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Farmers Lumber Company held a grand re-openeing celebration last Thursday for their historic storefront at 150 N. Jackson St.

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Members of the Jasek and Zatopek families will gather Sunday, July 19, for their annual reunion in Fayette County. The reunion begins with a 10 a.m. Mass at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Fayetteville and then moves to St. Mary’s Parish Hall near Ellinger with registration beginning at 11 a.m.

The Pagel family will hold its annual reunion on Saturday, July 11, from 11 a.m. - 3 p.m. at the Hallettsville Methodist Church Fellowship Hall, 206 S. Dowling St.. The Pagel family’s Texas roots date to 1850, when patriarch Gottfried Pagel, his wife Friedrike, and their eight children emigrated from Pomerania, Germany, and settled at Willow Springs in Fayette County, before moving to Lavaca County in 1858.

The mercury has been climbing, and the cicadas are putting on a nightly concert that makes a man wonder if they’re ever going to take a breath. Folks around here call this time of year the “Dog Days of Summer,” a phrase most people attribute to the heat. But after watching the goings-on down at Oak Thicket and Park Prairie lately, I’ve decided it ought to mean something else entirely—the days when the best memories are made alongside our fourlegged companions.

More than 7,000 miles from her home country of Uzbekistan, Kseniya Klyukina is trying to make the most of her musical education here in Texas, which includes participating in the Round Top Musical Festival with around 80 other talented musicians.

It’s that time of year when spring vegetable crops play out. Tomatoes stop producing when nighttime temperatures rise into the 80s.