Well, we’ve been having all sorts of yard cats that have been away for a while, coming back again!
When the girls popped outside for a bit, they discovered Creamsicle Baby was back.
He even brought his brother, Nutmeg, with him. :-) Creamsicle is looking thin and hungry, but last night he seemed to be more hungry for human attention than anything else! He just couldn’t not get enough pets and cuddles. The kittens weren’t too sure what to make of him. I know they’ve seen him before, but it’s been a while. Tuxedo Mask in particular was following him around with great curiosity.
Best of all, Creamsicle Baby was still here in the morning!
My goodness, the cats were just all over the place, while we were feeding them!
I don’t think I’ve seen so many of them trying to fit around the one tray under the shrine, either. :-D
After we were done with the outside stuff, my younger daughter and I made what I hope will be the last city trip this month. After this, I have only a court date at the end of the week at the smaller city, and after that, I should be done with anything but local trips. This trip was mostly for stuff the girls needed, but it gave me a chance to get a few last items for the pantry or freezer. Then, on the way home, we were able to stop at the mail and pick up the big box of tea my older daughter ordered!
Among the things I picked up today was juice to use once our ginger bug is ready. Between the home made, fermented pop and the tea, we’ll be well set for non-water beverages to enjoy over the winter. I also picked up some extra milk so I can try making the soda cheese my mother used to make that I finally got her instructions for. Her instructions were for 5 gallons of milk, though, and I only got 1 extra gallon, so I’ll have to adjust the ratios! After I double check with her that she actually meant to say “gallons” and not “liters”.
We are still having mild temperatures, even though we did actually get a bit of snow.
There was just enough that it was still around to see on things like the roof of the cat’s house, but not on the ground. We’ll have a couple of days just above freezing, then we’re supposed to warm up again. We’ve still got stuff to do outside before the ground freezes, but on the colder days, I am hoping we can start doing a whole lot of baking, in quantities sufficient to add to the freezer.
As long as the weather holds, we’re going to be very busy!
My husband had already fed the cats this morning, so when I went out to do my morning rounds, there wasn’t the usual crowd at the door. What I did find was an adorable Nosencrantz on the rail, and she was willing to pose adorably for the camera!
She let me get right up to her with my phone, and even snuffled it, without running away.
Then I turned around and discovered most of the other cats had quietly come around to check out the activity!
I love how Potato Beetle is on the cat shelter roof, watching the babies! Alas, while I got to pet him, I didn’t get to pet any of the other babies. Not even Agnoos was up to human contant.
So I went back and snuggled Nosencrantz while she sat on the rail. She seemed a bit chilly, and more than willing to have me lend her some body heat!
Then I turned around to see what a noise was, and found a big, fluffy skunk by the water bowls, on that wooden cross piece of the sledge under the cat house. It was warning off the cats, but when it saw that I’d moved, it squeezed under the cat house. And it was most definitely a squeeze to get under there! The skunk is about half again the size of Potato Beetle, and it’s a bit of a squeeze for him, too!
Today is supposed to be chillier, and we’re even supposed to get a bit of snow. Nothing that will stay, though. The kitties, however, will be just fine, with plenty of food and shelter – and a bit of stinky company at times!
I was greeted by some very hungry kitties, this morning!
I spotted two orange kitties this morning, and neither was big enough to be Rolando Moon. You can’t really see, but one of them is behind another cat under the shrine, in the background. There are two adults and two babies under there.
The orange cat sitting in his food in the kibble house turned out to be Nutmeg, back from wherever his other home is. :-)
They were all unusually hungry this morning, because when I came out again just a couple of hours later, there wasn’t any kibble left in any of the trays! Usually, we don’t need to do a refill until late in the day, but when I topped them up early, I got another rush of kitties coming over to indulge.
Potato Beetle is looking very roly poly these days! He was been super skinny when he reappeared after being gone for so many months. Having a reliable food source looks good on him. ;-)
Yesterday, as I was cleaning up and putting things away for the evening, I walked past the shelf in front of the sun room, and found myself being watched from the depths!
I am so happy to see Nosencrantz enjoying the cat bed I crocheted, long ago!
Every now and then, I’ll walk into the bathroom and find the sink looking back at me.
While there are several cats that like to drink from the tap, David likes to sleep in the sink.
Is that the most adorable face, or what? What a sweetie!!
The outside cats were in full cuteness mode, too!
Also, I have been able to confirm that Tuxedo Mask is, indeed, a male. I was able to confirm one of the ‘icouses, too, but I’m not sure which one it was. It wasn’t Bradicous, with his (her?) distinctive white tail tip, and it wasn’t the one ‘icous that has mostly white hind legs. That’s the one next to Junk Pile in the kibble tray on the far right, inside the kibble house. The others can be told apart mostly from their faces, and… well… it wasn’t the face I was seeing at the time! ;-)
It was a very wet morning, but I’m hoping things will dry up this afternoon. The weather forecasts have changed, and it looks like we’ve got just today and tomorrow to get work done before we start getting rain and snow over the next several days.
With our goal of stocking up as much as we can for the winter, on the assumption that we will have a month or two where we cannot get out to buy necessities, our monthly shop is being split up into multiple trips, so as not to overload the van.
Also, I hate shopping, so… babying the van is a handy excuse to keep it shorter. ;-)
I was heading out on my own for this trip, so I made the smaller Walmart trip, which let me make a shorter trip to the nearer, smaller city. The main thing I wanted to stock up on there was the cat kibble. They have more variety than Costco does.
Well. Most of the time.
Almost all the dry cat food was out of stock!
At least they still had the big bags of the cheap stuff – which even got restocked while I was there.
Yikes!
With six bags of dry cat food in the cart, there wasn’t much room for people food, but I got enough to tide us over until we can make the Costco trip. I even remembered to pick up a couple of shelf brackets for the second shelf in the outhouse, but I had no luck finding the battery operated LED switch plate I want to put on the wall across from the mirror.
Once I got what I needed there, I then went across the street to a Canadian Tire. Normally, we’d pick up more of the wood pellets we use for litter there, but I didn’t have room for more big bags in the van, so that will wait for the big trip. I got a quart sized can of paint to do the lettering on the sign I’m making, to replace the one that was stolen. We still have some of the bright blue we used to paint the picnic table left, but I decided to go with something darker for the sign.
The person in the paint department that knew how to use the machine to tint the paint was on break, so I used that time to find the heavy duty rope, and some hooks, so we can finally pull that stuck tree down. I also looked for the LED switch plate light I wanted for the outhouse, but there was nothing. It’s a novelty light, so I’m not too surprised they haven’t been restocked. Ah, well.
Canadian Tire is a dangerous place for me to be, with money!
Of course, I found a few other little things we needed, but then I found my new toy.
Yes, I bought a chain saw!
It was on clearance. I decided it was worth going into my seed budget to buy it – and I still have half my seed budget left!
Yes, it’s just a house brand, and yes, it’s electric. I figure I can realistically at least get a couple of years out of it before I wear it out completely. ;-)
It will, however, save me massive amounts of time and labour! Now that we have what we need to pull that stuck tree out, it’ll be much faster to break it down into the lengths I need to finish the high raised bed. Heck, I’m even thinking of taking it apart so I can tidy up the notches and make it fit together, better! No more using the baby chainsaw until the batteries are dead, then using a hammer and chisel for the rest! No more bucksaw to cut the lengths I need! Heck, with a 14″ blade, I might even be able to get more of the dead trees down this fall! If the weather holds – dare I consider it? – I might even be able to make at least one more high raised bed. Gotta clean up the existing beds, first, however, there is one bed left the girls didn’t get to clean up in the main garden area, yesterday. We might be able to “clean up” that bed, by making a second high raised bed there, instead! We’d have to cut down at least one, maybe two, more dead trees to do it, though.
Oooo… Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, here!
We shall see. Today, we got rain. Lots of rain, so it’s a write off for working on the garden beds. We should have two or three days to get work done before we get a day with rain and snow. After that, it’ll get chilly, with possible snow, but the long range forecast tells me we will remain above freezing during the day, well into November.
With the chain saw and the wood chipper, we should be able to get a lot more done, in a much shorter time. Meanwhile, while I was working on this post, my husband securely attached the new hooks to the new rope I got, which means I can pull that tree out tomorrow, and get to work!
Gosh, I’m all excited, just thinking about it.
So the trip was very productive, though I was more than glad to be done. Half way down an aisle at Canadian Tire, one of my knees decided to try and dislocate, making me VERY glad to have a shopping cart to lean on!
Being old and broken kinda sucks. ;-)
Once at home, after the girls unloaded the van and I changed a burnt out bulb in one of my headlights, I took the time to top of the kibble for the outside cats. It was still raining, so the cats were… well, check it out!
Hilariously adorable, is what they were!
They love that space under the kibble house! I’m sure they love having that sheet of insulation to keep their toes warm, too. :-)
One of the things I hoped to do was build smaller version of the kibble house for the water bowls. I don’t think we’ll be able to build it this year; from what I’ve seen in the barn and sheds, we don’t have the materials to complete it. They really like having a nice shelter from the rain, for their food, though!
For some reason, I just couldn’t sleep last night, so I much appreciated my husband being able to feed the outside cats for me and let me get what little sleep I did. Usually, that means I don’t really see the yard cats when I do get out, but he hadn’t been up to giving them water. We’re regularly giving them warm water in the mornings now, so I took care of that when I headed out. There were no cats around at first, but as soon as the warm water was available, a whole bunch of them came out of the cat’s house to indulge!
Agnoos was the only one who was willing to pose for a photo.
Oh, the cuteness!
I am very happy to see the kittens are making full use of the cat’s house. It’s become common, now, for me to walk past it and find several kitten faces watching me through the window. The shelf in front of the sun room, where the bottom two shelves were modified to make insulated shelters for them last winter, is also being used regularly.
I totally get why my later father loved the yard cats so much! <3
Just look at who I got to say hello to, this morning!
The beautiful Nosencrantz let me pet her, but wasn’t too happy about me coming any closer, so I let her be.
While this handsome gentleman (yes, we have been able to confirm Agnoos is male – and I may as well spell his name phonetically! LOL) was the opposite. He started off stand-offish, letting me pet him, but moving away, letting me pet, moving away… Then I straightened up and was about to move, then I felt a cat winding around my legs. Yup! Agnoos actually came over for more pets, and I was even able to pick him up and cuddle him!!! Yay!!!
I had a bit of a change in plan today. I had called my mother last night to see if she needed any help with grocery shopping. She said no, but then mentioned the heat wasn’t turning on at her place, and it was very cold. She had just been talking to my brother and he had said something to her about it, for me to check. She couldn’t repeat what he had said, and I couldn’t figure out her paraphrase. But it wasn’t a big deal, she insisted. I didn’t have to come over. She would wait until my brother came out to check it. *sigh* It was a short call, as her program was about to start, so I called my brother immediately after I got off the phone with her. It turned out he wanted me to check the breakers. Which I could never have been able to figure out from what my mom had said! I mentioned her saying she would wait for him to check it, which just left us shaking our heads. Why make him drive almost 2 hours after work, when I’m less than half an hour away and can do the same thing?
So this morning, I did a short version of my rounds, then called my mother up about coming over. It turned out she’d had a sleepless night, so she asked me to come in the afternoon. That gave me enough time to finish my rounds and grab a quick lunch, then I headed over.
The breakers were fine. She though she’d turned her thermostats up to 25C, but it was only at 20C, and wasn’t turning on. So I turned them up. Then, since she knew I would be coming this afternoon, she asked if I could help her with grocery shopping.
I had used her car, just in case that would happen!
So we did that, but as I was folding up her walker in and out of the car, I noticed the seat was falling off. Once back at her place and the groceries were put away, I checked it out. The seat is attached to the frame with a pair of loops, so it’s like a hinge. I could see both screws were getting loose, but one was falling out completely. I flipped it around to look at the other side, and discovered that both loops were already missing their screws on the other side!
Of course, these aren’t ordinary screws. For starters, they needed a hex key to tighten them, which I didn’t have, but I did have a screwdriver with Robinsons tips (square tips: it’s a Canadian thing), which worked well enough.
While I was working on that, my mother made tea, so of course, I had to stay for a visit. ;-) I don’t mind, since I know she is lonely will all the social activities still banned in her building. Still, by the time I was leaving, I had to rush to get to the post office before it closed, to pick up a package.
Oh, and I remembered to turn her thermostats down before I left. When we got back from grocery shopping, the apartment was way too warm, so I turned it down just a few degrees. Hopefully, she will be happy with that!
By the time I got home, I noticed that, while we have a nice, warm and sunny day, the wind has picked up a lot. I had intended to be working outside today, but have missed the best hours for the work. Ah, well. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get some of it done before it starts getting too dark, and the weather holds over the next while. In fact, now that I’ve finished grabbing a quick supper, I’ll be heading out now!
So much work to go, so few daylight hours to do it in!
Lately, while doing my morning rounds, I’ve find myself being watched and followed. Today, I had a whole crowd interested in what I was doing, while fixing up the fallen window to the storage house.
So. Many. Kitties!
I’m rather surprised that Junk Pile has been following me around more often, and coming closer. Not enough for me to pet her, but almost.
She may not be willing to let me touch her, but she’s comfortable enough to flop on the ground and start rolling!
She made some maternal noises while she was rolling about.
They got answered!
Her boy, Tuxedo Mask, came running, meowing away!
Then one of the tabbies showed up. I believe this is Chadicous, one of Butterscotch’s two tabbies.
Chadicous wasn’t willing to come any closer, but Nosencrantz sure was!
Such a cutie!
The kitties do love that picnic table!
I’m not sure which of the ‘icusous is on the table, but it’s one of Junk Pile’s babies.
I got distracted by a Caramel going by and suddenly…
… two kittens at the picnic table became five!
I believe that’s Chadicous under the table. The other four look to be all from Junk Pile’s litter.
Then I heard the strangest little beeping noise and found…
… Toesencrantz, checking out the replaced window set up!
I was not the only one curious about the beeping noise.
His cousins came to check him out, too!
Meanwhile, Caramel was checking out her… brother? Cousin? One of the ‘icouses, anyhow. :-D
Oh, look! I’m being watched from above, now! :-D
The cats just love climbing all over these huge old maples.
Even Toesencrantz tried his hand (claw? paw?) at climbing an elm.
While I was working on the garlic, my daughter did a whole bunch of clean up!
She pulled the Dorinny corn stalks that were next to the squash tunnel, then pulled all the squash, gourds and melon. Aside from the sunflowers, which we will be leaving for the deer to nibble on in the winter, we just need to weed and prep the beds that will be used next year, and put away things like the bin we keep tools and supplies in, empty the rain barrel and put it away for the winter, and take down the last of the critter barriers.
Then she pulled all the purple corn stalks, removed the three layers of barriers we had around the Crespo squash, and pulled those, too. I’m not sure what I’ll be doing with the corn block. There’s some very good soil there. It would be good to plant some sort of legume there, next year, to replace the nitrogen the corn used up. As for the squash hill, that’s something else I’m not sure what do do with. When we plant squash again next year, I want it to all be on the other side of the main beds, where they get more hours of sunlight.
What a sad sight. The Crespo squash had recovered so well from the critter damage! I definitely will be trying these again – with critter barriers, right from the start!
Once I finished with the last garlic bed, I pulled the frozen chard and the remaining radishes we’d hope to grow for pods.
All those radishes we planted, and these are the only ones that survived the grasshoppers!
It’s a shame we don’t have chickens. They would have loved all the greens we pulled today! Not that they will go to waste. They will get buried in the beds as we prepare them for next year. There are still four more beds in the main garden area, including the one with lettuce still in it, to clean up. The lettuce is handling the overnight cold very well, but they have become very bitter tasting, so they will be pulled. Of course, there is still the high raised bed to work on.
I had company while I worked on the garlic. The cats do like the high raised bed. I’m sure the wood is much warmer on their toes than the ground. :-)
My daughter was able to help with the high raised bed this time. She finished making the notches on the next end piece, in the background, while I cut another 9′ side piece from the last tree we cut down. She does not like using the baby chainsaw, and much prefers a hammer and chisel, so I started on the notches on the end piece in the foreground, until the second battery on the baby chainsaw ran out. By then, it was starting to get dark, so my daughter finished up the end piece she was working on and we called it a day. You can’t see the cuts I made on the end piece in the foreground, as I rolled the log onto them. They make it less likely to roll around, should the cats decide to climb all over it again.
The side pieces that are waiting are from higher up in the tree trunk, and quite a bit thinner than the other logs. Almost too thin. Since we will probably make this bed four logs high, I am thinking I should wait until I have thicker logs to use, and save the narrower ones for the top row. The tree that’s still stuck on the branches would give me logs that are just the right size – if we could get it the rest of the way down! :-D It’s either that, or find another dead tree to cut down. The problem with that is, most of the trees that need to be cut down are all really huge. They might be too big!
As glad as I am to have so many dead trees available that are still solid enough for this project, I’m a bit sorry to be using them. These are the trees we intended to use for the walls of the cordwood shed we plan to build as an outdoor bathroom. It’s possible, however, that we will be able to get a load of cast-off electricity poles. These are the remains of poles that broke in storms or had to be replaced for some reason, and we’re on the mailing list with the electric company. They don’t come available often, and not always in our area, but these are cedar poles and would be much better to use for cordwood walls than spruce. So maybe it’s for the better, that the dead spruces are being used to build high raised bed gardens!
