While heading out to do my evening rounds yesterday, I topped up the cat kibble – and got invaded by kittens!
There is only one adult cat in the kibble house in the above photo, plus Rosencrantz and her two are at their private dining area under the shrine.
All three litters of kittens were running all over the yard, playing with each other! The fact that most of them stayed to eat while I took photos – even with zoom – is very encouraging. :-) It will be good for them to get used to each other, since we can expect them all to be using the cat shelter over the winter.
While checking the garden beds, the girls gave me a hand moving one of the mesh covers so we could collect our very first chard leaves!
These are the Bright Lights chard, with their brilliant colours.
In the other bed where we had planted chard and radishes, only a single chard plant has survived the grasshoppers, and it’s pretty small, still.
Here we have the largest of the developing Hopi Black Dye sunflower heads. These are the ones that were direct sown after last frost.
This morning, I found this.
This is another Hopi Black Dye sunflower, from the row of transplants. These are the ones that did not germinate until after the others were direct sown, so they were much smaller and further behind. Then they had their tops chomped off by deer. Yet here they are, spindly and barely knee high, yet the seed heads are starting to open before the big ones!!
Speaking of seed heads…
I collected the driest of the poppy pods. I was a bit concerned that the rain and humidity would create a mold issue, so they are now in the sun room. As you can see, some of them are even dropping seeds!
These are Giant Rattle Breadseed Poppy, and the pods should be much, much larger than this, but given the growing conditions of this year, I’m just impressed we have any at all. There are still others that are green, but starting to dry out. I am debating just leaving them be, to self sow for next year. Given how few survived, there isn’t enough for eating, other than a taste, but more than enough to keep seeds for planting in a different area next year, if we want. I wouldn’t mind even finding a spot to scatter them as if they were wildflowers, where we can access them to harvest seed pods, but also where we can leave them to self seed, year after year. At the same time, I’m thinking of ordering more of this variety from Baker Creek, plus trying a different variety of eating poppies I found from a Canadian source. This is something I don’t mind having lots of, as poppy seeds are among those things I enjoy, but rarely buy. Neither variety I’ve found are like the ones I remember my mother growing, but I believe she got her seeds from Poland.
As things are maturing, my mind seems to constantly assess for next year or, as in the case of the poppies, for a more permanent crop. For all the difficulties we’ve had with this year’s garden, due to things pretty much out of our control, we have learned a lot that we can apply to future gardens, what we want to keep, and what we need to change. Especially as we move from our temporary garden beds to our permanent ones. :-)
On a completely different note, today we had an early birthday party to celebrate my mother’s 90th birthday at my brother’s. I was my mother’s chauffeur. :-) We had a great time, and we able to see her great grandson for the first time in almost 2 years. They live in a different province, so it was fantastic that they could come out for the birthday party.
Between the drive and how long we stayed to visit, we were out pretty much all day, but my mother held out very well. She even seemed to like the necklace we got for her gift and put it on right away, though she was completely indifferent to the little bag I crocheted to “wrap” it in. Even when I suggested she could use it to hold one of her rosaries, she said nothing. Now that I think about it, I don’t even know if she took it home. I helped bring in and put away her packages, and it wasn’t in any of them, so unless someone tucked it into her purse, she doesn’t have it. Which is actually a better response than I was expecting. :-D
Some things just don’t change! ;-)
Anyhow.
As wonderful as it was to see everyone, this introvert needs a battery recharge. I think an early bed time is in order! :-D
Yesterday evening, we found ourselves having another wonderful, solid rainfall! Enough to kick out our internet, but it was well worth it.
Then, even as it was still raining above us, the setting sun lit up the more gorgeous rainbows.
This is how it looked from the inner yard, beautifully framed by trees.
But we had to go to the outer yard to see both of them. Photos, of course, cannot do justice to the real thing! They were so incredibly bright and colourful.
It’s been a long time since we’ve seen rainbows!
Along with the welcome rain, we’ve had a lot of high winds lately. Sadly, the wind broke one of the Hopi Black Dye sunflowers in the old kitchen garden. This was the very first one that had been started indoors to germinate, and I planted it, and one other, there when I didn’t think any others would make it, so it was the furthest along of all the transplants (which are recovering from getting their heads chomped off by a deer).
When I found it bent in half, I placed a support near it and tied the stem gently to it, but it wasn’t enough. I ended up lashing a piece of doweling directly to the stem to keep it from bending.
Yesterday, even with the doweling, I found it it leaning over again; the main support had actually been pushed over the the wind, too, and was no longer holding it straight. It was looking wilted, too, but I straightened it up anyhow, and hoped for the best.
Frankly, I’m amazed it’s still alive at all, with that damage!
Remarkably, when I checked on it this morning, it was no longer wilted! Yesterday’s rain perked it right up again. It might actually survive!
While doing my morning rounds, I picked some beans and a zucchini, then grabbed a selection of garlic, an onion and a shallot, to bring to my mother. She’s supposed to avoid foods in the onion family, but a little is okay, so I gave her just enough to get a taste of each.
I was able to have lunch at my mother’s, then we ran errands together. There was only one place I wasn’t able to go in with her, as the store is still requiring face masks, even though they are no longer mandated. I find it so strange and arbitrary that I can help my mom at the clinic and go into a medical lab with no issues, but the second hand store has issues with open faces. I did get a laugh at the grocery store when my mom commented to another customer about her still wearing a mask. It turned out she had no idea they were no longer required. I hadn’t even finished explaining the mandate had been lifted when she was tearing that thing off her face. And here I’d just been talking to my mother, wondering at the people walking around outside, alone, with masks on, which has never been mandated, and she was suggesting people didn’t know the restrictions had been lifted. My response was, of course they know. Who doesn’t know about it by now? Well, it turns out she was right!
One out of the ordinary stop we made today was a hardware store. She was looking for something specific, so I snagged an employee (who greeted me by name, which was weird, because I had no idea who he was – even if he weren’t wearing a mask!) and told him what my mother was after. My mother half-recognized him; turns out he’s from a farm just a couple of miles away. I never knew really knew him, and probably hadn’t seen him even in passing, in more than 30 years, and am amazed he knew who I was. Maybe it’s because I look so much like my mother?
Anyhow, with him helping us, my mother got to the real reason she wanted to go there.
She asked for an estimate on some garden sheds they had on display.
*sigh*
I told my mother, we don’t need a garden shed. If she really wants to get something that will help make the place look better, a wood chipper would be more useful. She wouldn’t hear of it. She’s got her mind set on a garden shed to replace the old and rotting one that’s here. Well, it’s her money, and it would certainly get used, but if she wants to get something for the farm, it’s about the least needed of things on the list. Heck for the amount the estimate came out to (including concrete deck supports and delivery; we’d still have to assemble it), we could get a solid chipper, hire someone to haul away the junk (including the old garden shed), replace the main entry doors and frame, and still have money left over.
When I suggested the chipper instead, her response was one that has become her default when I point out things that are needed, vs what she wants, on the farm. She told me to talk to my brother, as if he could afford to get this stuff! She still planned to talk to him about the garden shed.
After I got her home, I took a photo of the estimate to share with my brother, and she started back tracking, saying there was no hurry. :-/
The seasons are moving along, though, and having a wood chipper by this fall would be a huge benefit for gardening next year, but she still can’t wrap her mind around the concept of mulching as it is, no matter how often I explain it. She’d never heard of it before, therefore this is a “new” thing, and wrong.
Ah, well. It’s her money, and she can spend it how she wants. I just hate to see her waste it on something so low on the priority list. Especially since it’s more about appearances (as if there’s anyone who can see it!), rather than usefulness, and she complains about how ugly the branch piles look, every chance she gets! Plus, if she wants to get something “for me” so badly, you’d think she’d want to get something I actually want or need. But it’s not really for me, anyhow. It’s for her, and what the neighbours think – the ones that live a mile away… LOL. :-D
So that got done, and we did have an actual good visit, even with our usual head butting. I left early enough to head to town to pick up some prescription refills for my husband. For the first time in a year, I was actually able to walk into the store to do it, too. Then I did a quick grocery run, dashed home long enough to put things away, then did a dump run.
I must say, it felt very good to finally get home and stay home! :-D I try to combine errands as much as possible, so we don’t have to go out as often, but my goodness, it is draining. I much prefer my hermitage! :-D
Meanwhile, I’m going to have to go out again tomorrow, to get things we need for early the day after!
When we were living in the city, I thought nothing of running out three or four times a day. Now that we’re living out here, driving out even once a week for errands feels exhausting.
I am so spoiled by living here on the farm again! :-D
Before I get into my topic, here’s a Ginger picture for you to enjoy!
I interrupted his nap! :-D
Such a sweet baby boy he is! :-)
Now, onto less fun stuff.
I mentioned in my last post about our garden progress, that I’d showed photos of the pea beds to my mother.
As expected, she had nothing positive to say.
When we moved out here, she had made such a big deal about us having to plant a garden and was so angry when we didn’t, and now that we are growing a garden – and a very large one, this year – she’s still angry! It doesn’t matter what I do; it’s never going to be good enough! I’ve learned to accept that, though. ;-)
There were, however, other concerns.
In showing her a photo of the pea beds, she could not recognize where they were. She even asked if it was “in the yard” (meaning in the lawn to the south of the house), and there is nothing in the yard that looks even remotely like that area. She thought the poplar poles were steel, and was thoroughly perplexed by the “screen”; she used the Polish word for screen, but she meant the strings I’d put up on the one trellis for the peas to climb. It took me saying it was just twine I found in the basement, three times before she was willing to accept it. She also seemed confused about the poplar posts. I told her where I got them from, then dropped it. She was having a hard enough time understanding what I was showing her in the photos. I didn’t want to try and explain something she couldn’t see. I had even shown her where we made the bed for the tomatoes, at the chain link fence. She looked at it, but didn’t say anything. I’m not sure she recognized where it was, even though her flower bed and lilac bush were visible in the photo.
Of course, she had to make negative comments about the nice, new garden soil the peas were planted in. She tried to mock me for buying soil, only to put it on top of other soil (where else it would go?). That was when I told her that I’ve been testing the soil (still not finished doing that), and that is it low on nutrients. How could that be? She never had a problem growing things! *sigh* I had to explain – again – that nothing has been done for that soil for a very, very long time! It’s not that she doesn’t understand the concept. She just refuses to accept it.
I showed her a picture of all the cups of seeds we have in the big fish tank greenhouse. She asked about the cups, and I explained about the double cupping and – anticipating the objection I could see building up – mentioned that there are people who have been using the same cups for 10 years, and they’re still good. Then I showed her what I had in the little tank, and her only question was, no more fish? No more fish, Mom. Just plants!
From there she launched into how she should have told us, before we moved, to just sell everything (she’s upset that we have aquariums), because we could have moved right into the house as it was; it already had furniture, etc. I had to explain to her that no, the house was really unlivable. I told her about how my dad’s old bed broke, and the bed upstairs had mouse poop under the covers, and the state of the mattresses. We didn’t get past that. She was wondering how there could be mice, when there were cats, and I pointed out that the cats were outside, not in the house! Then the subject got changed.
The thing is, before we moved, she did tell us to just sell everything. And we did sell and get rid of a LOT of stuff, but this was a conversation we had many times. It was a major point of contention, because she convinced us to move out by offering to pay for the movers, but then basically tried to back out of it. I think she really believes we could have moved out with little more than the clothes on our backs, and everything would have been just fine. The odd thing was for her to bring it up as if it had never been discussed before.
We went back to talking garden stuff, and I showed her a picture of the tomato seedlings and luffa in the sun room. Then I tried to explain to her what luffa were. She cut me off in mid sentence, telling me she didn’t want to hear about it because she had never heard of them before and didn’t care.
I called her on her behaviour at that point. She tried to use her age to justify it; she could say stuff like that, because she’s older than me. I did run with the joke, but also pointed out that age is no excuse to treat people like this.
I don’t know that it sunk in.
Thankfully, I’ve reached a point in my life where she can no longer hurt me, but she can – and does – hurt others in the family, and is completely oblivious to it, so if I can get her to think about the effect her words can have on other people, I will try.
That part, at least, was pretty normal for conversations with her. I am having other concerns. Among them, she’s been complaining of dizziness and headaches. Her knees are bothering her a lot more than usual, as is her mystery pain in her side. Usually, when I come out to help her with her shopping, she takes advantage of having a driver to run other errands, but today, it was just the grocery shopping, and that was it. Yesterday, she had suggested going to the hardware store, because she wants to buy us fence posts for that section by the garden. I didn’t bring it up, because she clearly wasn’t up to doing anything beyond her grocery shopping.
It’s not just her physical health that is at issue. For the past while, in conversations with her, I’ve noticed what I can only describe as a sort of malaise. Usually, she makes quite a big deal of her aches and pains (there was a clear element of using them to get attention involved), following by loud proclamations about how she wants to live! She’s not ready to go to heaven yet! There are too many things she wants to do!
She hasn’t done that in a while. Instead, I’m having to ask her questions to find out about things like the headaches and increased pain. She’s also tried dismissing them as just being part of getting old, which is really unusual for her. Basically, I’m seeing red flags for both her physical health, her mental acuity, and her psychological state. Part of my concern is that she’s had her second jab recently. After her first one, she complained of pain in basically all her joints, nausea, etc. All reactions many other people have described having after getting the C19 jab. Now she’s got the headaches and nausea; also common reactions, but too common to associate with any specific thing. All I can say is that it’s unusual for her, and it started after she got her second jab. She’s not associating it with the shot, though. She’s convinced the nurse or whoever it was, faked giving it to her, because my mother never felt the needle. The malaise, though, had started after her first jab.
Another part of the problem is the continued restrictions. In fact, the province went and shut down churches again. Churches are not, and have never been, transmission hubs in this province (nor anywhere else, as far as I’ve been able to find; it’s always been mostly through either nursing homes and long term care centres, or other places indoors with extended contact, like family homes). All the social activities that my mother enjoyed so much are still banned. Even within her building, people are still having to sneak visits with each other, hiding from the caretakers. Her municipality – as well as ours – has never even had a single case. Being able to go to church again was pretty much the only thing my mother had left to look forward to.
I’m seeing my mother in decline, and a lot of it is directly because of our province putting everyone basically under house arrest and turning us into a police state, as if that could somehow, magically, control Schrodinger’s virus. (Thank God we don’t live in the city! It’s much worse there.) The very things that had her wanting to live have been taken away. Now, her biggest excitement is being able to go grocery shopping, and even that has started to cause her more pain.
First up, thank you to those who wished me well after my last post. I ended up lying down for a while, and the pain was much reduced when I got up again. It’s still there, but it’s more of a stiffness than pain now. I still have no idea what caused it, but it’s getting better.
Which made things much less uncomfortable while helping my mother run her errands this afternoon. Since I had her car, she took advantage of it and we went to several places. Before heading home, I stopped to fill the gas tank. Talk about sticker shock!
A couple of days ago, gas prices had gone down to 117.9/L for regular gas, and now it’s 128.9/L!
For those in the US, 1 US gallon is 3.78L (1 Imperial gallon is 4.55L, so there’s quite a difference). So this about $4.87/US gallon in Cdn dollars, or $5.90 in US dollars, at today’s exchange rate. And that’s just for regular gas, not premium!
As I understand it, this is still a low price compared to UK prices! Granted, we’re a lot more spread out, and have fewer alternative options to driving.
So…
Ouch!
At times like this, we are thankful my husband no longer has to commute to the city, as he did when we last lived in this province.
Overall, shopping with my mother went very well. A few days ago, she called me with concerns about pains in her chest and wanted me to make an appointment for her with the doctor. In the end, he ended up doing a telephone appointment with her – and instead of talking about her chest pains and other symptoms, she talked to him about the pain in her knees! *sigh* Still, she got a prescription for a topical painkiller to try on her knees for a couple of weeks. The last couple of times I helped her shop, she had some near falls as her knee gave out. That didn’t happen today, but she did get tired very quickly. Thankfully, when I do these trips with her, I don’t have anything I need to rush off to, so I can give her all the time she needs.
There was one thing that had me shaking my head, but before I describe it, some background is needed.
My mother had asked us to move out here a few times, and one of the “perks” she dangled in front of us is that we could grow a garden and never have to spend money on groceries.
Which doesn’t make much sense. Even when she had her big garden, plus we had chickens and butchered our own cows, we still had to buy some groceries. But that was the carrot she dangled in front of us. We’d be saving all that money by having free food.
When we did move out here, and didn’t immediately put in a garden in our first summer, she was furious. Like, actually furious. She was also angry the we let it go to “weeds”, as if we were doing it deliberately, rather than because it was so badly plowed, we couldn’t mow it until one of the push mowers was fixed the following summer. We would have destroyed the riding mower my brother got for us (because the one that was here disappeared while the place was empty.) In fact, it got so bad that, at one point, we were starting to look at rental listings because we thought she would “evict” us and, frankly, we didn’t need the abuse. It calmed down, but took a lot of concerted efforts from my siblings and I.
Then, when we finally did have a garden last year, my mother have very little so say, and what she did say was all negative. She had never heard of mulching before, so that was bad. We didn’t get it plowed or use a tiller (none of the tillers here work), so that was bad. And so on. But, overall, she just didn’t bring gardening up as much.
This year, with our plans for a much larger garden, she was once again furious, because we are going to buy soil. She has even finally started to acknowledge that the soil is not the same as when she had my dad to plow it, 5 kids to help pick rocks, and manure for a herd of cows to fertilize it. However, she had nothing much to say about the fact that we are planning to have a large garden, even though she harangued us about it for our first two years here. I would tell her about the seeds we got, and she would chastise me for spending money on seeds. During one attempt at a conversation about it, she was giving me a hard time for now “allowing” her to have the garden plowed, when she offered to pay someone, but when I told her that if she were still offering, we were ready to say yes, she just said she would think about it. It hasn’t been brought up, since. (But I’m still not supposed to spend money to buy soil…)
So that’s where we’ve been at for the last while.
Today, while at the grocery store, we were looking at some canned goods and I mentioned that we now had the supplies needed to do both water bath canning, and even do pressure canning, so we will be able to do things like can soups and things like that, safely.
Her response was to make snarky comments about spending so much money, spending, spending…
???
So… I’m supposed to grow a large vegetable garden, but I’m not supposed to buy seeds, not supposed to buy soil, and I’m somehow supposed to preserve the harvest without buying canning supplies and equipment (her water bath canning supplies also disappeared before we moved here)
I pointed out to her that when she canned things, she spent money, too. She had to.
She promptly dropped it.
It is so strange that, with how big a deal she made over us not gardening over our first two summers here, now that we are gardening, and very excited about it (I even mentioned how excited we are about it!), she can’t see anything positive about it. Even when I mention that we’ve started seeds indoors, she expressed surprise (yes, she did start some things indoors, too, so this isn’t even doing something different than she did), but doesn’t want to talk about it. And yet, she had been constantly going on and on about my sister’s garden, and how wonderful it is, and bragging about it every time my sister brought her some fresh produce. My sister has been gardening on their farm for somewhere around 40 years, but you’d think it was all a new and wonderful surprise or something.
So very strange.
But not as strange as the phone messages I listened to.
Yes, our vandal had called her again, a couple of days ago. For the first call, it was an unfamiliar number, so she answered it. She told me about it later, but neglected to mention that he had called her three more times, leaving messages!
He’s changed his story again. Now he’s saying he doesn’t want her money (which is hilarious, since for years, he was constantly after her to pay for things for him), but only wants to “walk freely” on the farm.
Why on earth would he even want to walk around on someone else’s property? It’s one thing to have come here to “take care” of the place, when it was empty (though he was helping himself all sorts of things at the same time). It’s quite another to want to just pop over any time, while there is someone living here, just to “walk freely”.
He obviously has no idea just how creepy that sounds.
Well, his messages were all sorts of rambling diatribes about how my mother has given the whole farm to me (she hasn’t), and why did she do that, when he worked so hard here, and we didn’t do anything at all, ever (he’s including my brother on that one). Then wailing about how we’re trying to put him in jail and have ruined his life.
Oh, and apparently, I go by, waving at him and laughing at him. Laughing!
Also, we’re fat. FAT!!!!
I think the funniest one was his claiming my daughters are holding parties. *snort*
There were some new ones in his messages, though. Now, we’re apparently ruining the lives of my late brother’s children, too. How, I have no idea. He’s also claiming I’m responsible for putting him into almost $200,000 of debt by charging him. Which I’m not doing, because when I tried that after he broke the gate, the courts stayed the charges after he went through some sort of program. I’m applying for a restraining order. How any of that resulted in him going into such massive debt, I have no idea. More likely, he incurred debt in the belief that he would coerce the farm out of my mother and sell it to pay off his own bills.
But that’s just a guess on my part.
Which leads me to the other new thing.
He actually offered to buy the farm from my mother (who doesn’t own it anymore, and he knows that) for…
…
drum roll please!
…
$500.
Which is what he says my parents paid for the farm (which would be the two quarter sections we’re caring for now, not the third quarter section the younger of my brothers got as an early inheritance).
In 1952.
Which I think might be before my parents were even married. Certainly before any of us kids were born, and only my late brother and I were born after the moved her from the city. I believe my parents bought the property in the early to mid 1960’s, and they certainly paid more than $500 for it! Even the quarter section my younger brother lives on cost them more than that when they bought it!
So where did he even get those numbers?
And what on earth was he thinking, to even suggest buying the property for the price he thinks it was purchased at, almost 70 years ago? Was he trying to be insulting? If he was, it didn’t work.
As my mother put it, he’s just making things up!
The oddest thing (among many odd things) is that I can submit these messages to the courts, both in my application for a restraining order (whenever that finally makes it to court), and in my defense against his vexatious civil suit against me, which still has a court date in July, and he knows this. He’s said as much in some of his past messages.
So why does he keep doing it?
And why is he so obsessed with this property? Particularly since he already has his own farm?
And why does he keep going after my mother, as if she still owns it?
None of it makes sense.
Interestingly, when my mother updated her will, the lawyer commented that he sees lots of people doing stuff like this, so he has lots of experience in making wills that can’t be contested by such people.
How very sad.
Ah, well. We deal with what we have.
In the mean time, I think building nice taaaaalll deer fences around the perimeter of the yard sounds like a very good idea. Something that also gives us privacy from anyone going slowly by on the road and peering through the bushes… :-/
We may live in the boonies, but sometimes I think it’s not quite far enough in the boonies. There are still people around. ;-)
But before I get into that, we had some activity in the feeding station yesterday evening!
Two pairs of deer came by – but they were NOT together! They kept fighting each other and chasing each other away from the feed. I do try to spread it out, but by the end of the day, there isn’t much left.
I managed to get some video, since I had to use my phone to take the pictures anyhow, and put them together. I’m trying to move away from YouTube, so I’ve uploaded to Rumble. Please let me know how this works for you.
If that doesn’t work for you, please try clicking here.
They were really cool to watch!
Anyhow…
I had considered going to my mother’s church this morning, to have our Easter basket blessed, but the church was needing to have people register and so on, in advance, so we decided to skip it this year. At least they had it this year. Last year, it wasn’t allowed.
So we were to assemble our basket today and just bless it ourselves. I did want to take advantage of things being open to make a run into town. I was going to do it in the afternoon, but I got a phone call from my brother. He and his wife had found a new recliner chair small enough for my mother and wanted to bring it over. I agreed to meet him and help assemble it, in the afternoon.
Which meant I headed into town earlier today, then went straight to my mother’s town to meet my brother before we headed to her place together.
The main thing I wanted to do today was get a second battery for the baby chainsaw. I also brought in the little corded chainsaw we found a while back. It should hopefully just need to have the chain sharpened. Otherwise, it should just need a new chain.
After starting a work order for the chainsaw, the lady tried to find a battery for me. After confirming they had none in stock, she went to the Stihl site to check their inventory.
They had none.
Zero.
Anywhere.
Which I suppose makes sense. Most people buying a battery operated tool will order a second battery so they can set one battery to charge and continue working with the second battery. This little thing has a matching little battery, so a lot of people buying these would not have a matching battery already and be getting a second one at the same time. Since this thing is so popular, they can’t even manufacture them fast enough to keep up with the demand, they would probably be going through more of that type of battery than the cordless pruner itself.
She did place an order for one for me, but has no idea when it could be fulfilled. They will call me when it comes in, though. Until then, I’ll just have to make do with one battery.
Since I was there anyhow, I picked up an extra bottle of oil for the bar, plus an extra chain. These fall into the category of “better to have them and not need them, then need them and not have them!”
Once the little electric chainsaw is in cutting shape again, it will be enough to meet most of our needs. We won’t be taking down any big dead trees with it, but it will go a long way in helping cut up the already fallen ones to make them easier to clear away.
That was taken care of rather quickly, and I had time to visit the beach for a little while.
The ice fishing shacks are long gone, but the ice is still thick enough for people to walk on it, and do a bit of ice fishing without a shack.
Then it was off to my mother’s town. I made a stop at the grocery store there, because I remembered seeing them carry the same type of deer feed and bird seed we usually get.
Not today, it turns out. All sold out! We at least still have some deer feed left, and the birds like that, too, so it can wait a bit. :-D
It did give me a chance to pick up a few things for my mother that I noticed she runs out of very quickly.
Then my brother and I met up, heading to my mother’s and surprised her with a new non-electric reclining chair to replace her old arm chair that she’d been complaining about. Of course, she had nothing nice to say about it, complaining that it was too big (it was the smallest they could find!), or that she didn’t need it, etc. The complaining was less than usual, however, which tells me she was actually very happy with it! :-D I am hoping she will be able to use it to sleep on, every now and then, as she still has breathing issues when she sleeps, and being slightly upright should help her with that.
So that worked out well, and we even stayed for a short visit. Then we loaded all the packing materials, and my mother’s old chair, into my brother’s truck, so my mother had nothing to worry about. Since the chair needs to be further forward, to have room to recline, than her other chair, things needed to be shifted around, and she now actually has slightly more space to walk around than with the smaller chair. :-)
On the way home, my route took me past where the recent fire was.
I am happy to say that the house tucked in the trees I was concerned about untouched by flames. There’s a drainage ditch that cuts through that quarter section, and it acted as a bit of a fire break that kept it from spreading to another house in the same quarter. The only thing that burned was open field. It was “just” a grass fire.
Driving around that quarter, however, showed that a LOT of that field was burned! When controlled burns are done, they tend to focus on specific problem areas, not entire fields. I could see where it had burned out of control, and the tire tracks from the emergency vehicles going in.
It was after I’d turned onto our road that I saw just how far it went. Plus, oddly, there was a burned out car in the middle of the field. ?!? Yes, farms tend to collect old cars, but they don’t leave them in the middle of fields they grow crops in!
As I got closer to the quarter we are on, I saw where the fire had actually jumped the road to our neighbour’s field. It didn’t go much beyond the ditch, thankfully. Another thing to be thankful for; the renter plowed the field he’d grown corn on. It would have acted as a fire break, since there wasn’t enough fuel available.
What I also saw was that the fire had actually burned past the fence, into the quarter section belonging to the younger of my brothers. Not far, thankfully. His quarter is mostly hay, so there was plenty of fuel available for a grass fire!
Which means the fire reached less than half a mile from our place, and my brother’s.
So thankful that no homes were lost!
Meanwhile, while I was away, the girls took care of assembling our Easter basket. Well. Except for the stuff that needs to be kept refrigerated. :-)
Looking forward to celebrating Easter tomorrow!
I hope you are, too. May your Easter be a blessed say of peace and great joy.
We’re still on the chilly side these days, and will continue to be for a while longer. As I write these, we are just below freezing, and our predicted highs aren’t going to be much warmer. It’s like that mild weather we had, and my being able to do some clean up in the spruce grove, was just a tease!
I think the cats are still appreciating the kibble house, and not having to be on the frozen ground to eat. Their water is freezing solid overnight again (except for the heated water bowl, of course), and they’re enjoying the warm water they’re still getting every morning.
I look forward to when we can take that tarp off the kibble house and give it a good paint job! It’s still too cold for paint.
At least the snow is mostly gone, so I can extend my rounds, checking the fence lines, etc. Which is where I found this poor little pussy willow, desperately trying to develop its catkins! :-D At least since we cleared this fence line, it is finally getting morning sun and warmth.
One of the things we will need to do today is go into town and retrieve my mother’s car. A bit late to help my mother, though! Yesterday, shortly after noon, I got a call from my mother. When I asked how she was doing, she told me she was “dressed”. Meaning, she was dressed up and all ready to head out. !!
We had been talking about me helping her with errands when I got her car back, and I was suggesting Wednesday or Thursday, hoping it would be done by then. Somehow, my mother thought it had been settled for Wednesday! So she was all ready to go for her errands, and for me to show up at the usual time. Of course, I didn’t show up because I didn’t know this! :-D I told her I didn’t have her car, but she had quite a few errands to run, and didn’t want to delay them. So I headed out right away and, just in case, brought our little step stool for her to use to get in and out of the van. She has one just like it, but I wasn’t sure if she’d grab it or not. I’m glad I did, because she had forgotten hers. She realized this while waiting for me, outside the door where I usually meet her, sitting in her walker. She was going to give me her keys so I could run in and get hers, but it wasn’t necessary. It turns out she doesn’t need it so much to get out of the van, but getting in is much harder for her.
One of the stops she needed to make was at the Senior’s centre which, unfortunately, has stairs, so she has to leave her walker outside and hobble in. :-( I helped her with the door and saw there was quite a few people inside, so I told her I’d wait for her outside. One of the social workers that I’ve been talking to about the horrible caretakers in my mother’s building came out to chat. She asked how my mother was doing, since my mother has a habit of saying she’s having troubles when she’s actually doing pretty well, but saying she’s doing well when she’s having troubles. Which isn’t all that unusual, I’ve found! ;-) One of the things I mentioned was that my mother was getting some serious cabin fever.
Which is when I found out something interesting. Not a good interesting, either.
When our province locked down even harder (which, as I predicted a year ago, actually caused an increase in deaths and illnesses; the first uptick of excess deaths our province had was during the annual winter increase, since the pandemic bypassed our province entirely until then, and no one in either of our municipalities has ever tested positive), buildings such as my mother’s locked their doors and only “authorized” personnel were allowed in, while residents were told to stay in their own apartments as much as possible, though they were “graciously” allowed to not wear masks within their own homes. :-/ “Authorized” personnel included the social workers, and people making deliveries. Because of the caretakers, my mother would sneak me or my siblings in through a side door, as we brought her groceries in. Yes, technically we were allowed in the building to do this, but the caretakers look for any excuse to harass people. Especially my mother, who is one of the few people to stand up to them.
Well, it turns out that my mother’s building is the only one that’s still locked up. All the other buildings run by the province are open. The social worker speculated on just who was responsible for keeping the residents locked up, and I half-joked that it made it easier to “control the inmates”. Unfortunately, the joke was too close to reality. She told me that one of my mother’s neighbours is considering putting a sign on her door to turn her apartment number to “Cell ##”, because she feels like she is in a prison. To be honest, in a real prison, they’d have more freedoms than the people living in my mother’s building, it seems. The frustrating thing is, there’s nothing we can do about it. The people living there are too afraid of the caretakers to complain, and since it’s a government run building, instead of a privately run building, getting abusive employees fired is pretty much impossible. The social workers have been trying to get the problem addressed for years – long before my mother has lived there – and had their own jobs threatened, instead.
It’s so frustrating. I was hoping my mother was serious about escaping to another building in town – one where meals are included, so she wouldn’t even need to do grocery shopping – but she chose this building because her church is right across the street. She wouldn’t be able to walk to church from the other building. That and she really doesn’t want to go through the hassle of moving again, even though this time I’d be available to help with our van. Truthfully, with the exception of the caretakers, this place is pretty ideal for her. She shouldn’t have to move, just to get away from crappy employees.
What a mess.
After my mother finished at the senior’s centres, we did the rest of my mother’s errands, finishing with some grocery shopping. After everything was brought in and put away, I was even able to stay for tea. Before I left, I gave my mother a big hug. She almost started crying. :-(
Just before I got home, I heard my phone going off, so I checked my messages before unlocking the gate. It was from the garage, letting me know my mother’s car was ready! It was too close to their closing time, though. I suppose I could have grabbed my daughter and left immediately, but since I had just finished helping my mother with her errands, there was no longer any rush.
Meanwhile…
Today, I need to focus and prepare for tomorrow. We finally have our court date for the restraining order against our vandal. I really don’t know what to expect. I think the most likely thing to happen is that they will run through the docket as quick as they can, and it’ll be rescheduled for a hearing at a later date. Of course, what I hope will happen is that the restraining order will be granted. A restraining order is just a piece of paper, but it does give the police more to work with and, more importantly, our vandal will have his guns removed, and he’ll have to stop drinking. The order is for a year, and then I would have to re-apply, if I felt it was warranted, but I would hope that a year of being dry, and having to prove it regularly, will make a difference in his mental state. It’s a faint hope, but it’s there, nonetheless. There’s still his vexatious litigation against me to deal with, but that court date is in July. If he were at all sensible, he would drop that, as he has no case. It’s basically just his way of getting back at me for applying for the restraining order after he tried to break the gate again.
What a mess.
As crazy at it is, I have no regrets for moving out here. The positives far outweigh the negatives, and it’s still better than what we left behind.
Still, it would be nice if all we needed to do was take care of this place for my family, which is why we moved out here to begin with!
One of the things about visiting my mother is, she tends to … pass things on to us.
Basically, she is foisting off things she doesn’t want or need on us, because there’s lots of room on the farm, right?
Four decades, friends in the city doing that to my parents. A lot of that stuff is still lying about in various places. Now she’s doing it to us! :-D
Most of the time, it’s not an issue. I just got a bag full of plastic containers that will be just fine for putting leftovers in the fridge (some of them are what I used to bring meals to her! :-D).
Previously, we got a bag full of odds and ends that included small flashlights so old, the batteries were on the verge of leaking.
We just never know what to expect!
One thing she has been pretty consistent in including has been sweets. She “can’t eat” sweet things (yes, she can. She knows enough to limit herself, but she has her preferences, and that’s just fine).
Most of the sweets are little baggies of candies the social workers have been including in little gift bags they’ve been giving to people in my mother’s building, since they aren’t allowed to have bingo or coffee nights or any of the other many social events they used to organize.
Someone, however, has been giving my mother Polish chocolates!
The last box she passed on to us was around Christmas, and they were quite excellent.
Today, she gave me these.
Wawel (VAH-vel) is a place. Czarny Las (CHArny Laas) means Black Forest (and is the site of the WWII massacre of 250-300 Poles by the Gestapo). Czekolada Nadkiewana (Che-ko-lada Na-jye-vana) means stuffed chocolate. The info in the back says this is from Krakow, which is not all that far from where my mother lived during WWI until the province was turned over to the USSR after the war, and Poles were expelled.
I find myself curious as to who is finding these Polish chocolates for my mother, and where are they finding them! The only place I can think of is the city, which has a substantial Polish community my parents used to be a part of, but I just don’t know of anyone in her building would even know the area exists, never mind knowing where to buy Polish products.
When I got home, I opened the box, discovering that it had already been opened. My mother had tried them before passing them on to us. :-D
Unfortunately…
… they were not stored properly! :-D
It looks horrible, but it’s just a bloom that happens when the chocolate gets exposed to temperature extremes, instead of being in a consistent cooler temperature.
I was not expecting to see all those mouths when I unwrapped the chocolate!
Yes, I did try a piece.
Not a fan of the cherry filling. I’ve never been a fan of fruit in chocolate, really, so that’s not a surprise. I suspect the temperature fluctuations that caused the bloom also affected the texture of the filling.
I did some unexpected running around yesterday and didn’t have a chance to post. Now that I am, I’m seeing that the title font in my editor has changed. I did not change the default font. I’m not even sure how I would do that!
Well, we’ll see if anything is different after I hit “publish”. So far, it looks the same as always when I hit “preview”.
WordPress gets weird at times!
Anyhow.
For the last couple of mornings, I have been happy to see that the outside cats are using the cat house again. When I head out, I’ve been seeing a big mass of orange in the window and, as I come closer, three heads will pop out to look at me! Unfortunately, when I try to get closer to get a picture, Creamsicle Jr. gets spooked and runs off.
I’m still heating up water for them, which they really seem to appreciate!
Yesterday, the plan was to drive my husband to the clinic to get some blood work done. Unfortunately, he had another really bad pain day, and could not handle the trip. I should see if they will fax the requisition to the lab in the town closer to us. I think he would better handle a 15-20 minute drive, over a 40-45 minute drive!
I still wanted to take the van out on the highway, though, and see about blowing more carbon out of the lines at highway speeds. So I headed out to the Walmart in the small, nearer city to finally pick up the rest of the month’s supply of cat litter and dry kibble.
You can tell that spring is in the air, though, when you start seeing birds in the Walmart!
This little guy was checking out the bird seed aisle, and finding stray seeds to eat! :-D
While there, I hoped to pick up more 750ml canning jars, but there weren’t any. I’d picked up the last one, previously, and it doesn’t look like they got more. So I got more wide mouth 500ml jars (2 cups/half a quart). I think these are the two sizes that will be the most useful for us. The plan is to pick up a case or two every month over the summer, so that we’ll have a good stock available by the time we are harvesting from the garden. Assuming everything goes well and we actually have enough to preserve. I usually go with “hope for the best, plan for the worst” but in this case, we’re also planning for the best!
The van, I’m happy to say, ran well. I even loaded the heavy stuff in the back, rather than the middle, and didn’t feel any of the issues I’d noticed before, that had us splitting our trips and loading the heaviest things in the middle of the van.
Later on, I made sure to call my mother to arrange a grocery shopping trip for her. That was set for this afternoon.
If all had gone to plan, I’d be on the road to her place right now.
Does anything go to plan? :-D
It was quite late when I got a call from my mother. She had suddenly developed pain in her bones. Especially her already damaged knees.
My mother had received the vaccine for Schrodinger’s virus a couple of days before.
She was obviously quite concerned, but as we talked I suggested it might also be because of the fluctuating temperatures. That calmed her down, and she decided she would take some Tylenol, bundle up for the night, and keep the cordless phone by her bedside, just in case.
I’m happy to say she was feeling better today. When she got the shot, she had the usual adverse reactions everyone seems to be getting; her arm was sore, redness and swelling. Fatigue, as well. No allergic reactions, but I wouldn’t expect any from her. She has an iron constitution. Muscle and joint pain, nausea, diarrhea, fatigue, vomiting are all on the list of adverse reactions that are being reported. We will have to keep an eye on her after the second shot, as reactions are reportedly worse after that one.
Though she was feeling better, she wasn’t up to actually going out, so I was going to do her shopping for her. We had a bit of a snow storm happening this morning; not unusually cold, but colder, with blowing snow, low visibility, etc. It was supposed to get worse in the afternoon, so I headed out in the morning. I popped in to go over her list with her and be really clear on what she wanted. I noticed things that were not on the list and asked her about them. It’s always hard to shop for someone else. Especially when shopping is often a “see what’s good” or “whatever’s on sale” situation.
There were a few things on her list she would have picked up at the pharmacy, but the pharmacy kicked me out because they don’t honour medical mask exemptions, so she said she would get those items, later. She’s not willing to pay the grocery store prices for the same things. :-D
Just me and her list did make for a very quick trip! I was even able to stay for a short visit, which I haven’t been able to do for a while.
So she is doing all right, but is very tired and will be getting lots of rest for the next while. My siblings and I are going to have to watch not to pester her with phone calls to check up on her! :-D
Thankfully, the local weather has actually improved; whatever was being forecast for this afternoon seems to be missing up.
Today turned out to be a lovely, warm and sunny day!
While doing my morning rounds, I had a chance to check on Potato Beetle’s wound, and it’s looking very good. After the trip to the vet, though, I don’t think he trusts me as much, though! :-D
I called up the company we want to buy garden soil from. I spoke to someone else this time, so I went over what I’d been told before, then said that we were looking to get two truck loads of soil, but first I wanted to know of someone could come over to see where to dump the loads. For one load, it’s not an issue, but for the other, there are low hanging branches that might be a problem, so I wanted to look at that with whomever would be delivering the soil.
She said that she was unable to call any of the guys during the day, as there is no cell phone reception where they are (boy, does that sound familiar!) but she will pass it on to them and call me back on the weekend. The one thing she wasn’t sure of is if the soil was too frozen to load into the trucks or not. They usually do gravel, which will break up, even if frozen, but soil behaves differently. If all goes well, though, I’m hoping well have delivery as early as next week! Otherwise, we’ll see what they advise. We’re going to be above freezing for several more days, so I don’t think it’ll be much of an issue.
Later on, I called my mother to ask if she needed any help with errands or grocery shopping. For now, she’s good, so I’ll probably be heading over next week to give her a hand. Then she asked me what was new.
I made the mistake of answering her honestly.
*sigh*
I told her about the garden soil we were arranging to buy.
She was FURIOUS! I barely finished telling her about it when she lit into me about how she had this big wonderful garden there, and it seemed I just wanted to do things the hard way and had to spend money…
It went on for a while. In a nut shell, I should be growing a garden exactly like she did, back when I was a kid (which isn’t even possible, since they squeezed in so many trees, a significant portion of the garden of my childhood now has either trees, or shade from trees, in it), I should not be spending any money on anything, not even seeds. Also, I should not be thinking about planting trees (I’d reminded her of our plans to grow fruit and nut trees), but should be growing lots of vegetables to store for the winter, like she did, and since she didn’t have a problem with the rocks, I should just plant things like she did, rocks and all. The real problem was the “weeds” I “allowed” to grow, and there wouldn’t be any if we’d have plowed it, which she offered to pay someone to do, but I said no. I asked her if she was offering again? She repeated that she had offered and I said no. I told her, two and three years ago, we weren’t ready. We’re ready now. If she’s offering now, we’re saying yes.
*heavy pause*
She said she’ll think about it.
Uh huh.
So that was an … interesting phone call.
The reason I’d wanted to talk to her, though, was because I finally got a copy of the calls our vandal had left on her answering machine a while back. He’d been saying he wanted to meet with her to talk. She had misunderstood, thinking he meant on the phone, but he was saying in person. I wanted to make sure she knew it was not safe for her to meet with him alone. Not that I think he would physically harm her, but he would be emotionally and psychologically abusive towards her.
We also talked about the possibility of her changing her phone number. She hadn’t thought of that. She doesn’t want to, but at least now it’s a possibility that’s on her radar.
Once the phone calls were done, I decided to take advantage of the warmer weather, and headed out to the garden area.
It was time to do a burn!
The stack of diseased apple tree branches we’d pruned last summer needed to be dealt with.
The pile was just dry enough to burn well, but also snow covered enough for the flames to never get big enough to be a concern, as it would have been if I’d try to do this in the summer. This was no bon fire! When we first moved here, there was a huge pile of pruned wood in the middle of the garden that my family wanted to set a match to. We’d just left a province that had been devastated by forest fires, so we were not exactly keen on having a bon fire with resin torches, aka spruce trees, nearby. This was much smaller and could be better controlled.
As the fire worked its way to the other end of the stack, I shoveled snow over the remaining coals and ashes, little by little.
I was able to spend a couple of hours outside, tending it, but by the time the fire burned away all the small stuff and only the larger logs were left, I was finally chilled enough that it was time to go inside.
The fire itself was so hot at times, I could feel it from 6 or 7 feet away, but it wasn’t enough to make up for damp boots and cold toes!
So the last of it got buried in snow. We’ll finish burning the remains after it’s melted away again.
Even if we’re not able to finish burning the diseased branches here, there’s just a few large pieces left that would be easy to move somewhere else to finish burning away.
Unfortunately, I expect we’ll have to cut down several more crab apple trees completely, not just in this area, but in others. All of that wood will need to be burned. We won’t even be able to use it in the fire pit for cookouts. That’s going to be a lot of wood to burn, so until we can get it done, we’ll have to keep the wood separate from any other wood we clean up that we will make use of as much as possible, even if they end up being chipped and used for mulch. The last thing we want is to have is infected wood chips!
There may still be snow on the ground, but it sure feels good to be warm enough to start doing jobs like this, outside!
Yesterday, I made a quick trip out to deliver some turkey dinner to my mother. She tried to tell me I didn’t need to, but when I mentioned potatoes and gravy, she couldn’t hide how excited she was. :-D
It was just a quick stop, as she met me at the side door of her building, but she had a surprise for me, as well. It seems lots of people have been giving her sweet food gifts – far more than she can (or should!) eat. While the tin of shortbread cookies I gave her will keep well (I told her to have them with tea, when her lonely neighbour sneaks over for a visit), but some needs to be eaten more quickly.
So she gave me a bag with a box of chocolates someone had given her to take home. It wasn’t until then that I saw that these were a type I’d never seen before!
The writing on the package was in Polish!
Thankfully, the pictures that showed what the different chocolates were, had both Polish and English, though some of the translations still didn’t tell us what they were. At least, I hope not. I’ve never heard of avocado as a chocolate filling before…
I’m willing to try it, though!
My daughter picked up two 5 pound boxes of “ugly” chocolate from Purdy’s this year, so we won’t to into this box until those are done. :-D
I got a call from my sister this morning, letting me know that my mother wasn’t feeling well, so I called my mother to check on her. She was feeling pain in her bones, having trouble moving, but also stomach discomfort. So far, we’re not looking to take her to the hospital or anything; something she does not want to do again. She must have been feeling better by the time I called, though, because she began to lecture me on my gravy in the dinner I brought for her. Last year, she complained that I included “so much” bacon, which clearly meant we eat massive amounts of bacon, all the time (I’d included, at most, 2 slices from what I put on top of the turkey before roasting it). So I skipped the bacon completely this time. Now she’s complaining that the gravy is white instead of brown, and that I should have browned the flour first, but clearly I didn’t and just wanted to do things the “easy” way, and so on. I told her it was done exactly the same way as I did it last year, and turkey gravy is a white gravy. Because it’s turkey. But no. Gravy is supposed to be brown. It tastes better when it’s brown. Then she talked about how she learned to brown the flour in a pan, first, from her mother and describing how she did it. I told her I knew how to do it, because I’d learned how from watching her when I was a child. I just don’t do it. She sounded surprised by that. She always sounds so surprised that I know how to cook – even as I give her meals that I’ve cooked!
So… I figure she can’t be feeling too ill if she has that much energy to complain about the colour of the gravy that came with the Christmas dinner I brought for her.
*sigh*
Well, we shall see how she feels as the day goes on.
Meanwhile, she was kind enough to give us these beautiful chocolates from Poland that she didn’t want. Which I don’t mind at all! :-)
The Re-Farmer 