Bragg Family South

The picture above is of a Gardenia in flower in our backyard. This relative of the coffee plant produces a number of large, pretty, and very pleasantly aromatic white flowers. After several weeks of continuous and heavy rain, we have finally strung together a number of really nice days, with relatively pleasant temperatures and humidity levels (at least for the South) and lots of sunshine. We have tried to take advantage of this as much as we can. Last weekend (Memorial Day weekend) we went to Arkansas Post National Memorial located about an hour east of Monticello. We've taken a number of you there over the years--it is the site of Arkansas's first permanent European settlement, and was occupied into the mid-1800s when the shifting Arkansas River and other events led to its gradual abandonment . It did serve as a Confederate fort during the early years of the Civil War before an overwhelming Union force conquered it in a battle. Nowadays, it is a nice little national pa...

Boy, Stephen got so tuckered out with anticipation of this blog, he couldn't even finish his supper!! As y'all well know, little kids can sleep just about anywhere if they're tired enough, and Stephen sure was this night... The end of May sees a number of things closing for the year...at least for now. Kenny is wrapping up a fairly successful season in Little League. This year was the first he went from using a batting tee to hold the ball to the pitching machine, which hurls the hardball at the batter at about 40 miles per hour. Kenny had very little experience hitting pitched balls, so he was pretty intimidated at first, but as he got used to it and we practiced at home (for a variety of reasons, they didn't practice much as a team), he got to be a fairly reliable hitter--perhaps one hit a game, with 2 to 3 opportunities per game to bat. He scored a run, and drove in a run with a sacrifice grounder, stole a few bases (real easy at this level), and played a variet...

We continue to get rainy, stormy, soggy weather here in south Arkansas. The UAM weather station shows about 13 inches of rain so far in the 12 days of May we've experienced--an average of just over an inch per day! Today, we kept that pace going, with a strong storm that passed by just before supper time that dropped 1.2 inches of rain in one hour. They continue to forecast rain in the future--not that we need it! The picture above is taken from the boat landing on the highway between Monticello and Warren (a number of you have canoed this river with me, launching from this spot). Usually, there is probably between 15 and 20 feet between the surface of the river and the bottom of the bridge--now there is only two or three, and the river has yet to crest. The whole Saline River bottom is full of water, and it is now flooding the low ground above the traditional flood plain, as you can see in the picture below: We took this picture tonight as we drove along the roads in the ar...

2009 continues to be a hard weather year for this part of the world. Yesterday morning, just as I was getting up to start my day (about 5 a.m.) a line of severe thunderstorms blew into the Monticello area. We had a tornado warning for the area, but the wind damage apparently was caused by straight-line winds, not a tornado. Still, many trees and power lines were down on the north and east side of Monticello and a number of other communities here in Arkansas. Homes, businesses, vehicles, and other property were damaged, and a few injuries from the storm and its aftermath have been reported. Our place is fine--the power flicked on and off a few times, and our biggest impact so far was that they canceled Kenny's school yesterday. These storms also brought heavy rainfall most of Tuesday morning, with around 3.3 inches here on campus. Our area has received between 8 and 12 inches of rain during the last 4 days, with more rain forecast for the next week. Needless to say, streams...

We sure have had interesting weather so far this year. Dry to start out with, then stormy, now excessively wet. Since mid-afternoon yesterday we have gotten around 5 inches of rain from a series of storms and heavy rainshowers that have "trained" (passed one after the other) over the whole region. As much as we've gotten, other places have gotten 7 to 10 inches or more during the last week. The picture of the Kenny and Beth in our backyard was taken just minutes ago, after the rains came to a stop. Not all our news revolves around the weather. The kids have been busy as usual--here are a few pictures of Beth's dance recital: The girls spent a lot of time looking off-stage to get cues from their instructors as to what dance steps they were supposed to be making. Below is a picture of a "field trip" Beth's preschool class took to a local park: This weekend was also Hamburg, Arkansas's "Armadillo Days"--a local festival feature a carniv...