for fear the copperheads are there blending right end with them. So, on one of the cold mornings we're going to have beginning in a couple of days, I need to rake those when snakes won't be out.

I'm antsy to get things planted too, but it is too early. Waiting is hard, and since the cold keeps coming in cycles, there doesn't seem to be any reason to get in a big hurry.

I'm glad Garry was able to repair his vehicle himself. How cool was that?

Eileen worked so hard and her appliance issues made it so challenging so I am very glad to hear that it all went so well.

Sometimes winter down time is good, you know, and you don't have to stay busy every minute. That busy time when come soon enough after the weather warms up.

More little plants are sprouting in the garden, notably more dill, some fennel and lemon balm.

I have gotten more beds cleaned out, other than deliberately leaving debris cover for seedlings. I think I now have 10 out of 15 raised beds cleared of plant debris and the few winter weeds that were sprouting in the mulch. I also have cleaned out some grade-level growing areas along the western and northern portions of the garden where we never built raised beds. Hitting those winter weeds early is the key to keeping them from getting established. I need to get a load of mulch and fill in any spots where weeds have sprouted. I'd like to get the rest of the beds cleared out today, and if the weather permits, I will. I just looked outside and it still is raining, so I may need a Plan B that involves doing things indoors. I looked outdoors because I heard thunder. So, I may not get the outside time I'm hoping for. We do have a very slim chance of hail and tornadoes this afternoon, but the daytime is supposed to only have a couple of waves of rain move through, and the sun might even peek through the clouds this afternoon. February tornadoes, while rare, do happen. We had an EF-4 hit the edge of our county and adjacent Jefferson County and then a significant portion of Carter County (the community of Lone Grove) on February 10th, 9 years ago, causing 8 deaths and almost 50 injuries. Since that occurred, folks here take possible tornadic weather in February a lot more seriously than before.

I spent time yesterday cleaning up and reorganizing the garden shed. It really wasn't in bad shape---just cluttered from stuff left here and there at the end of the growing season. I put a 4-shelf plastic shelving unit in there, and gathered up everything that was on the white work table or the floor beneath it and organized it into plastic totes on the shelves. That leaves the white work table free for use as a work surface. The only thing left on the table now is my garden tool bucket filled with hand tools, and the table is where I always leave it when it isn't in use. With the space beneath the table cleaned up, I am able to store all the 8' t-posts I pulled from beds yesterday underneath the table, and I put the rolled-up trellis netting formerly attached to the poles on the top shelf of the shelving unit, stored in a blue IKEA laundry basket. In mere weeks I'll have to figure out where this year's trellises will be and will drag everything out of the shed and put them up, but I don't have to think about that until pea-planting time. I move the trellises every year or two for crop rotation.

The flu really has exploded here and a lot of the small local school districts are closing for a few days because of (a) absenteeism rates of more than 30%, and (b) so many teachers being ill that they cannot get enough substitutes so have begun combining multiple classes into one. It isn't just flu, but also a lot of strep throat and recurring rounds of some sort of stomach virus, so local parents, in particular, have their hands full with sick kids. Friends of ours who are sick tested positive for Type A Flu this week, but we know others who tested positive for Type B. Our granddaughter's school, the largest school district here in our area, has cancelled classes for the rest of the week. Another local school in our county had to cancel classes because OG&E has three gas leaks very close to the school and is working to repair them. It is fortunate OG&E found these leaks before anything could explode near the school, but now the school is sort of at the mercy of the repair process and just felt it was safer to not have anyone in the school buildings until the nearby leaking gas lines are repaired. The kids who are rejoicing at the unexpected holiday from school won't we rejoicing in May when they are having make-up days tacked on to the end of the school year.

The warm days have caused explosive growth of the daffodils and now, plants that were barely emerged and low to the ground last week are 4-6" tall and have visible buds preparing to bloom. My daffodils aren't even early-season types. I choose mid-season types so they wouldn't bloom too early, and these are going to bloom too early anyway. They bloomed early in 2017---at the very end of February right as a big cold front was coming our way. I remember that well. So, this year, they're going to bloom well before that. Fortunately, daffodils can withstand a lot of cold and even snow.

The warm weather this week has spoiled me and I am SO ready to get out into the garden this morning. The pesky rain is messing up my day.

Dawn

Nancy, that's great that Garry was able to fix his own truck!

Dawn, I'm so impressed with all the work you got done the past two days. Did the weather allow you to work outside today too. It's weird here. It is currently 61 in Moore and 44 in Norman. I'm in south OKC right now and I'm not sure what the temp is here, but it's not super cold just dark and chilly and damp.

I'm leaving work earlier than normal for a Wednesday and going to Lowes to pick up the paint for the dresser. I'm feeling uneasy because of a couple of nightmares I had the past two nights. Then, on Sunday, as I was getting ready for work, the movie Silence of the Lambs popped into my head...specifically the part where the girl is driving and the Tom Petty song, American Girl was on her radio--right before she helps the serial killer and he kidnaps her. THEN--for REAL, I came home late that afternoon after grocery shopping and Ethan was watching Silence of the Lambs and THAT part was on (Girl driving, American Girl playing) right as I walked in. I've thought about this coincidence...there's no way he knew that was in my head. He was still asleep when I was in the bathroom getting ready for work. I didn't mention it at all later, because why would I? It was just a fleeting thought. And we've never once talked about that movie. So, last night I had to stop at Walmart after Pilates and I have the bad habit of parking at the dark end of the parking lot because it's where you can walk through the garden center. I felt a little creeped out (because after telling my coworker of that coincidence, she warned me to be careful), but then got really creeped out because the same guy kept appearing on the aisle I was on. It's possible he also needed dental floss, ziplock bags, and witch hazel. ANYWAY, I'm parking under a bright light at Lowes and not helping anyone load anything into their van.

That is all.

Hazelinok-

That would creep me out too! Always listen to your gut instincts.

Up here in Logan County we are 33 degrees - have been all day long. Larry and I had doctor's appointments in Edmond this morning. Seemed like the further south I drove it warmed up a tad - but only to 37 degrees. Poor Larry had a rig and a hot oiler working on one of his wells and was out in this drizzly mess all afternoon. I fixed him an extra big chicken pot pie to warm him up.

I went out to my potting shed to check on my grow light and all seems to be well. It's holding about 62 degrees. I took my little windowsill tray with Alt rosemary tips out there yesterday to put under the light. I'm trying to get them to root but I had them in a north facing bedroom window in the house and I think all are dead but for 4-5. We'll see. Not a big loss - I needed to get some size off the plant and just thought I'd give it a try. I've taken the plastic lid off and it has no bottom heat. Is that ok?

I planted a Sam's bag of tulips last fall in the north facing bed under my kitchen window. I had to replant them 5-6 times as something kept uprooting them at night. The poor things are starting to come up this past week and even the ones that the animal took a bite of is greening up. I'd dig her a hole, but I'm afraid I'd disturb the roots. I'll probably get some potting soil and cover her up.

I'm on a Tour Committee in my Master Garden group and I set up a tour next Tuesday after our regular meeting to tour the Guthrie Greenhouses. They are the Red Dirt plants you see in stores. I'm really excited to see their operation. My uncle lived in Guthrie and I remember the greenhouses were about a block or two behind his house. Now, I can't count how many they have. I'm going to find out and report back. In September we are going over to Arkansas to tour P. Allen Smith's house. This has been on my bucket list for decades! And getting to go with ladies who love flowers - and not my husband who couldn't care less. Now don't get me wrong, I love him, but this isn't on his bucket list!

Dawn, just watched the weather and can't believe how warm your neck of the woods are compared to us up north! It's amazing how the weather varies in our state.

Everyone stay tucked in and warm tonight. Spring arrives in just 42 days!!!

Patti

Jennifer, I was able to squeeze in a few hours in the garden this afternoon after the rain finally moved on out of here. I worked until it was almost dark, but still managed to get indoors and get dinner made before Tim arrived home from work. I cleaned out three more raised beds, weeded a pathway at the low, north end of the garden that had weeds sprouting in the mulch, and worked on other miscellaneous little garden tasks here and there. I did remember to bring tender plants into the mudroom tonight because we will awaken to temperatures near freezing in the morning. Today wasn't as warm as the other days, but it still hit 73 degrees and we briefly had sunshine. Of course, rain fell, so the puddles that dried up a couple of days ago are refilled already. Some places at the north end of the garden that I was trying to weed (not raised bed areas) couldn't be weeded because they still are heavily saturated from rainfall. Oh, I could pull up weeds, but huge clumps of mud came up with them, so I gave up on that idea.

Lucky the cat stayed with me in the garden, which is her favorite place in the world, and apparently it turns out she likes to herd chickens. While the chickens know they are not allowed in the garden, they decided to slip in through the gate and start digging and scratching in the mulch. Lucky and I were at the far northeast end of the garden, which is the most low-lying area, and the chickens came in the gate at the highest point of the garden---the southwest corner. We ignored them until they had worked their way down close to where we were and then, at that point, Lucky had had enough. She walked straight towards them, staring them down, and they all headed straight for the garden gate. The rooster is a lot bigger than Lucky but even he wasn't going to stand up to her. So, when the chickens reached the gate, Lucky turned around and came back to me, stretching and purring contentedly as if to say "did you see what I did?". Then, she heard the chickens making chicken sounds as they slipped back into the garden and off she went again. .This time she escorted them out of the garden and sat at the gate until they had gone maybe 100' away from the garden. She's a great chicken herder and I had no idea.

Today in the garden I noticed the largest Arp rosemary is blooming. I unearthed a brown stink bug while digging out a clump of crabgrass. I delightedly smashed that stink bugs to smithereens with my trowel. That wasn't even the best moment. Later on, while pulling up some wild carrots that were creeping under the north garden fence, I found an overwintering leaf-footed bug and I killed it too. Any winter day that I can kill two of my least favorite garden pests is a good day.

It has been a great week in the garden, but it is over now. Still, we had 5 good days of incredible warm weather before winter rolls back in overnight.

Your dream and all was creepy. I hate creepy dreams like that, and your experience with the same person on the same aisles at the store is sort of creepy as well. I'm glad you made it home safely.

Patti, Well, your cold creeps me out! What does the weather think it is doing up there? Acting like it is February or something? I wish y'all could have had the lovely weather we've been having down here.

Have fun on the garden tour. I love, love, love Red Dirt plants! Their quality is so good and I believe their prices are much better than those for Bonnie Plants. If there is some kind of plant I need to buy, I always look at Atwood's in Gainesville, TX, first to see if they have it there because I'd rather buy Red Dirt plants than anybody else's.

I bet seeing P. Allen Smith's landscaping and plants is going to be awesome and I'm glad you're going to get to do it with other garden lovers. That is going to be such a fun trip for y'all.

I guess Spring is getting closer and closer but we all know it is just a date on a calendar and sometimes Oklahoma's weather doesn't get with the program and give us spring weather (at least not consistently) when we expect it. Let's hope there's not round after round of late freezes like we had last year.

The rain here today was minimal---a little under a quarter inch, but since the ground remains saturated already, it all sat on the surface and puddled and ponded, making it seem like more rain had fallen. More rain is supposed to reach us in the overnight hours. We're still really warm here--69 degrees at 9:30 p.m. It is so bizarre. It took forever to cool off last night too. Sometime while we're sleeping the cold front will blow through here. Supposedly our high for tomorrow will be 43 degrees and we'll hit it at midnight, but I'm not so sure we'll cool off that quickly. We are supposed to keep dropping then, and be at 32 degrees by 9 a.m. (Tim is having a hard time wrapping his head around the fact that he'll have to dress for cold weather in the morning because he's gotten used to leaving for work with temperatures in the 60s this week. I think that he thinks I am pranking him when I tell him the forecast for tonight and tomorrow. lol. I guess it is back to the coat, hat, gloves and boots again tomorrow morning, and I don't intend to work in the garden either. I worked as hard as I could on the warm days knowing they weren't going to last. I think our local TV met said we will have 3 days of cold weather here and then warm back up to normal February temperatures by Monday or so. One good thing about February is it is a short month that flies by pretty quickly.

I hope none of y'all get the ice that's in the forecast....or hail....or tornadoes.....or anything else.

Dawn

Bon, As you can see, we did not cool off by midnight, so our official high temp for today was registered at midnight as 70 degrees. lol. Not to worry, Mother Nature brought us down to 32 before 7 a.m. On paper, it will look like we had a warm day but all we really had was a few warm hours overnight.

I was watching the NWS webpages yesterday and last night as the Winter Weather Advisory and Ice Storm Warning areas expanded bit by bit through the addition of new counties here and there.

I think some areas of the state were surprised by ice either falling when rain was expected or roads freezing over after rain fell. It looks like things are a mess in much of the northern half of the state. When the strong wind and rain finally moved through here beginning around 3 a.m., I looked at the statewide school closing list and it wasn't that long. This morning it is significantly longer. When I was awake, I noticed the Winter Weather Advisory had been extended down into southcentral OK into three counties for a few hours, but by the time I woke up this morning, it already had expired for areas this far south. At least portions of three other counties near us lost power after a huge feeder transmission line was brought down when the storms tore through here. On the news this morning, it was unclear how widespread the outages are and it also was unclear if the power still is out.

Two more Carter County school districts have cancelled classes for the rest of the week due to widespread flu and strep throat. They are the 7th and 8th school districts to recently cancel classes due to widespread illness. Things are so bad there that the local hospital is asking all visitors, but in particular children, to stay away, in order to lessen the spread of the flu. Last week they had restricted visitors to new moms/babies in order to protect them, and then they came out with the general request that all visitors stay away. Wow. Apparently while I have been all wrapped up in doing garden work on these warm days, the flu outbreak was spreading rapidly in our region. Down here in Love County, no schools have closed due to illness and our hospital still is allowing visitors but I am not sure if we're much better off than our neighboring county to the north or if we're slower to respond. Since we still seem fairly healthy here, I think that if we go anywhere this weekend, we'll head south instead of north just to be presumably safer from the flu. I had the flu in August, which was horrible at the time, but now am grateful I got it over with early.

I'm so grateful for all the garden chores I was able to complete this week, but now, after having experienced at least 5 nice warm days that went as much as 30 degrees above average, the cold is going to seem even worse by contrast. Other than bundling up and going outside this morning to fill up the bird feeders (should have done it last night while it was warm, but I was trying to get dinner made) and also to feed the chickens and wildlife, I plan to stay inside and stay warm today. From 81 degrees earlier in the week to an expected low tonight around 20 degrees is such a huge change, but at least it happened over a period of several days and not all in one day. The one good thing about this cold is that none of the fruit tree blooms are large enough or open open yet to suffer damage, so hopefully this cold slows down their rush to blossom. If we'd had just 2 or 3 more warm days, I think it would have been too late for the fruit trees as they seemed to be rushing headlong into spring blooming this week in all this heat. Thy probably still will bloom too early---I don't see them going another 6 weeks on the verge of blooming without going ahead and blooming, but for now at least, they have been stopped in their tracks.

Dawn

The Bowie place did not work out. Next.....

The right place will happen Bon.

Lots of slick bridges up here this morning. We just missed the worst of it, though. Osage and Washington counties and everything to the north and northwest of there has a full blown ice storm. Glad it didn’t make it this far south.

DFW this weekend. My cat saw me putting tog my bag for the trip, and decided to stop speaking to me for a few hours. I’ll probably be in trouble when I get home.

The roads didn't seem too bad, but the parking lot had a thin layer of ice across it. Our pups did not want to get up today. In fact, our older boy didn't even get out of bed until I was passing out treats before I left. The younger two just ran ot to take care of business then were ready to come inside and burrow back under the blankets. It's a shame they're so neglected lol.

This cold snap is hard on my pocketbook. Had to order more garden plants.

Thanks for the picture of the weather, Bon. I now get it. I kept thinking, "Dawn's weather is NOTHING like ours here." Dawn's weather is nothing like the weather for many of us in OK, huh!? Wow.

Yep, Jen, even Titan isn't staying out very long. He's been in and out about a dozen times today. The cats went out this morning for 30 minutes and they were DONE.

Rebecca--you'll hate coming home after a trip to DFW! Can I go with you?

Yes, our deck has been slippery all day. And how it didn't snow during the night is beyond me--it rained cats and dogs--we got an inch. Garry wanted me to check the forecast to see when he could quit being a recliner potato. I checked, and said, "Never, I guess." February looks to be extra chilly. LOL Wow--it has warmed up to 25 and 16 with wind chill.

I'm thinking of you, Kim, and praying for you.

I'm wondering if I've forgotten any other important flowers I intended to grow this year.

Amy's obsession with peach/coral/salmon colored flowers is beginning to spread to me. Which is not a bad thing. I found peach-colored ginger and realized I had to try them. Do any of you grow ginger? What about ladies mantles?

Kim, I'm sorry to hear that the place in Bowie didn't work out. Is there a Plan B, or is it back to the drawing board again?

Rebecca, I was wondering if the ice made it far enough south to reach you. I'm glad it didn't.

lol lol lol about the cat. You know that when you return from your trip, you will have to put up with the cat's wrath and attitude.

Jen, Our dogs were the same way. Out and then in again as quickly as possible. They have such a rough life.

Nancy, I keep telling you my weather is like the weather in Dallas and, when I say that, I swear I am not making it up! Usually this works to my advantage, but it can work against me when we go from too cold to plant tomato plants to too hot to get fruit set all within the same week. It is why I push so hard to plant early---it is the only chance I have to get great fruit set. We don't always get hot insanely early here, but sometimes we do.

Our cats haven't even gone out today, except the one who went to the vet to be neutered. He is a semi-feral rescue that we think we have tamed. Ha. He just arrived home and he is mad at us!

The grandkids are coming tonight to spend 3 nights. I hope I've had enough recovery time from day-long gardening all week to be ready for day-and-night grandchildren. We have a lot of indoor activities planned because it just is going to be too cold to do much outdoors.

In my heat, peach and salmon fade to almost white, so I love the hot colors. Last year we had tons of yellow in the garden. This year it will be tons of red because the hummingbirds love it so.

Ladie's mantel was a fail here---it likes cool and mild weather, which I have in short supply. It might do better up there.

Dawn

I do love the red, too, Dawn, and will have a lot more of it this year than I've had in the past.

Oh, wow. You are going to be BEAT three days from now! LOL. Ask me how I know! But it's fun, huh!

Amy and I were discussing lady's mantle today. I wouldn't be surprised if it fails here, too, but will give it a try. I'm going to try it out front where it would only get an hour of sun. I appreciate your answer, though.

We have snowflakes drifting down. LOL Garry just pointed that out to me and said, "You might have an inch of snow in your rain gauge tomorrow.

It's back to the drawing board again. I have thought of couch surfing but at my age that does seem very fun. My landlady requested a visit Saturday so we will see what is going on there. I am going to get little man tomorrow night. I have not seen since Christmas day. I miss him so much but such. Challenge to get things straight.

Jen, Thank YOU! Okra seeds! A very nice early BD gift. Thank you! Thank YOU!!

I'm so sorry, Kim. Glad you get to see your little man this weekend.

What new garden plants did you order, Nancy?

A new cat, Dawn! Does he have a name?

My dogs are bored out of their minds.

FInbar darts out and in of the house as we go out and in. Tom is smoking some meat to put in chili for a chili cook off, so there is a lot of that activity right now. The smoker is in the shop (unfortunately. He needs a smokehouse.) Back to Finbar, he brought his first dead mouse to our back door. It was a tiny little thing. Juno doesn't go out. Both got their nails trimmed this afternoon. They luckily accept that without much of a fight.

I feel like my sentence structure is weird tonight. Weirder than usual.

First coat of paint is on the dresser. It's too bad that I have to wait a minimum of 3 hours to recoat. I think I've found a new home for some of our black distressed furniture. Our second living room (the kids living room) at our old house had black distressed furniture. I like it, but there's no place for it. Anyway...the point is, I'm making progress. And it feels so good. The utility room needs an organization re-do, but the dumb crates are in there. As long as we have these particular dogs, we will need crates. I've thought about moving my light shelf to the third bedroom and out of the utility room. The second year here, it was in the 3rd bedroom. It's something to think about. I'm scared to leave the lights on when I'm not home because of that light malfunction last year. Sure don't want a fire.

And I am sorry, too, Kim. Keep us posted.

Well, Jennifer, this week's order so far is Malva (Mystic Merlin), Sweet woodruff, and Hardy narrow-leafed Peach Ginger from Almost Eden. :)

Last week's was tatarian asters and gladiolas.

My CATS are bored out of their minds. Yay, Finbar!

Hi all. I had more flower questions, and was going to start a new thread, but with changes can't figure out how!? Could someone start one? Lisa???? So my newest flower questions is what about crossandra? They sound awesome, but I'd likely have to start anew each year. I would think they grow good here--do you have experience?

Nancy, nothing is more dangerous than a bored cat.

Glad you got them, HJ. I've been carrying them back & forth to work for a couple weeks, keep forgetting to get stamps. And that reminds me, I still have Megan's envelope waiting. I SWEAR I'll get the money in the mail by the weekend. You can hold my seeds hostage if you'd like!

Kim, warm thoughts and well wishes for you. If there's anything we can do to help . . . .

This is too cold, ya'll. I'm glad the wind is calm! The wood-burning stove is full blast and it only takes the chill off. We're huddled in the bedroom room near a small heater. lol

It'll be gone as fast as it arrives, but dang.

40 days to spring !!

Thank you all. I know my ramblings aren't garden related but you all so sweet and encouraging.

Today I am down with the worst pain ever around my left side front to back by my ribs. I am treating as kidney or colon so i will be covered either way. Made the best herbal tea with milk thistle, blueberries, hibiscus, and rose hips. I have an arsenal of homeopathic medicine so I should be good to go soon. Warning signs fever, slight pain for 4 days. In my jobjobs I always have a littlwntwinge of pain.

I received my prize of 26 seed packages and Clyde's planner. What a serious blessing. Out of 26 ppkpkgs 12 are things I wanted but wouldn't spend the money on this year. All are things I dont hhahavhave except one.

Really thrilled me how it seems the seeds were hand selected for me. It gives me hope that I may actually get to garden this year.

Cool! I bought that eggplant this year and the Nero "cabbage" (sold other places as kale) is tasty.

Ha, Kim! Great score! I'm so happy you won them.

Good to know Amy. I have been down with kidney so haven't done any research yet. Cant wait to stastarstartstart a few.

Nothing gardeny to talk about....it's flippin' cold outside!

Kim, I'm sorry you are sick. I hope you feel better soon....but congrats on that great seed collection!

I'm going to come back with a pic of a dead critter. I don't think it's a mouse...maybe a possum or mole or something. It is very small, though. No bigger than 2 inches long. There are several dead ones in the back yard.

Welp, whatever it is , it won't be a problem in your yard this year! Sorry they froze to death. I guess there's worse ways to go.

Bon, I'm afraid it's my great hunter, Finbar, who is killing them and bringing them to the backporch area.

Looks like a mole to me. Can't believe you posted that. LOLOL. Wow. Spose Finbar's responsible? If so, you got a darned good cat. We either have no pests or we have 3 useless cats. LOL I DO think we have no pests right now, because I see Tom and Tiny as little critter-killing monsters. Jerry would prefer just lying on Garry Dean's lap. :) You are correct, Rebecca, a bored cat is a dangerous cat. Luckily for us, bored humans can keep an eye on bored cats. That's about all the entertainment we have. HJ--just saw your Finbar post. Finbar's a rock star! Hope his cousin Tiny will be, too.

It IS flippin' cold. Dagnabbit! BUT I actually am a little bit encouraged by this. I have this little voice inside MY head that says this is acting more like what a year should be like. And so I am looking for a real spring starting in March and April. I'm hoping this is right. . . otherwise could be a very grumpy chilly Feb, March and April. :)

I have been having an absolute ball looking at flowers online the past few weeks. Oh my oh my. I had a pretty short grow-list last month. The grow list has outgrown my yard now. I need to talk GDW into buying a couple more lots. BUT. I got lots of containers going, so can experiment a bit. I have vegetable seeds coming out the kazoo. . . so am not even really thinking about them. I'll plant lots of greens. Potatoes. Got the garlic going. Onions. Lots of tomatoes, a few choice peppers. Then a whole lot of maybes--carrots, beets. Cabbage. Beans. ???? I don't believe I need to plant one single herb really, but have chamomile and valerian on my list. I DO have a lot of rearranging to do in the beds. That and container plants will be my big focus.

Meanwhile, please keep posting your favorite veggie/herb/flower plants!!

Hwy 195 in Williamson county Texas closed due to icy bridges.

@HJ Yeah, that's DEF a worse way to go. But kudos to the kitteh for clearing your yard of garden vermin!

Nancy, I agree. I obsessed over the temp via mesonet this morning while praying the temp would go up. It did, but only very slowly and the wind chill remained very low. I had a hot wood burn going on the stove while fueling it seasoned wood. I felt like a conductor shoving coal into a steam locomotive. Matched with three radiant heaters in the house and it wasn't enough. I couldn't complain (much) because my husband in the weld shop without temp control. It encouraged the kids to stay in bed as long as possible this morning. I said, "Forget it. It's just too dang cold."

We failed to light the stove last prior eve and keep it a low glow. If we don't do that, a chill sets in the house that's hard to remove.

It's kinda rare where we're at at least, to see such low temps hang on during the day. It's just too much.

Ya'll can bet I'm praying the meso temps for this weekend and next week are legit.

My cilantro and lettuce sprouts and seedlings are LOVING the low temps in the kitchen.

Future salsa and sammiches!

I believe the cadaver is a shrew. Cats won't eat them.

And unfortunately, that is a gardener's helper killed by free-ranging cats. The shrew is a voracious predator of insects, and may also eat mice and voles.

Yes, dbarron. . . that little sharp nose on a 2" long critter does look like a shrew. In glancing the first time just noted it's whitish paws that I took to be bigger than they were. Kind of cool to know they're around. Well, not in HJ's yard, apparently.

Another cold one today! 18 windchill. We're going to have a high heating bill this month. We should have been using the fireplace. I mentioned it to GDW this morning.

Rebecca, is it warmer now in DFW?

What is this cold lasts through March and into April? I would be very pouty. Guess it'll do what it's going to. . .

I gave a Radiator Charlie to one of my friends here last year. I called him yesterday to see if he wanted some tomato plants this year and he said, "YES! Especially Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter!" Ha. He said it produced mightily for him and was the best tomato! Remember, I said I got hardly anything from it because it got hot so early. But he reminded me his tomatoes were in a shadier spot! Wow. This year my tomatoes will be in the bed closest to the shop, so will be in shade 2 hrs earlier than last year.

Nancy, I am already beat! Another roughly day and a half of all this activity and I might be dead, but we are having fun. It is good training for the upcoming planting season.

Kim, I hope the meeting with the landlady isn't about her having different plans for your house. Enjoy your time with the little man.

Jennifer, His name is Frankie and we've been trying for about three years to tame his feral side well enough that we can pick him up, touch him, pet him or exert any sort of control over him. Some feral cats never can acclimate to more domestic behavior, but we are winning him over with canned food. He still looks pretty wild and is incredibly lean and muscular as are many feral to semi-feral cats, but we were able to get him into a crate and take him to be neutered (and to get his shots). He was mad at us yesterday but also at the same time relieved to be back here and no longer at the vet's office, but not so mad he wouldn't let us feed him and pet him. A lot of people say feral cats cannot be tamed, but they can. Sometimes it takes a few years to do it though, and often it is a very slow process where you're forever taking one step forward and two steps back. He and Lucky seem to know each other from their feral journeys. Lucky is fully domesticated now, and I think there is hope for Frankie to someday be as calm and gentle as she is now.

Kim, I'm sorry you're ill and hope you recover quickly. Your seeds and planner are a sign, I think, that you'll be gardening somewhere.

Bon, The good thing about the cold weather here is that it usually passes through fairly quickly, as least compared to many other states. I hope y'all are toasty warm again soon....without the need for the wood-burning stove to provide that warmth. I think it stays cold here for two more days and the warming trend starts around Monday. If that has changed, I don't want to know it because I'm just hanging on and waiting for the warm weather to come back.

Jennifer, Great job, Finbar! He's doing his job as far as he is concerned, and I think dbarron's ID as a shrew is the right one. You have something I've never seen here. I'm not saying we might not have shrews around, just that of all the god-forsaken-wild-things that ours cats and dogs have killed and brought home, there's never been a shrew among them.

Nancy, This does feel like a more normal winter although we still haven't been nearly as consistently cold as we were our first few years here. Everything seemed to change around 2005 and since then winters just have gotten warmer and warmer, except for 2010-2011 which was the last really persistently cold winter that I can remember.

Rebecca, They really expected more snow and ice flurries in north and central Texas than they received in general, but it isn't because the clouds weren't trying. A lot of snow and ice were falling from the upper levels of the atmosphere but in the very low dewpoints closer to the surface level, the precipitation was evaporating before it could reach the ground. Our dewpoint here was only 12 so I'm not surprised that adjacent areas of north Texas were the same. It was odd to see the Winter Weather Advisory covering the area south of the D-FW metroplex yesterday, but I bet everyone in the DFW area is glad the precip missed them.

Nancy, I doubt DFW gets much warmer than we will today, but I think they usually warm up a day earlier than us, so if we are expecting the warmup on Monday, they may get it beginning Sunday. So much flu is running rampant down there now that we are carefully avoiding going south this weekend. Of course, flu is running rampant to our immediate north, so we aren't going far from home at all since Love County seems to have, so far, avoided the widespread flu and strep that now have closed down 8 school districts in the Texoma region.

I cannot believe how cold it has been the last couple of days. We are up to 38 degrees and it isn't even noon yet, but I don't think we're expected to get much warmer than what we are right now. The 4 year old is lobbying to go to the playground in Gainesville, but I think it is still too cold for that. Maybe tomorrow will be a touch warmer. Or maybe the sun will come out.

Dawn

Supposed to hold steady at 38 today, maybe a few degrees warmer tomorrow.

I've ONLY saw shrews when cats kill them. They're more common than people think though. They're just rather secretive little things.

Thinking about it, maybe I've saw shrews and just thought they were large mice. If not stopped in motion, it's hard to tell them apart.

Wow, Rebecca and Dawn--that's cold for DFW, huh! It's 40 on the deck min/max thermometer. I think we're all showing remarkable good sportsmanship with this weather. But I am afraid I'm going to have to start some seeds this weekend. Just to see some little green things.

dbarron, years ago when I lived on the ranch in Wyoming, I somehow caught a shrew, and we figured out it was a pygmy shrew. I had it in a jar, but quickly turned it loose when I read up on how much they eat. Very cute, actually. And that's the only one I've ever seen. The other two nifty cool creatures we had out there were horned toads and we spotted a black-footed ferret (they found out their diet consists largely of prairie dogs, and we had a sizable prairie dog population.) They were thought to be extinct back then, but we saw one to testify that they weren't.

When we were kids, we use to catch horned toads for pets. They're cute.

It is official, the Tiny chunk is now the heaviest of the three cats, at 10.5 lbs. The other two are at 10 lbs each. And remember, he has only 1/4 of the tail that the other two have! And you are correct, I think, Rebecca, a bored cat spells trouble. Two tipped over weed pots, one kitchen cupboard entered, constant game of hell-bent-for-leather tag.

Dawn, I must have been about your age when I used to have my two grandkids in MN over for sleepovers from Saturday late morning to Sunday afternoons. It is just absolutely exhausting! And THREE days! But so fun. I'd take a long nap on Sundays as soon as their parents picked them up. LOL Amy, were you as exhausted by your little guys?

Amy, I used to have Paypal. I can't exactly remember what the deal is now. But a few years ago when I hadn't used it for a long long time, I tried to use it again, and can't remember what the snag was, but they wanted me to provide an affidavit or birth certificate or some such ridiculous thing to prove I was who I said I was. And while I applauded their efforts at keeping us safe, I thought, well that's a bunch of nonsense, who needs em. Also, when my brother died in 2016, his wife never did get some money they had of his. She got tired of the runaround and gave up.

Bon, you mentioned wood stove. You don't mean wood cooking stove, do you? Now THAT would excite me.

How's the painting going, HJ?

Okay. That does it. I'm gonna go plant some seeds. Happy Saturday, everyone!

I'm bored. Dawn can't help out with the ongoing conversation, because she's probably comatose by now. I came back here because I was bored. And see I never submitted previous post.

I didn't get the seeds planted. I fixed GDW a grand fried very thick pork chop dinner (they were amazing!) with bad stuff--no salad, no green veggie. We don't do that very often. Tonight was sheer indulgence. Mashed potatoes with pork chop gravy and frozen corn. Love a good pork chop as much as a good steak--and they're a heck of a lot cheaper!

Tom the cat was freaky tonight (he's always freaky in one way or another.) But so adorable. He was in a very snuggly mood. First me for about 15 minutes. . . On my lap, snuggling, reaching up patting my cheek, then reaching up and kissing me. . then snuggling deeper into me. Then, he left me and went over and went through the same drill with GDW. It's so sporadic with him, that when he does that, GDW and I both melt. Jerry and Tiny are both loving and somewhat snuggly, but not overpoweringly snuggly like Tom can be. I've never had 3 cats at a time. I had two at one time, but they hated each other. These three like each other and Titan, and the four of them are like family.

Jerry loves GDW and can almost always be found snoozing in Garry's lap if Garry's napping. Tom is more with me than Garry because Jerry's always with Garry. Plus, Tom likes to run around and I move. :) And yet when he wants lovings, he shares between GDW and me. Tiny is way more mine than GDW's in some ways. And yet he, too, will jump up on Garry's lap now and then. But Tiny knows I understand his language and so always comes to me when he wants something. Or wants to pester someone. He pesters me a lot. He pesters Tom and Jerry a lot.

I was researching American bobtails. One article talked about how they don't so much meow as they chirp. It's like a meow with a warble in it. Prddrrd. And his meow is certainly distinct. He figured out how to let me know he wants out. Go over by the door and prrddrrdd and again and again. Very cute.

Tom must have watched Titan knock by opening one of the double screen doors and letting it loose. . . and so he can do that. Tiny can too, but I'm not sure he does it on purpose. And Tom's the one who figured out he can get into the kitchen cupboards. Tiny's the one who thinks its fun to unroll toilet paper.

Jerry, he just goes with the flow, but loves NBA basketball. And is the one who can climb to high places and know flower vases over. Little %^&*(.

Now the chances are, both GDW and I are going to die before these cats do. They're charming, honest they are. . . any godmother or godfather volunteers out there?

TOMORROW the seed planting begins. I made out labels today--that's a start, right?

Brr it's cold. Did I mention that?

Nancy, it's just an old cast iron wood-burning stove. I can boil liquids atop when it's hot, usually with cinnamon or some good smelly that i have on hand, but that's it. We try not to use it but when it's a god send like this week.

I look forward to the day it is heating a greenhouse instead of the residence.

I have an unhappy task of hauling a dead deer off this morning, a nice fat young buck. Its to bad it had to end up in my yard rather than in someones freezer.

Bon I was over at my daughters yesterday, we are in the very long task of downsizing her place in order to move her over here. She had a large pellet stove she was going to get rid of and I suggested that she keep it and use it for a hobby/work area in her barn. She plans to build a large metal barn to live in, and store her junk while she has the house built.

I hope to get some seeds started soon. I need to find my seed starting junk that I have not used in 4 or 5 years.

The tractor should be warmed up by now, so I will go haul off that beautiful dead deer to the back side of the place.

Very wise, Larry. We have another in Bill's shop. Rarely used, but another god send when he must fix the clutch in the dead of winter. Yep.