Our puppy Grover (3 years old now) had a special reunion today with his (real) mother and brother. Mary, the black and white dog in the middle, gave birth to an astonishing 13 puppies in December 2008, all of which were utterly adorable and quite assorted in appearance. We were the lucky fosterers and then adopters of our delightful Grover, who clearly gets his build from his mama (the dog one). His brother Tank looks much different but is just as sweet as his mom and Grover.

How this post IS garden-related is that without Mary, we wouldn’t have Grover poop in our yard and our plants wouldn’t regularly get trampled by Grover wrestling in play with our two other dogs. Plus, clearly in the picture above, the dogs are on grass, and grass happens to be a plant type. Garden enough for me!

Last night a gorgeous, gigantic, and very bright full moon came over the horizon, a moon dubbed a “Supermoon” with good reason.

The moon appeared exceptionally large and bright because of its proximity to Earth. Its elliptical orbit brought it a mere 221,566 miles (356,577 km) away from Earth, closer than it has been since 1993.

My family and I ventured out to an open field to try to catch sight of the moon at its finest. And sure enough, the moon was dressed to impress. Fiery in appearance near the horizon, the moon’s true brightness shone through the higher the celestial body rose in the sky.

As the moon cleared the trees, its glow reflected on the nearby creek.

There were bats flying all around, catching plentiful insects by the water. At times, they’d fly right across the glowing orb. Ohhhhh, how I wanted to get a picture, but they were way too fast. No lucky shot either. Drat.

NASA calls the Supermoon a rare beauty. Wouldn’t you agree?

When engineers water plants, they make a Rube Goldberg project out of it. This engineering project was on display at the Explore UT event in Austin on Saturday, and kids and prospective students from all over were invited to get to know the campus’s colleges and organizations.

The engineering students’ project involved 21 steps and various household items to get H20 to their plant, and sure enough, water reached its destination. The starting point was the mechanical hamster up at the top of the contraption.

My method of watering involves at most two steps (move hose, turn on water), or better yet, zero steps (wait for rain). Now, which of us is the genius here, I ask you?  🙂   

Actually, we love Rube-Goldberg projects — my older son is destined to be an engineer, so projects like these are always going on in his head. I wonder whether I could get him to be more willing to sweep the floor if I asked him to make a Rube-Goldberg project out of it… hmmm….

Over at the chemistry department, the boys enjoyed watching fiery explosions of hydrogen balloons, fingers set on fire, jets of flame, and a banana turned into a hammer via liquid nitrogen.

The chemistry professor even created an indoor thunderstorm, drenching the front row and momentarily removing oxygen from the vicinity.

The zoologist in me dragged the family through giant scorpions, Death’s Head cockroaches, furry tarantulas, expanding lungs, sheep brains, skeletal comparisons, and other interesting displays of the biological world. Here I roll my eyes, because I literally had to force my kids to experience that which fascinates me. Nothing blew up, so why should they be interested? I made a meager attempt to get them to look at algae through a microscope. Yeah, forget that, Mom.

But eating ice cream made from liquid nitrogen? Exciting and tasty! Mass ping-pong explosion via mouse traps? Fun! Sigh. Okay, to be fair, all that stuff was pretty cool.

Here’s a view of the UT tower as seen from through a chain-link fence at the top of RLM, one of the engineering buildings at UT.

The boys got a great glimpse at the college experience, and the chemistry professor taunted them (and the rest of the audience) that he gets to use the S word (stupid) at college, and they don’t. It was a good day.

The freezing temps took their toll on the garden, and no place is it more obvious than in the veggie garden. Can you identify these wilted souls?

They are lettuce, snow peas, and broccoli, respectively. RIP, dearly departed veggies. I will miss you.

But some veggies were troopers and held in there through snow and ice, thick and thin. Among them are the garlic…

and the spinach.

I’m not sure this should be included with the veggies of the veggie garden, but the wild onion is spreading again in the backyard, so much so that it looks like grass. I love to run my fingers through it. And who would have thought that the smell of onion could be so delightful?

I’m seeing other signs of life around the yard, too — green sprouts really stand out among the dead and brown. I guess it’s time to dig in and get dirty and start prepping the yard for spring!

I’m back on the exercise wheel again — following that delicate line of trying to exercise to strengthen my back while not aggravating my back. Today’s workout was yoga, and without going further into the woes of my weakened physical self, I’ll just say that breathing, the key to yoga, was very much the key to me not falling over.

Each time I concentrated on breathing, my mind was whisked away to two scenes. The more difficult poses (in other words, most of them) prompted an image of trees and a woodland path, with my breath the wind that rustled the leaves. When calmness was what I sought, an image of a sunlit beach came to mind, and a gentle coastal breeze blew toward me instead. The subconscious is a powerful thing. 

I know that the very spirit of yoga is based on nature, but never has it been more apparent that nature is in the very spirit of me.

Shouldn’t this mean that yoga ought to be easy for me? So unfair.

The winter garden might not look like much right now, but Big Muhly never fails to impress, no matter the season. It’s one of my favorite plants in the garden during the cold season, even though there’s scarcely any green visible.

The seedheads criss-cross themselves, but I don’t see a blockade. Instead I see a welcome sign.

Big Muhly is also known as Lindheimer’s Muhly, and it’s endemic to the Edwards Plateau here in central Texas. It can grow to be some 5 feet tall in no time. Birds love it as nesting material, and it provides great cover for small wildlife, like lizards. Look how lovely it looks with Goldenrod in the spring, as seen at the Wildflower Center…

And with Fall Aster in the fall, in my backyard….

What’s extra nice about Big Muhly is that I don’t have to do much to it to take care of it — trimming it can actually do more harm than good, so I just let it be. And in return it gives me a beautiful show… all year long.

Happy anniversary to my hubby of 15 years — you’ve made me bloom in this garden we call life.

This week I received a special invitation to join the Beautiful Wildlife Garden garden blog team as a southern representative — Texas being my home region. I feel very honored to join such a great team so dedicated to wildlife gardening! Please visit this wonderful group blog that works to redefine beauty in the garden and to encourage the welcoming of wildlife of all sorts. 

What does it say about my personality that I love thorns? Thorns, spines, prickles, bumps, sharp-pointed leaves, and even little velcro-hairs — I am utterly fascinated by them all.

My husband might say that I’ve been a loving thorn in his side for some 15 years now (well, he wouldn’t say that to my face). My parents and sisters might say that I’ve been a thorn for much longer than that, given that I’m in my fourth decade now! My kids probably consider me to be a big thorn in their plans to conquer the world one video game at a time.

But truth is, thorns and other sharp things have a much greater purpose than just to snag your clothing, irritate you, and make you bleed. We’re back to talking about plants, mind you.

In terms of botany, they are a supreme defense.

And in terms of wildlife value, they provide tremendous protection. Birds nest safely in their midst.

The leaves of the Agarita bush might be sharp, but the plant is called the Babysitter Bush for a reason. Deer and other animals hide their young under the bush while they forage for food.

Lizards are well protected from predators in briar patches and brambles.

See? Good stuff, those thorns.

I can’t say that I love all thorns. I’ve been stabbed by some that made me cry. We removed a small tree from against our house when we first started gardening, because the 2-inch long spines on that tree were going to put an eye out (it spreads by roots, it turns out — years later we are still trying to keep that tree from coming back).

And Greenbrier is one frustrating vine. It has all sorts of prickles, including ones on its leaves, and it is the very example of a plant version of a Hydra — cut off its head and it will grow two more.

But no matter. I still love thorns and the like. And if I can be a bit of a thorn myself, I’m okay with that. I tell my kids that it’s a mother’s job to be a protective thorn — keeping her kids safe and guiding them along the pathways of life (and keeping them in line!).

Just my thorny opinion, as it were.