Limes!

When life hands you limes . . .

make sopa de lima!

In the midst of hacking back the tropical vegetation in our backyard on Saturday morning, I discovered the tiny fruit tree on the side of the house was full of limes! We had no luck last summer trying to grow tomatoes, but the stunted five-foot tree that's never thrived produced all of these and more. Craig thought at first they might be unripened lemons or oranges, but they're juicy limes!

In our original landscape, we were supposed to have a lime, lemon, and orange tree. Shortly after the trees were planted (I'm talking hours), the Phoenix area had two terrible weeks of overnight freezes. The three fruit trees limped along until the next spring when the Bumpuses drained their salt water pool into our side yard, killing half the shrubs and making the fruit trees look even more pitiful. Mrs. Bumpus didn't realize that saltwater kills shrubs (their other house is a farm?) or that the water would go under the wall? So four years later, we now know we have a grapefruit, lime, and ??? tree. Eventually, that third tree will reveal itself!

On a sidenote, we thought we heard movement (a Vette revving up) at the Bumpuses house on Saturday. Craig looked at me and said -- That can't be good! We haven't seen hide nor hair of the Bumpuses since they flew back to Washington State last March. Every so often, someone walking past stops and asks us if the house is a foreclosure because the Bellagio fountain (broken irrigation pipe) continues to spurt every evening at 7 p.m. and the weeds are now taller than the shrubs. We always tell the passerbys that it's not a foreclosure -- it's just the Bumpuses!

By the way, the sopa de lima was excellent! I'm so glad La Bruja shared their simple recipe in Ixchel's Kitchen. It's so easy to make, and I almost always have the ingredients in my cupboard (or on my tree)!