We're Walkin' in HIgh Cotton' at the Ranch!

 We arrived here at the ranch late Monday afternoon.....

and I was so excited to see the cotton fields along the County Line Road!

I've never see the cotton look this high and this pretty!!

I knew it must be time to harvest, and once that was done,

 I would be free to pick the 'leavin's'...the left overs!

They seldon ever get their big machinery along the edges of the fields.

I have in mind to pick a big bouquet with long stems for a tall wooden vase I have by the front room door at the ranch.

There's always a special thrill when we get to the gate!

Arriving is so much more fun than leaving.

This time we have Tabitha and Samantha with us.

It's been awhile since they've been down here and I think they were excited.

Tabitha 'sang' to us nearly all the way and I'm pretty sure she thought they were going to the Bells.

Ah, we are back!

The horses came down to say 'Hello.'

This is outside the big garden gate and where I feed them carrots and veggies.

Sherry came down to help us unload and she did all the lifting putting the food and stuff away.

Louis Dean was out mowing the spent garden down within an hour of getting out of the truck.

We got everything situated and carried our glasses of wine out to the deck just in time to see the Harvest moon rise. Perfect!!!

Louis Dean was in bed and sound asleep by 9:00.

I was in the girl bunk and looked at my phone and it was 9:20 on 9/20!

We both slept a good 10+ hours and Louis Dean brought me coffee in bed.

Samantha especially likes to hang out in the girl bunk with me. 

We put a screen door guard across the window since she pushed her way out of it one day last spring.

Louis Dean will need to screw/nail it to the wall so she can nose it over and crawl out.

Tabitha has been enjoying herself.

Shes such a big girl cat!

They have been running around and exploring everything.

There was a package in the mail for Louis Dean when we left town and I stuck it in my purse for him to open on Tuesday morning.

It was from Chandy!

A pic holder in the shape of a guitar with three specailly engraved pics.

She even had his named engraved on the case!

I took lots of pictures and videos and we were swapping them back and forth with Chandy - but I forgot to take one of just the case with the pics.

It was a fun morning!

He spent the day getting the garden all cleaned up.

Grasshoppers are everywhere and they ate up all the blackeyed peas and anything else that was growing. Our rose bushes are stilldoing well but my herb garden has literally bit the dust.

I am determined - again - to buckle down and write the rest of my memoir.

My goal is to write a chapter a day, until I opened up my documents and discovered I needed to work on both of those to finish them off. And I did do that!

While I didn't actuall do any art on Tuesday, I did set out all my current projects and glazed the two that were finished.

Tuesday was the Bee Meeting in Hillsboro and Louis Dean surprised us by coming with us!

The speaker was the man in charge of the Beekeeping Program at the Johnson County Jail.

What a great idea and it is wonderful how this retired man has shared his love for beekeeping in such a way as to help inmates discover skills they can use upon release.

Commercial beekeepers can't find enough people for the jobs they have so this is a viable area of employment opportunity.

It was interesting and inspiring and when it was over, we ate Mexican food at El Conquistador followed by a quick shopping trip to Walmart!

I did so well all day and had lots of energy - until I didn't.

Seems I get no warning signs before it's gone!

The moment we got back to the ranch, I walked right in and went right to bed, leaving Louis Dean to unload the groceries. No thoughts whatsoever that he would put any of it up.

This morning I found the toilet paper on the front porch, my candles scattered in different places in the front room, detergent in the bathroom and I finally found the cat food underneath a curtain on the coffee bar area! AND the little 2 for $1 pies from Walmart are in the freezer! (I think Louis Dean is trying to hide them!) 

It's always an adventure living with Louis Dean!

Summer called me this morning - and we made some plans to spend the day together!

She drove from home and picked me up at the ranch and then we met up with some friends at a Mexican restaurant in China Springs!

We had a great time and visited and caught up with everyone and what they are doing.

Lots of good things going on with these ladies!

Linda and Dona had been Glamping at a RV park nearby and they were now going home.

Summer and I went to HEB!

LOVED the pumpkins and I bought one of the pink ones.

Plus a lot of the clearance plants!

Yello tomatoes, lantana, plum bago, and more.

I plan to plant all this in the rose bed flower garden area.

Hopefuly, the grasshoppers will not be there.

We plan to borrow a few chickens or roosters to come stay with us up here and eat all these pesky crtters!

We saw they were harvesting the cotton on our way back to the ranch!

I'm so happy I got to see it!!!

Texas produces a quarter of all the cotton used in the USA.

Those are some big rolls of cotton!

Grasshoppers can feed on cotton plants without damaging the cotton!

Summer is planning on going out of town so she brought my birthday gifts with her and gave them to me before she left.

My favorite is the book......

Though I do love the fragrant candle with the wood burning wick and the Autumn Taffy!

She always gives me a Christmas ornament and it's usually cardinals. It's a tradition!

Summer knows I'm a bag lady and I do love the bag!

LOVE the book!!!

I'm grateful for the blessings of being a mother.

It made me cry.....

I'll close tonight's journal entry with Alabama singing....

High Cotton!