Indian Summer.

what is the springtime-equivalent of indian summer?

a front came through the houston area tuesday night, dropping some much-needed rain and the unseasonably-high temperature. it obviously won't last long, but in the meantime, the respite from a too-early summer is greatly appreciated.

Green Space.

over the last few months the houston chronicle has been introducing various reader blogs. among the most recent is green space--a reader blog about gardening. so, given the sporadic posting here, i suggest checking them out!

the two authors can also be read at cybertoad's garden and garden obsession.

now, if only the chronicle's garden editor, kathy huber, had a blog...

This is not a Pregnancy/Baby Blog.

i promise. however, since i did just spend the last nine months pregnant, i'll briefly expound on the topic of gardening in that state.

in short, forget it. my first four months (mid-june through mid-september) coincided with the height of houston's summer. it's hard enough gardening without being perpetually exhausted and mildly nauseated; add stifling heat and humidity and just thinking about being outside was enough to send me to bed. thus nothing was accomplished outside last summer.

after about mid-september our weather generally becomes more pleasant, sometimes downright delightful. and i should have been experiencing that "second trimester" energy burst. cruel myth; didn't happen. i certainly felt a little better, but it was about all i could do to get through the day at work. by the time i came home i just wanted to sleep. and sleep was generally all i did on the weekends.

as usual, we had some wonderful early spring weather this year (say, late january and february), and i did want to get out and work in the yard, especially since it looked so dreadful. but add to the ongoing exhaustion an inability to bend over and breathe at the same time, and, well, no gardening for me.

despite my grumbling about not being able to garden, i really did have a relatively easy pregnancy. it's just that when you start adding a lot of weight--my weight gain was about 28% over my normal weight--in a relatively short period of time, and much of that weight is another little being trying to displace all your internal organs, it gets very hard and very uncomfortable to do much of anything. one of the first things i noticed after the sprout was born (besides the fact that she was absolutely adorable and not at all squinched up and wrinkly like some newborns) was that i could inhale again!

so now that the sprout has arrived, why haven't i done any gardening? she's four weeks old today, but, as with all infants (or so i'm told), she pretty much determines my schedule and my activities. and it comes down to feed the baby, change the baby's diaper, sleep with the baby, repeat. oh well, she'll be ready to help dig in the dirt (eat the dirt, more likely) soon enough.

Our Springtime Sprout.

i haven't forgotten the blog, i've just been preoccupied with a different "project."

on march 16, darin and i welcomed the arrival of our first child, an adorable little girl. (i'll be referring to her as "the sprout" in a probably futile effort to keep her name off the web for a while.) the three of us are still settling into our new roles, and for the most part she's a very agreeable baby. darin is disappointed, however, that she isn't quite ready to mow the yard.

needless to say, plants and yard have suffered a fair amount of neglect, and that will likely continue for the forseeable future. i do hope to find time to at least post the occasional update on what plants can survive this new, heightened level of neglect.