Well, for a while there, I thought the kittens that were moved into the sun room had been moved out again! We did not see them when doing the evening feeding, nor did I see them when checking during the night. Handily, we’ve left the shop lights that were hanging over the transplants where they are, which means we can use the remote control in the bathroom to turn them on and check the sun room. 😄

There’s a reason we didn’t see kittens.

My daughter happened to be in the bathroom when she heard a ruckus. She looked out the window, just in time to see one of the mamas chasing a skunk out of the sun room, batting at its butt.

Yeah. It still stinks in there.

When we didn’t see the kittens after that, we thought the mothers might have taken them away again, but nope! They were there this morning!

From what I can see by their sizes, I think the three kittens in this photo are from two different litters. Then there are the smaller kittens whose eyes are still blue, and finally there’s the tuxedo that’s been here a while, still running around outside. Which means we might have a total of 4 litters combined right now!

While they were eating, I was able to reach down and pet some of them. I was even able to pick up and cuddle three of them! Two from the above picture, and a third that wandered over to the kibble container I was standing next to. One of them hissed a bit while I picked it up, but the power of ear scritches is a magical thing, and they settled in a fair bit.

The cats have knocked so much stuff off the shelves and onto the floor. Even after picking up most of the stuck knocked over during the winter, the cats climb into the shelves and knock it all down again. Which is now giving the kittens lots of places to hide, so I guess it’s okay we haven’t been able to get it all cleaned up, after all!

In other things…

Before heading to the city yesterday, I texted the garage about our van. I mentioned that it seemed to be the power steering that was making the noise, and asked if I should drive or tow it in tomorrow (meaning, today) for him to check when he could. When I got to the city, there was a response, and he said it should be okay to drive it in; he just suggested I add power steering fluid. He also gave the okay to leave the van and gave instructions on where to park it.

Today being Canada Day, I knew he would be closed. He’s closed Sundays and, with Canada Day falling on the weekend, a lot of places close on the Monday, too. So he might not be able to look at it until Tuesday, which is fine by us. Since we were at Walmart, I picked up some power steering fluid, too.

So today, I topped up the power steering fluid. We haven’t driven the van in a few months. Even the doors are stiff to open and close! Then I drove it to town, with my daughter following in my mother’s car, to drop it off.

The fluid seems to have made a difference. The steering wasn’t making noise anymore, though when I was outside the van while the engine was running, I could still hear the noise from the engine area. From inside the van, the engine sounded quiet.

Gosh, it felt so good to be driving the van, instead of my mother’s little car! Except for the lack of working air conditioning. 😂

There was something else, though, that wasn’t there before. When I hit the breaks to decelerate, there was a repetitive whumping coming from the rear. !!!

So after parking the van, I sent a message to tell the garage where the keys were hidden, mentioned topping up the fluid, then told about what was happening when applying the brakes.

The 2016 Caravan we’d tried to get financing for is still there, and the price has dropped considerably! At the time we applied for financing, it was selling for $15,400 – though he knocked $400 off for us from the start. Later, I saw it go down to $14,600, then down to $13,900. It is now down to $10,400 ! We weren’t able to get financing for it, because it was just over their mileage cut off. The loan we were approved for was a newer vehicle with lower mileage, but with no credit cards, loans or mortgage to improve our credit rating, the interest rates and requirements were insane. I got a low limit credit card to use to improve my credit rating, which takes about 6 months to really make a difference. We’re at only a couple of months, so it’s still too early to apply again, and get a decent interest rate. But if that van is still there by fall, I’ll be applying for it again. We’ll even be able to make a down payment, though it we can get it with only the van as a trade in, that would be preferable. There are a lot of things that money would be useful for. Life finally getting a plumber to work on our bathroom taps! One vet bill used up the money we had for that, but hopefully, we won’t have any emergencies to require us to dip into it again.

Of course, as I walked by, I took a look at the van. Looking through the tinted back windows, I could see some bags in the back. Looking through another window, I could finally see that they were bagged tires. The van has a set of winter tires, too!

Gosh, it would be so nice to have that van! We loved it when we had a 2007 Grand Caravan, and while the 2005 Uplander we have now has little things that I really like about it, a newer Caravan probably has some version of them, too. I would just really love to have a vehicle that doesn’t have me saying an extra prayer for protection, every time I have to drive somewhere! If the van needs repairs that cost more than it’s worth, though, we might end up applying for it again, sooner, rather than later!

One nice thing about having the van waiting at the garage until it can be looked at: once at home, we didn’t have to squeeze my mother’s car into the side room of the garage, and could park where the van usually sits. Not only is there room to open the driver’s side door all the way, but someone can get in and out of the passenger side, too! 😂

Ugh. It’s past 4pm as I write this, and we’ve hit 30C/86F That matches the 30 year record high from 2012. Tomorrow is supposed to be even warmer.

It could be worse. We could be matching the record low of 5C/42F set in 2001, instead!

Though we had some excellent rain recently, I need to check the garden beds and see if they need to be watered in this heat! It won’t start cooling down for 3 or 4 more hours, though.

Plus, of course, check to make sure the water bowls outside are full, and maybe add some frozen reused water bottles in them, as well!

The Re-Farmer