Finally some rain

Butch has had my rain barrel up and ready for over a week now and today we have some rain. Plants prefer rainwater. They do so much better with it so this is good news for me and my plants. I do not have many plants yet. Only the ones I hauled down to Texas and then back again.
Keri's Mom Roslie cleaned up the front part of our yard while visiting Keri before we made it back to Iowa. That really was a big gift to me to have all those leaves and twigs picked up as it freed me up to get at the backyard cleanup. Yesterday I tore into the back and made quite a bit of progress. I was hoping for a bit of time to get it finished before the rain started this morning. No grumbling here. We needed the rain. 
I awoke this morning at 5:00am to the sound of thunder. And I mean serious thunder! It never seems to be serious in South Texas. I am sure there are times but we never seem to be there when it does. There is nothing like a mid-western thunderstorm. It can really be a rip snorter! They say we are in for a 3-day possibility of severe storms so somebody will most likely get more than they want.

We sometimes miss the blooming of the tulips but not this year!

Ready to Bloom

 And son Jason gifted me with another of his sculptures.  I love them! Better picture later...

We have been having some vacuum issues. My Shark Navigator Freestyle would only work for about a second straight off the charger. Then if I put it back on the charger for a couple of hours it would work just fine. Frustrating to say the least. I do not get all fired up to clean house all that often so to get delayed by a cranky vacuum is very counterproductive. My diagnostic technician (Butch) has been a bit mystified as well. At first, he thought it was the charger and then he thought it might be the battery. It is not definitive even yet but we are leaning toward battery. 
And then Keri's Dyson handheld is doing essentially the same thing. We are going with battery.