My apologies to everyone who has been checking on my blog since I haven't posted for quite a while. I have had another health crash following more dental surgery. I don't like writing about health problems, but I haven't been up to doing much to write about because of them.

My garden is at a low ebb at present. The roses are doing fairly well, sending up new sprays of pink and red blooms occasionally. The crape myrtles are also blooming well, providing most of the color in the yard. I'm looking for the reblooming irises to bloom again, but so far nothing there. I've got more irises on the way to fill in the empty areas where most of the irises mysteriously disappeared.

The pear trees had a fairly good crop this year, but the neighborhood boys slipped in and made off with them. How they manage to do that without attracting attention is a mystery, since they would need stepladders to get up into those trees.

The fig tree is doing well but still has no fruit. Maybe next year it will decide to try setting some. It looks very nice in its corner by one big pink rose.

The tomato plants are doing well and have recently started blooming. The weather is so hot that they probably won't set any fruit for a while until the highs drop below 90 degrees F. We've had a scorching summer with a lot of highs in the high 90's and heat indexes in the 100's to 110's. It ought to be cooling off by now, but so far it is still very hot. I'm running the hoses to keep the plants going since there hasn't been nearly enough rain for that. Even the weeds are languishing.

I did get more knitting done and have another sweater box nearly full. Most of the crafting was set aside in favor of reading. My get up and go is more gone than usual, and I'm using most of it on housework. At least we're still eating, and I'm grateful for that. The threat of Mom taking over the cooking is getting me up.

I've been making some fruit filled muffins. It's an interesting concept, putting a small spoonful of fruit filling on a half filled muffin cup of batter and then spreading more batter over it to hide the filling. It bakes like a regular muffin, but has a nice little surprise on the inside.

My brother Steve has been filling in with fast food from a contest now running. He's determined to win the $100,000 prize. So far, Mom and I have been eating chili cheeseburgers and spicy chicken sandwiches aplenty while he sneaks off with the apple pies and drinks. The cats get their nibbles of burgers, too. We could all be shaped like cheeseburgers by the end of the contest.