getting things done

Our 2025 garden – I hope!

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Yes!!!

It felt so good to get a really productive day outside. It’s been so long!

I did have to wait until the afternoon, when it warmed up to our expected high of 6C/43F. Even so, some of the areas I worked in that were shaded longer were still partially frozen.

The first thing I did was finish off the bed I was working on yesterday. That little section was shaded and still rather frozen, so it took longer than it normally would have. When I was done, I grabbed a nearby roll of plastic that was rolled up and waiting to be put away for the winter and laid it out on the bed, starting from the shaded south end. It wasn’t long enough to cover the entire bed, but all I really wanted was to get the end that got more shade to warm up a bit, once the sun was able to start hitting it.

Once that was done, I shifted to the old kitchen garden and cleared the rectangular be that had the Forme de Couer tomatoes this year. That bed was shaded by the house on one side so it, too, was partially frozen. After clearing it of weeds and mint rhizomes, I grabbed one of the plastic sheets that had protected the eggplants and peppers earlier, and laid it over the soil. This bed is shorter, so the plastic was plenty long enough.

I had decided to use the high raised bed, which is already prepared, and the open section of the garlic bed for winter sowing, so I didn’t need to clear another bed, yet. Leaving the plastic to warm the soil, I headed into the house and started going through my seeds.

I had already considered what I wanted to winter sow earlier, but I’m always flexible on stuff like that.

After going through my seeds, I decided on some ordered chaos.

I’m also going to need to clear one more bed.

Most of the seeds I will be sowing are older seeds, so I don’t expect a very high germination rate for some of them. I also decided to include some additions.

Here are the beds I was able to finish planting before it started getting too dark.

The first image of the slideshow above is in the old kitchen garden. With that theme in mind, I’ve got more “kitchen” greens. These include:

– spinach – four different varieties
– Swiss chard – two different varieties
– Shallots – saved seed collected from a lone surviving shallot a couple of years ago
– Kohlrabi – both purple and green
– Hedou Tiny bok choi – we got these as free seeds a couple of years ago, but they were smothered by elm tree seeds after they sprouted. A couple of seedling survived and bolted, so I let them go to seed and saved them.

Lastly, I included some onion seeds collected this year. Hopefully including the onions and shallots will keep the deer and damaging insects away.

These and another group of smaller seeds were added to a repurposed herb/spice shaker container, along with some seed start mix and vermiculite I had left over from starting seeds indoors in the spring, and given a thorough shaking.

After emptying this container into the old kitchen garden bed, it was mulched with a thick, insulating layer of leaves that was topped with some grass clippings, as was done with the garlic already planted.

In the next image, you’ll see the bed I had started on last night. This one is now a summer squash bed. Years ago I had accidentally bought three collections of summer squash when I meant to get just one. We’ve been using the seeds for several years now, but they are starting to get old. The only new seeds were the White Scallop patty pan squash. The others are Sunburst (a yellow patty pan), Endeavor (green zucchini), Goldy (yellow zucchini) and Magda (mottled pale greens, similar to zucchini). I don’t expect much for a germination rate for the older seeds.

With these larger seeds, I scattered them from end to end on the bed, then pushed each one into the soil, spreading them out more evenly in the process, used a rake to gently cover them over, then mulched with leaves and grass clippings.

The next two photos – the remaining end of the garlic bed and the high raised bed – have root vegetables, plus protective onion seeds. These include:

– the last loose seeds of Uzbek Golden carrot (I still have the home made seed tape of those)
– pelleted Napoli carrot
– beets – three red varieties left over from before, plus a white Albino variety given to me
– Purple Prince turnip
– radishes – three red varieties left over from before, plus a yellow variety given to me.

Plus, protective onion seeds were added as well.

I used the shaker over the small area next to the garlic, but I honestly couldn’t tell if any seeds got out. I mulched it anyhow, but when I got to doing the high raised bed, I took the shaker lid off and just scattered the mix. I could at least see the pelleted carrot seeds! This bed is shorter, and I ended up not finishing off the container. I’ll find somewhere else to sow the rest of the seeds.

After mulching the high raised bed, I moved the wire cover onto it for winter storage. The wire is open enough that it won’t prevent snow from covering the bed, and the snow is an important part of this winter sowing process.

This left me with two containers of seeds. I decided to plant the flower seeds. I wanted those in the main garden area and decided to use the space by the high raised bed where the pumpkins and drum gourds had been planted. It’s a small space and did not take long to clean up. That last space got:

– Butterfly Flower: Orange shades (a milkweed) that I tried starting indoors this past spring, but never got to direct sowing the rest.
– Forget Me Nots – given to me by a friend
– Nasturtium; Dwarf Jewel Mix – I got those this year and never got around to planting them.

I look forward to (hopefully) have a busy patch of flowers for the pollinators in the main garden area next year! The Nasturtium should also act as a trap crop, luring in insects that might harm some of the other plants.

For flowers, I also have two packages of Western wildflowers mix. I have an area along the edge of the maple grove that has been covered with the insulated tarp, folded in half, since it was taken off the septic tank lid in the spring. I’m hoping that did the job of killing off any weeds under it. Once the tarp is removed, that is where I intend to plant the wildflower mix. It has 16 varieties of annuals and perennials native to Western Canada in it.

I am now left with one last container of seeds to plant, but I was losing light and need to prepare another bed for them. This container has:

– Dalvay peas, including seeds I collected from the ones we planted this past year
– King Tut purple peas; from collected seeds
– Royal Burgundy bush beans
– Hopi Black Dye sunflowers – just one of the two packages I had
– Mongolian Giant sunflowers – I had only one packet of those
– a small number of Montana Morado corn. We’d grown them a couple of years ago and left them to go to seed, as we were going to test grinding them into flour, only to have the cats dump the entire bowl of collected seed. I managed to salvage a few seeds – less than a dozen.

I chose this combination so that the peas could climb the sunflowers, while the pole beans can shade the ground. This group of seeds did also get onion seeds added to it. Everything in here is prone to being eaten by deer, so I’m hoping the onions will be enough of a turn off for them.

After talking to my daughter about it, we figured the place to plant this is in the long, narrow bed along the chain link fence. It’s mostly clear already, as it had potatoes in it this past year. There’s just one self seeded tomato plant still needing to be cleaned up. Plus, the kittens have been using it as a litter box, so that needs to be cleaned out, too.

So that is my plan for tomorrow. To get that last group of seeds winter sown seeds in. Then, I’m hoping to get a bit more clean up before taking the garden tour video I’d originally intended to take in the middle of the month. This will be the last garden tour video of the year.

In the spring, once the snow is melted away, the mulch on all of these will need to be removed, to allow the soil to warm up and the seeds to germinate. If all goes to plan, this will give us a head start to our 2025 garden.

With most of these, I completely finished off the seeds I had left from previous years. I still have plenty of other things that can be started indoors, and others for direct sowing.

Next year’s garden will be very, very different from how this year’s garden turned out. Not having four 18′ beds dedicated to winter squash and melons is going to make quite the difference! We will be planting fewer tomatoes next year, too.

Even if this winter sowing experiment doesn’t turn out turn out, I could get away with not buying any new seed this winter.

I will still buy more seed, of course! Just probably not until a month or two from now. I’ve already got my eye on some rare heritage breeds that I’d like to grow, if only to help keep the varieties going.

Mostly, though, I’d like to finally get some new beds started, and get at least one permanent trellis built.

If the weather holds.

We shall see.

I’m just happy with the progress I got today!

The Re-Farmer

Finally home

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Today it was arranged for me to go back to my mother’s place to help her with basic home stuff. These are the things my mother needs help with, but that Home Care out here doesn’t provide. Light housekeeping. Laundry. That sort of thing.

Of course, I stared my day with my morning rounds. This morning, I used some stock from the crockpot in the liquid I used to soak kibble for the outside cats.

Oh, my goodness, did they ever love it!

The kibble I picked up recently was the Walmart economy brand – we needed quantity over quality, this time. It didn’t absorb as much liquid as some other brands we’ve tried. That made carrying the bowl I use, without sloshing everywhere, rather more challenging! Of course, the first trays I add food to are in the sun room, and it’s easier to just put the bowl down in the middle of the floor and start scooping.

Thankfully, the scoop I have is larger and fairly deep, so scooping so much liquid works fine.

Of course, as soon as the bowl was on the floor, it was inundated by cats, already starting to eat, which made for another challenge to scooping it out!

This time, though, the cats were for more interested in the excess liquid. Hoo boy, where they ever excited with this treat!

This is definitely something we want to do more often. Especially in the winter, when not only having warm food first thing in the morning will be a help, so will the extra fat and nutrients in the liquid.

After the morning errands and breakfast were done, my first stop was the post office. Our powered anode rod has been in for a while, but we haven’t been able to pick it up until today. I was also able to mail my mother’s payment for her ambulance bill; she doesn’t trust her local post office, nor does she trust their outside mail box. She says some of her mail to Poland never arrived, and she’s convinced the staff at the local post office kept it back, because one of them mistook a letter she was sending as being to Ukraine, rather than Poland. As for the outside mail box, it got stolen and broken into, some time before we moved out here, so more than 7 years ago.

🫤

Anyhow. It’s sent, and hopefully, it’s made out to the right name, because there was nothing on the bill to specify who to make a check out to, since hardly anyone uses checks anymore.

With all that, plus a quick stop for some gas, I got to my mother’s at about 11, which is the time I normally get there when I’m planning to run errands for her. I did pick up a treat to go with our tea, though.

I was there for just a few minutes when my cell phone started ringing. That happens so rarely, I’m always surprised by it. 😄 It turned out to be our mechanic. When I called about having our truck towed to them, I spoke to one of his employees, as he wasn’t there, nor was he there when the truck was dropped off. He just found a note with the keys and my phone number on it, so he wanted to know why it was towed in!

I explained to him what happened and what we did, just to get the truck home. After hearing that, his initial thought was that some gunk got into the switch – that’s now three different people who have suggested this being the most likely reason the alert kept going, and the pressure gauge kept dropping, even after we’d added as much oil as we did. I told him we were already planning to book an oil change (after we had to cancel it when I booked it about a month and a half ago), with a diagnostic to figure out why the check engine like was on. My OBD II scanner gives several possible reasons, not nothing definitive. Once he had that information, he could take a look at it and know what he was looking for!

I haven’t heard from him since then, so that tells me he wasn’t able to do that today. This is something he would do in between other customer bookings, when he has a bay open, so that could take a while.

Of course, my mother was hearing bits and pieces of the call, so she was wondering about how that was going, so I explained it a bit before we got to work.

One of the first things she asked me to do was to check the schedule in the laundry room. It turns out her apartment was blocked off for 1-3pm. There two other apartments blocked off for the morning, but no one was doing laundry at the time. Lunch hour wasn’t blocked off for anyone on any day. We figured it would be fine to start early – but maybe not too early.

After getting her laundry out and sorting it the way she wanted, we settled in for some tea and conversation until her Meals on Wheels was delivered. The volunteer delivering it was one of the social workers that comes regularly for planned activities. When she got there, she told my mother that someone from Home Care had come out yesterday, but she wasn’t home. We asked what time, and she said at about 1pm.

My mother’s appointment in the city was at 1pm!

Normally if there is something going on, Home Care calls me, first, as I am the primary contact person. If they did, I could have told them my mother wasn’t going to be home at that time, but no one called either of us. All the social worker knew was that it was something about meals, and not about my mother’s medical assist visits.

They really should have called first. The social worker figures they’ll try and stop by again, later, but when she first brought it up, it sounded like she thought my mother had an appointment with them, then skipped out on it. We figure it has something to do with the bulk meal preparation we were originally going to get for my mother, until she decided to go with Meals on Wheels instead. I think the Meals on Wheels is the better choice for her. I don’t think she could tolerate someone preparing and packing up meals in her apartment for 2 hours for very long, even if it was every two weeks. Plus, she is so happy with the Meals on Wheels food she is getting!

After she had her lunch, we made up a grocery shopping list for her, then I started her laundry. Her building has two washers and two driers, so I got both washers going, then headed out to do her grocery shopping. With having prepared meals delivered three days a week, it reduces her grocery list a fair bit, so I was done, back and put everything away before the washing machines were done!

After her first loads went into the drier and her last load was started, I took advantage of her watching daily mass on TV and did some sweeping and dishwashing and whatever else I could see that needed doing, then sat and finished watching mass with her.

I did have a bit of a mystery that got solved while I was sweeping up.

Shortly after I got there, and I got the call from the garage while she was getting dressed for the day, I saw her taking a bucket of urine from her room to the bathroom. I figured she was finally using the commode in her room, but couldn’t see it. While sweeping in her bedroom, I saw that it was gone, and there was a table where it used to be.

It turned out to be in the living room, covered with a cloth and being used as a table.

I don’t understand why she refuses to use the commode. Her bucket fits perfectly into the pan it comes with, so she doesn’t have to struggle to remove a pan that would need to be carried with two hands. Instead, she’s squatting over a bucket? With her wrecked knees? I just don’t get it!

Well, we can’t force her to use the thing, I guess.

While sweeping, I also found one of the traps left by the exterminator and checked it out. There were plenty of insects stuck in it – it’s that time of year, when more of them come into the warmth – but no sign of bed bugs that I could tell. I was looking closely while going through her laundry and while sweeping, too. Nothing. The exterminators still need to come one more time, and she should have gotten the notification letter telling her when they’ll be coming by now, but she hasn’t mentioned anything to any of us.

We’ll have to be on top of this, so we don’t have a repeat of her almost getting herself evicted for refusing to let them in.

Anyhow…

My mother had told me she would fold her laundry herself, but I did that for her. I was going to need the basket for her last load, anyhow. She also had some things that were too heavy for her that I moved, and others that needed to be tucked up higher than she could reach for winter storage.

All in all, I was there for about five hours. My mother was really tired by then, too. She’s still having trouble sleeping at night, but with all this going on, she wasn’t able to nap during the day, either. She was still going to get two medical assists for her medications, with one of them typically about an hour after the time I left, so not much point in trying to nap then!

After leaving my mother’s, I made a quick stop at the grocery store for a few groceries to tide us over until CPP Disability comes in next week.

Once at home and heading to the house, an absolute army of cats came out to see me, clearly looking for supper! I left my daughter to put away the groceries and mail, then headed out to give the cats their evening feeding.

They were very happy kitties!

Especially this one.

This one is black with a white blaze on his chest – no other white that I can see – and I call him Midnight. He is friendly enough that, once we are able to get more of the females spayed, we will be able to easily catch to get neutered.

That reminds me. I want to find more breakaway collars to put on the cats that get fixed, so we can spot the ones that are done right away. I did pick up a collar recently to try out, not realizing until I went to remove the packaging that it was not actually a breakaway collar. With outside cats, I won’t use any other type, as the risk of them getting caught on something and choking is too high. So far, I’ve only found them at a local dollar store. Hopefully they will have more, the next time I get there. I got four of them, but only Syndol still has his. I think I put the other ones on too loosely. Since then, Gouda was neutered, but he and Rolando Moon are the only orange cats we have right now, so there’s no mistaking them for other cats.

So that was how things went today. Hopefully, over the next few days, I can stay home for a change and finally get work done outside! At this point, the very least I want to get done (besides finally harvesting the potatoes and sunchokes) is plant a bed of garlic. Anything I mange to get finished beyond then, as far as the winter sowing I’m hoping to do, is gravy.

I just need to have a few days at home, with no running around, to do it!

Wish me luck!

The Re-Farmer

Winterizing the sunroom, and cheeky kitties!

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Today has been gorgeous and sunny, with almost no wind. The weather apps say we’re at 13C/55F, but feeling like 10C/50F.

The thermometer in the shelf shelter, which was getting hit with full sun, was reading almost 30C/86! 😄

My daughter took on the very messy job of starting to scrub the walls around the tub, as we let the rotten parts we found under the tub surround, dry a bit. There is very little room to assist, so I took advantage of the pleasant day to start winterizing the sun room, as well as making some changes in the old kitchen.

Last winter, we set things up for the cats on one side, while the other side was used to store our tools and supplies.

Unfortunately, the cats knocked so many things off the shelves and all over the floor. Then, because it’s darn cold out there in the winter, they used all sorts of corners to do their business in.

The girls started cleaning it up in the spring, but it never quite got finished.

So I got it mostly done today, which included moving some things out of the old kitchen.

The first thing was to get the broken pieces of tub surround and get that onto the junk pile for later hauling to the dump. Once those were out of the way, I could get at a rocking chair that was here when we moved in. We can’t use it in the main part of the house – too many creatures with tails! – and it’s just taking up space in the old kitchen, so I ended up putting it in the storage house. That gave me access to the small shelf I wanted to move to the sun room. It was meant to be used to hold things like extra packages of toilet paper or paper towel, cases of canning jars and the like. It ended up getting blocked off, and not just by the rocking chair! There were cases of canning jars on it that we never opened. Last year, we didn’t have enough produce to make it worthwhile to can, and this year will be much the same. I just moved those over to a plastic couch for now.

The old kitchen had been cleaned out and set up to be someplace we could sit and relax in, but that didn’t work out, either. We had to move the kibble into the old kitchen because the racoons kept knocking the bin over and spilling it onto the floor. Then we found ourselves having to use it to store our garbage until we could make a dump run. That basically took up most of the space.

I’d like to get that couch moved out, too, but there really isn’t any room for it in the storage house, either.

Still, once I cleared out the rocking chair and the shelf, I could move my late father’s walker in the space where the shelf was. Now we have all sorts of room in the old kitchen again!

I’m keeping the walker handy, because I see the day coming when I will need to be using it myself.

As for the sun room, I didn’t have to empty it entirely, which was nice. I started off cleaning and clearing around the cat cage until I could move the cage, and the interlocking floor mat it sits on, towards the middle of the west facing windows, then clean up the corner where it had been. The collection of cat carriers we keep in there got taken outside and dismantled to varying degrees, depending on the design, before getting scrubbed down and left to dry in the sun. Basically it was clear a spot, clean up under it, clear a spot, clean up under it…

The cats may use the great outdoors to do their business in the summer, but the skunks and racoons will drop their messes anywhere and any time!

Ew.

Then I had to take out a whole lot of stuff on the storage and tools side of the sunroom, and empty the matching shelf that needed to be moved into the other corner.

Quite a bit of stuff ended up getting thrown away due to cat damage.

Other stuff got moved to the garage for storage, including all the paint supplies I could find. Others got tucked into the counter shelf, where the cats can’t get at them.

Finally, the shelf itself got taken outside, where I could hose it down.

Once the shelf was out, I had to mop the floor several times to get the messes that were uncovered in the process.

Ew, again!

Finally, I was able to shift over the wooden shelf that was under the bathroom window, and move it into the corner. That cleared enough space to be able to open one of the doors under the counter shelf all the way. The floor isn’t level, so I had to put scrap pieces of rigid insulation under it, so it can’t fall forward. Then the small shelf from the old kitchen was set in place, and I could finally start putting things away again. This shelf got mostly gardening supplies, plus the critter cam was set up on to top of it, too. I ended up getting a piece of scrap 2×4 to raise the camera up a bit higher, with pieces of Alien Tape to hold them in place.

Eventually, I was able to bring the big shelf back in and set it up in the corner across from the one in the window. I had to get creative to work around the shop lights we’ve got hanging across there. These are set to turn on with motion activation after dusk.

Once the lights were adjusted for the new shelf, I was able to set up a folding closet door we found while cleaning up after moving here, and have found so many uses for! It is long enough to create a platform between the shelves, with enough space above the cat cage for the cats to still use the top as a bed.

With the cooler temperatures, we no longer have the wire mesh door we made to keep the cats out of the old basement, allowing us to keep the door open and let cool air circulate. Last year, we set that up between the shelf in the window and the top of the cat cage, with a box on top to level it. We then had to use some scrap 2x4s to support the wire mesh door, since it was bending under the weight of cats, plus we put a sheet of rigid insulation under it, partly to keep things warmer below, where the heat lamp was, partly so the cats could walk over the wire mesh without their paws falling through. We still put cat beds and another piece of scrap insulation on top.

The folding closet door I set up between the shelves is narrow enough to fit inside the wire mesh door frame, so that can now be stored and used for the cats at the same time again – and the closet door is far more solid! The wire mesh door is longer, too, making the entire platform more secure.

Then I could start putting some things back on the shelf for storage, including the cat carriers.

This is how the cat side of the sunroom looks now.

There are two small cat carriers on the bottom, and larger ones in the next two shelves above. Hopefully, the cats will just use them and not knock them about!

The platform now has a couple of cat beds, plus the self warming mat, on it. Two of the shelves against the window have the canopy and walls from the broken market tents on them for the cats to use as beds.

We have a number of other cat blankets that need to be washed, and then they’ll be set up inside the cat carriers or draped over the shelves of the mini greenhouse frame, though those will need cardboard or something laid on the wire shelves, first.

The sun room kibble trays were then returned to the sun room and, last of all, I got the critter cam positioned were I wanted it.

I have the live feed running as I write this. I can see cats in the cat beds and self warming mat on the platform, and more on the shelves in front of the window. I can’t see into the cat carriers to know of they are being used or now right now.

Later on, we will set up the heat lamp, clamped to the platform, and the heated water bowl near the small shelf that’s now in there, where it can be plugged into the same cord that powers the critter cam.

Aside from little things like that, the sunroom is ready for the winter, and moving things to the garage has given us a lot more open floor space, too.

One thing I’ve been considering it setting up the canopy tent I got on clearance, somewhere close to the house, as an extra shelter in the winter. Perhaps in the corner, where it could be over the window to the old basement, if I could find a way to secure it. For now, though, the tent is in its package, on the shelf between two windows.

It has been claimed by these cheeky little buggers!

Quite a few cats have decided it is an excellent bed. Especially the kitten in the foreground of the photo above!

At least they’re not trying to knock it off the shelf!

This was not the job I planned on working on today, but it was one that needed pleasant weather to do, so the other stuff will just have to wait a bit longer. This was a big and messy job, and I’m glad it’s over with!

Meanwhile, my daughter scrubbed at the bathroom walls until her arms gave out – it was so bad under that tub surround, she only got half of it done. My other daughter made supper for all of us, then cleaned detritus out the tub as best as can be done right now.

All in all, it was a productive day.

I’ll have to leave productiveness to the girls for the next couple of days, though. I will need to help my mother with groceries tomorrow because, the day after, my husband has to be at the hospital in the nearer city for an 8:30am CT scan. Which means we need to leave here by 7:30am at the latest.

Time to go call my mother and work out what time I’m coming over!

Until then, thanks for reading all my blathering, and I hope you have an awesome night!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2024 Garden: harvest before first frost, and getting a lot done!

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My younger daughter and I were able to get so much done today, all before our expected first frost.

Depending on which weather app I look at, we’re supposed to drop to either -2C/28F, or 1C/34F tonight.

Either way, we’re looking at frost tonight.

Strangely, there are absolutely no frost warnings. Perhaps the humidity is too low. The temperature alone is enough to cause damage, though.

Last night, my older daughter helped me cover the two beds that actually can be covered, and I’m glad we did. We dropped to 3C/37F last night, and that was enough to kill off the last of the squash and melon leaves. Even the Crespo squash was droopy, and they were the only ones that were still lush, green and growing.

My daughter started off by checking on the biggest Crespo squash. As she rolled it aside, the stem broke right off its vine.

This is what it looked like, underneath.

We made sure it wasn’t sitting directly on the ground, but this damage still happened.

That’s okay. We’ll just cut that part off and eat it first!

This one is mature enough that we should be able to save seed, too! It took four years of trying, but we finally got a mature Crespo squash!

The two that were growing in the bean trellis didn’t get to full maturity, so they’ll need to be eaten sooner, too. Or we could cut make a puree to freeze or something like that.

My daughter started off harvesting the tomatoes in the old kitchen garden ahead of me. She’d collected all the Forme de Couer and had moved on to the Black Cherry tomatoes by the time I was able to start helping her. The Black Cherries were so tangled up in the lilac branches, we had to cut our way through to be able see, never mind reach, the tomatoes. After a while, I grabbed a pile of cut up tomato plants to take it to the compost pile when I realized, there were plenty of tomatoes in the compost pile to gather.

So I grabbed another bin and worked on those.

I found a surprise!

I knew there were two types of volunteer tomatoes in there. A few Indigo Blues, and a whole lot of Roma VF from last year’s harvests.

I found a third type, completely buried by the others!

They look like a slicing tomato of some kind, but I don’t remember growing a red variety of slicing tomato last year. It was also the only one that had an almost ripe tomato.

You’ll notice a lot of the Romas are very pale – almost white – in colour. These were essentially blanched from being under so many stems and leaves. I’m really surprised by how many we got in there!

It’s a shame they never got to ripen. A few of the Romas had started to show a blush. Who knows how many of these will actually ripen once indoors.

By the time I got the compost tomatoes done, my daughter was almost finished the old kitchen garden, so I moved on to the main garden area, bringing the wagon with the Crespo squash, to start harvesting the squash and melons. Then my daughter joined me and started harvesting the rest of the San Marzano tomatoes.

I found several melons were already “harvested”! One had a hole in it and was essentially hollowed out, so I’m guessing a mouse got that one. The others looked more like racoon damage.

Once the squash and melons were picked, plus a few patty pan squash, I cut down and went through all the corn stalks to find the cobs I’d left to go to seed.

*sigh*

This was all the racoons left me, and it’s not even dried out enough to have viable seeds.

Ah, well. Live and learn!

That done, I got another bin and helped my daughter with the last of the tomatoes. There were so many San Marzanos in the main garden area! Then we did the tomatoes that were at the chain link fence.

Here is the entire harvest.

The bin with the cat next to it has the Chocolate Cherry tomatoes from the chain link fence in it, plus the tiny tomatoes from the volunteer tomato plant that I found among the potatoes. There were so many perfect little tomatoes! Not a single one had a chance to ripen. We have no idea what kind of tomatoes they were, either.

My daughter had already moved the previously harvested winter squash from the garage to the house, so now these squash are set up in the garage. It looks like some of the blue squash did get to fully mature, but most of them seem shy of full maturity, so they won’t be able to properly cure. They are still quite edible, though. They just won’t last as long in the root cellar than if they had fully matured and cured. Still, some time set up like this in the garage will help them last a bit longer.

Once we were done with the harvesting, my daughter uncovered the box of the truck, and we loaded up with as many bags of cans as we felt we could properly secure.

Which turned out to be maybe a third of the pile!

The whole thing got covered with a tarp and strapped down with ratchet straps. We set two up in an X across the pile, plus two more across the front and back. It was pretty windy, though, and once we got to highway speeds, the tarp was billowing under the straps more than I liked.

We stopped at a gas station to tuck the tarp back in place, then secured it more using Bungee cords. It still billowed, but nothing that was a potential problem.

This is the first time we’ve gone to this salvage place, but they were easy to find. I’d called for instructions yesterday, so we knew where to go to start. After talking to someone in the office, she directed me to where we should pull up, and staff could unload the truck.

My daughter and I started taking the straps and tarp off while they brought over a couple of bins with a forklift to bring them to the scale. All the cans are in transparent bags, so they could see that there were some tin cans in there, too.

That was okay for them, but good for us.

The tin cans go for 10 cents per weight.

The aluminum goes for 50 cents.

When they’re mixed up like this, they basically figure out something in between.

After everything was unloaded, we moved the truck again, and I went back to the office to wait. I had thought I stopped out of the way, but I turned out to be wrong, when a very large truck pulling a very long trailer came in! One of the office staff asked if we could park on the street. When I moved the truck, though, there wasn’t enough room to get by the trailer. I went back inside while my daughter waited until the truck could pull ahead, then she found a place to park.

As I was waiting in the office, I heard some staff going back and forth and saying something about “getting her a magnet”.

Then a guy came up to me and handed me a red keychain with their company name and number on it. It turns out, I was the “her”, and the keychain has a strong magnet on its end. This is for the next time we bring in a load; when we back stuff up, we can use the magnet to make sure there’s no cans with steel in them mixed in.

It means we’ll have to re-bag all the cans again, but the difference in price makes it worth is. With sooooo many cat food cans, plus the pop and energy drink cans, it is quite a loss to not get full price on the aluminum because there’s half a dozen tin cans scattered among them.

In the end, we brought 208 pounds, which got us just over $17. While they did give us an in between price, we still could have gotten quite a bit more, if we didn’t have those tin cans in there.

Live and learn!

It was very nice of them to give us the magnet, too. We have magnets, of course, but this one will be much more convenient!

That done, my daughter and I made a quick stop at a gas station, then headed home. We made a point of not covering the box again so that, once at home, we could give it a cleaning. The truck has screw holes in the bed from when it was a commercial vehicle hauling trailers. A remarkable amount of dust from the gravel roads gets in there!

I know it’s just going to get full of dust again, but it sure did feel better to finally wash that out with the hose!

Then we filled the truck again, this time with our garbage. We were overdue for a trip to the dump!

I had planned to go to a different landfill in our municipality, but I don’t know the area it’s in, so we went to our usual one.

I was really glad to have my daughter with me! The pit area is a real disaster. My daughter got out before we went into the pit area to make sure there wasn’t anything that might puncture a tire. While she kicked things out of the way, I slowly crawled along behind her with the truck until she could guide me in backing up to the pit. Not as close as we normally would have gone; too much broken glass!

And nails.

She was finding and kicking away nails, the whole distance!

This place has really gone downhill. The previous municipal council had fired the guy that used to take care of the landfill. I don’t know what the new council is doing, but the attendant that’s here now is not someone physically able to maintain the pit. Which is fine, if being an attendant is the only part of her job description, but whoever it is that’s been hired to use the heavy equipment to clean where we’re supposed to drive up to the pit is not doing a good job at all. Even the equipment being used is different, and the tracks on that front end loader is just destroying the gravel driveways.

But, we got the job done, and so far, it doesn’t look like I’ll be getting any flat tires, thanks to my daughter!

As we were leaving, my daughter wondered about being able to go to town and pick up something. It had been a long time since either of us had eaten, and she was thinking of perhaps treating us.

After talking about it, we decided that, between the two of us, we could pick up some fish and chips for all of us for supper.

Which was about when we got a message from my husband. The pharmacy called. When he had his prescription refills delivered, they didn’t have enough to fill one completely. They now had the amount they owed him.

Well, that was handy! We would have time to do that, before the pharmacy closed at 6pm.

A trip to town, it was!

As we were going along, we ended up stuck behind some slower moving traffic, so it took a bit longer to get to the pharmacy. I was going to just dash in, anyhow.

As I was walking in the door, behind two other people, a staff member let us know…

…they were closing in one minute – and she locked the entry doors behind us!

It turns out, they close at 5:30.

Thankfully, my husband’s prescription was quick to find, and it was already covered, so it just needed to be handed to me, and I could go!

From there, we went and got the fish and chips to bring home, plus a quick stop at the grocery store for something else my husband needed. We could finally go home!

We weren’t quite done yet, though!

One home, my daughter took care of bringing in the hot food, while I started bringing the bins of tomatoes into the old kitchen.

I have no idea what we’re going to do with them all.

In previous years, we kept a bin of green tomatoes out and my family just snacked on them as they ripened. They were all small grape, cherry or pear type tomatoes.

I know there are lots of things that can be done with green tomatoes; we’ve just never done them. I wouldn’t be able to eat them, so it’s a matter of finding things the family would like.

What we don’t have is the space to lay out so many green tomatoes in what should be a single layer, to ripen indoors. It would have to be in the living room – the cat free zone – but it’s a disaster right now.

Until we figure that out, all five bins are now laid out on the chest freezer in the old kitchen. That room is too dark and gets too cold to be able to leave them there to ripen.

Once we were finally able to have our supper, things still weren’t done!

It was back outside to recover the two beds for the night, so the peppers and eggplant will survive. The hoses had to be prepped so they wouldn’t have any water in them to freeze, and I even remembered to close the doors in the side of the garage the squash and melons were in, so they won’t get as cold.

And now I am FINALLY done for today.

I’m hoping to actually get to bed before midnight and get some real sleep for a change. My attempt to do so last night was a total failure! 😄

There is, of course, lots to do outside. This is one of the busiest times of the year, as we get ready for winter, while the weather holds!

The Re-Farmer

Cat isolation shelter progress, and a productive day

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I must say, I’m pretty happy with how today went! It was a lot more productive than expected.

Aside from the triple harvest I wrote about in my previous post, I was scheduled to go to my mother’s to help her with errands.

I left earlier, as I wanted to stop at a store to find something I needed, then hit a bank machine before picking up some Chinese food for our lunch. My mother told me she’d had their steamed rice and vegetables for lunch after church and really liked it, so that’s what she wanted me to order.

I am not sure what she ordered, though, as that is not a typical menu item. At least, not as a combination meal for one. She also said it was “brown rice”.

They don’t serve brown rice.

They did have the steamed rice and mixed vegetables as separate items, so that’s what I ordered for her. Another reason I am not sure what she actually ordered that she liked so much; the mixed vegetables alone were more expensive than any of their combination meals. It, and the steamed rice, is meant to be shared by several people!

She’ll have enough to last her for a couple of days, at least!

I ordered a meal combo for myself.

When my mother saw the food, she was surprised by the rice being white rice. It was supposed to be brown! Sure enough, she had eaten stir fried rice, and somehow thought it was plain, steamed brown rice.

The vegetables were what she wanted, though.

They did, however, include small amounts of meat, which had my mother hesitating. She even asked me at one point, do you think it’s okay? before eating it.

She is still completely convinced that the Chinese restaurant serves cat meat. She’s given me several different stories as to why she thinks this. The first time, she told me one of her neighbours had told her this. Then she said she saw it in the news (though that turned out to be about a restaurant in the city, who know how many years ago). Then it was because she saw more stray cats around, so that must mean they’re serving cat. Talking about what she wanted me to order last night, she said that their prices are so much lower than the restaurant the specialized in deep fried chicken, so in her mind that must be proof they’re serving cat. *sigh*

She likes their food, their prices and their generous portions a lot, though, so she just can’t resist going back.

We had an excellent lunch.

My mother had her first home care visits to help with her medications last night. She would have had two visits last night, and one in this morning, by the time I saw her, so I asked how it went. That set her off into talking about how she couldn’t sleep last night, and it had be because of “all the pills” they gave her.

They’re the exact same pills, from her bubble packs.

Then she said she’d gotten up in the morning and had a bit to each, then went back to bed. Just as she was finally falling asleep, there was a knock at the door. Home care was there for her morning meds.

I asked my mother if she had taken her pills at 5am, like she usually does (she’s already been instructed not to, but to wait for home care).

I didn’t quite get a straight answer out of her, but I think she did.

Which has me wondering; did she take a second full set of pills when the home care person arrived, or just the new supplement for her eyes, which is the only one that’s still separate?

The whole point of getting home care to help her with her medications is because, even with the bubble packs, she is getting confused about them.

Hopefully, she will remember to NOT take her morning pills at 5am (there has never been any reason for her to take them that early), but to take all her morning pills, including the new supplement, with breakfast, when the home care person arrives.

After lunch, we went over her list and added a few things she had forgotten. She needed to go to the bank for cash, though – the one thing I can’t do for her. She really didn’t want to go out at all, with how she was feeling, but she had to. I told her that, after going to the bank, I could take her home again and do the rest of her shopping. She liked that idea.

For someone who wasn’t feeling well, my mother was pretty darn spry!

Getting in and out of the truck was hard for her, as usual, but once she was at her walker, she just took off like a shot! I actually had a hard time keeping up with her! I honestly don’t know how she does it, at times!

After she was done at the bank, she decided to come along to the pharmacy, but to stay in the truck. Her bubble pack refills were set to be delivered today but, since I was there on her behalf, anyhow, I could pick them up, then pick up some other stuff she needed from the pharmacy.

That was her limit, though, so I took her home from there.

Talk about timing.

She was unlocking her door when her phone started to ring. It was the eye doctor, following up on her. They’re already tried calling me and left messages, and were trying my mother’s next.

My mother now has an appointment to see the eye specialist in the city.

The clinic is in the opposite side of the city from us. The drive will be well over an hour, plus the appointment is expected to take about 2 hours in total for all the tests they need to do.

This is going to be a very long day for her!!

She’s going to have her eyes dilated, and they wanted to make sure she had sunglasses. I have extra sunglasses that fit over regular glasses in the truck, so that’s taken care of.

The appointment is on the day I was planning to go into the city for our first stock up shopping trip for next month, but that’s okay. My mother’s appointment is more urgent!

We were very happy about the timing with all this!

The call done, I headed out to get my mother’s groceries, then put everything away for her. There wasn’t anything else she needed for me to do, and she was more than ready for a nap, so I left soon after. Gas and a stop at the post office was in order. The items that were supposed to arrive yesterday, but then tracking said they would arrive on the 26th, were all in.

After I got home, I was soon back outside. After harvesting the winter squash, I started working on the cat isolation shelter.

I was able to finish tacking down the mesh covering the pallet floor with pieces of wood lath. There was just the back that still needed to be done but, with the wire mesh already in place on the back, it was the more difficult one to do. There is now nowhere any tiny kittens could squeeze through the pallet floor and get out.

Then it was time to start enclosing the top level. The not-door sections needed to have insulation cut to fit, then covered.

Here is a slideshow of how things went.

The first section I worked on had the shelf across the back to work around. I had cut it to fit snuggly, but it was a bit too snug, and the insulation snapped at the shelf cut. A bit of trimming, and the pieces were fit in.

Yes, there’s a gap at the angled corner support. It was large enough that I could cut a strip from the corner that had been removed and fill it in.

I don’t have enough paint to pre-paint the pieces anymore, so that will have to be done later. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get a colour match.

I had a number of wood lath pieces left from my last bundle that weren’t all the same length, or had damage in areas. I cut 14 pieces to 16″ lengths, which left me with a 15th piece that was just a touch short. I wasn’t sure if I’d needed it, though.

This first side has floor boards that are ever so slightly too long. I hadn’t bothered to trim them. I made use of the excess length to hold the first piece of wood lath in place. Then each piece was lined up with that first one and nailed into place.

If you look at the second picture of the slideshow, you can see I had to use that slightly short 15th piece! That corner has the brace in it, so there was extra material to hammer the nails into, to secure it. Plus, it overlapped the top frame piece that it could be nailed into.

The other side was easier to do. The insulation for there just needed a 45° cut in one corner.

If you click through to the third photo, you’ll see I didn’t quite get the angle cut right! 😄 That shouldn’t be a problem, though.

I had to start a new bundle of wood lath to cover this side. They are supposed to be all 4′ long, but a few were just a little bit short. After finding 5 pieces that were all the same 4′ length, I was able to cut the stack into 16″ lengths, then nail them over the insulation.

In the last two photos, you can see how it looks on the inside.

It can be assumed the cats will try to use the insulation as a scratching post. There’s something about this insulation that they just love for that! In fact, in the photos of the insulation pieces before they were covered, you can see all the cat scratches!

I didn’t want them to pull the insulation right out if they did scratch at it. I had some nails just barely long enough to go through the insulation, so I used some of those to tack it to the wood lath from the inside. You can’t really see the nails in the photos.

The problem is, these probably won’t hold against cat scratching. Using any longer nails would just go right through the wood lath. I’ll have to think of some other way to keep them in place. I even tried nailing a piece of wood lath vertically on the inside, but I’m left with the same problem. Any nails long enough to secure it in place would go right through the wood lath on the outside. Any nails short enough to not do that can be easily pulled out.

I am more than open to suggestions in the comments!

After this, it’s time to cut that clear plastic I brought up from the basement. I found out from my brother that these were used to cover windows in the house, on the inside, to stop drafts. All but one of the windows were replaced before we moved in here. He thought these were from what is now my bedroom/office/craft room, but that window still has a covers over each half, as it was the one window not replaced. The frames on them are quite different from the frame of what I brought to the garage, so I still don’t know where these came from. It does tell me, though, that it is probably Lexan, which is good, since it can handle UV light and weathering better.

I’m going to have to be careful cutting it, though. My brother tells me there’s a possibility of shattering!

The first piece to cut will be to cover the front of the shelter’s upper level. That should leave enough material to use as clear doors on the sections that did not get covered today.

Hopefully, that will be a job I can work on tomorrow.

Little by little, it’s getting done!

Aside from all that, we got some good news today.

The electric company is currently doing a lot of work in the area, replacing power poles, doing over due maintenance and repairs, etc. – and clearing trees away from the power lines.

We got a call from them today.

They would like to come onto the property some time in the next while, to clear any trees or branches near their power lines.

We had to pay a tree company to do that, about 5 or 6 years ago. Things are starting to grow back and getting too close to the lines again.

The power company will be doing it, and there will be no charge.

They will only clear around their own lines; not the lines to the house, garage, barn or pump shack. Which is fine. The lines to the garage and barn don’t have trees near them. The one to the pump shack is something we can keep clear ourselves. The one to the house is almost directly under the main line to the pole the meter is on, so it’ll be cleared by default.

The guy I spoke to couldn’t tell me when they’ll be doing this, but it doesn’t really matter, except for the gate. I asked if they could call ahead, so we can unlock it for them. We’ll see how that works out.

So… yeah. It’s been a pretty productive day today! We’ve got all sorts of things falling into place. 😊

May things continue to go as smoothly and productively!

The Re-Farmer

It’s a good thing I’m flexible!

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Today started off as an open day. No appointments, no running around planned… It was a day to catch up on things around home.

Which is mostly what happened!

My day started off sluggishly. With thunderstorms on the forecast, I got up and fed the outside cats before any potential storms, then went back to bed.

Well. I tried to. I finally gave up.

There was one errand that did have to be done, though. We were running out of kibble for the outside cats. I was considering where to go to get enough to last a week that would be in budget, and was thinking a trip to the feed store in my mother’s town might be in order. It was either that, or Walmart, but it’s not worth the cost of gas to get just a bag or two of kibble.

While I was checking Facebook while having breakfast, I caught a share from livestock supply store I follow, even though I’ve never been to that store. They are just outside the town to the North of us, and I’ve simply never had cause to find them. From the photos shared, they just got new pet inventory.

Including 40 pound bags of cat food.

In two different brands we haven’t seen before.

I decided to give them a try, heading out in the early afternoon. After finding the place, I asked about the kibble and got prices, then checked the rest of the store out.

I will most definitely be going back there for other things in the future!

Of the two brands of cat food, I chose the less expensive one, though even the more premium brand was a slightly lower price that the 40 pound bags I was getting at the feed store in my mother’s town. While looking around I noticed they have live traps of various sizes. They had the size for cats that I was looking at in Canadian Tire – at a better price, too! The rescue was going to lend us a trap, but I think the last person they lent it to is still ghosting them.

On the way back, I stopped at the post office, expecting some packages for my husband. Nothing was there, though. I just looked up the orders and they changed from arriving by 8pm today, to “now expected by September 26”.

Ah… I see why now. They’re being sent by Purolator, not the mail. They’re apparently in the city, but delayed “due to external factors”, whatever that means!

After I got home, I made a point of giving the outside cats a light feeding with the new brand of cat food, to see how they like it.

They all but inhaled it!

I guess this will be a brand we’ll get more often! The only down side is that this town is in the opposite direction of anywhere we normally go. So we’ll still be getting kibble at the feed store in my mother’s town, but special trips to this place for kibble will also happen.

While considering my issues with the cat isolation shelter and the materials I wanted, in contrast to the materials I have, I remembered something.

I do have clear plastic.

We found two of what looked like some sort of sliding door to me, in the barn. We’d brought them to the house, cleaned off years of dust, then put them in the basement. When we were still letting the cats down there, we kept the “bar” area closed off for the breakable stuff, and used one of these as a door to the entry.

I decided to bring one of them over to the cat isolation shelter and see.

I don’t know if it’s Plexiglass or Lexan or what. What I do know is, it’s big enough to cover the top front of the isolation shelter – and there should be enough left over that I might be able to cover a section on each side, too. Perhaps not as a sliding door, as I had been considering, but at least as a window on each side.

I’m really loathe to cut take the frame off and cut it up, though. It’s really well constructed.

I decided to think on it while working on the catio hammock.

I brought out a black plastic mesh, measured and cut it to size, then used steel strapping to secure it in place.

Syndol approves!

Once that was done, I had a nice piece of left over mesh.

The Crespo squash that’s hanging inside the bean trellis and breaking the cross piece with its weight needs a hammock.

So I threaded some ties along two sides of the leftover piece, and set it up.

The ties are attached to the metal supports on the A frame trellis. I tried to lift the squash up at least a bit, in the process, so get some of the stress off the broken cross piece. I used Mason’s line as ties, as it was thin enough to thread through the mesh. It’s strong, but that squash is going to get heavier. I may need to supplement them.

We’ve got some cool nights coming, so it was time to get the eggplant and hot pepper bed set up. I picked up clear table vinyl table protectors for the job. I got two for the garden and two for our dining table.

It’s a good thing I had four, because I needed them all.

The bed is 9′ long and 3′ wide, so I needed a minimum of 24′, plus overlap. I thought I could get away with three of them, but that only gave me about 20′

In the end, I decided to use some clear Gorilla tape I picked up, and connect the sheets in pairs.

The kittens were very interested in what I was doing!

The wind made laying them out so the ends to be taped together were on the sidewalk, and all nice and even, quite a challenge! I got it done, though.

While I was working on this, I started getting messages from my SIL.

She and my brother were going to make a trip out to drop stuff off today! They had a small trailer to haul out, and were going to load up as much other stuff as they could in the process. I was surprised that they would make the trip out after my brother got off work, given how quickly things are starting to get dark, but they still have a lot they need to bring out here. She kept me up to date on their progress, as she was able, while I continued with the preparing the vinul.

Once the pairs were taped together, it was time to wrap the box frame over the eggplants and peppers.

When we had it wrapped before, we made a point of covering the length first, and having the overlap at the ends. I recall the wind really seemed to catch on those ends. This time, I decided to centre the vinyl sheets at the ends, and have the overlap in the middle of the long sides.

The box frame has a wire topped frame on top, and I was able to use that to hold the top of the vinyl in place, wrapping the excess over the top of the box frame and into the middle. The wire topped frame, however, isn’t secured in the center, and it starting to twist and bow out. We’ll need to set a line across and pull it in, but not today.

After the vinyl was in position, I used paracord to secure it to the box frame around the top. That one I made very tight, since it needs to not move at all. I added more paracord around the bottom and the middle, to keep the wind from blowing it around. Those are snug, but we will still be able to move the vinyl to reach into the bed, then tuck it back under the paracord again when we’re done.

The only problem is that the box frame has a cross piece in the middle. With the excess vinyl sitting on top of it, I could see the wind was going to be a problem. In the end, I ended up just using more clear Gorilla tape to secure the vinyl to itself on the inside. Hopefully, that will work!

With my brother and SIL on the way, when that was done, I went to open the gate for them. I think took advantage of the situation, grabbed a pair of loppers and the wagon, and headed to the end of the driveway.

If you click through to the second photo in the above slideshow, you can see my first wagon load. That’s all poplar saplings, spreading through roots. They were starting to obstruct visibility as we leave, making it hard to see if any vehicles are on the road, coming towards us.

I did three wagon loads like that!

While I was working on that, my SIL kept me updated. Then ended up driving into a storm with the rain coming down so hard, they had to pull over. When the could finally start driving again, they stopped at a gas station in town along the way to check on things before continuing on.

They still hadn’t arrived when I finished my third wagon load of saplings. At that point, it was getting hard to see the stems I was trying to cut!

My brother may have driven through torrential rain, but we got nothing all day, save a few spatters now and then.

After tossing the saplings on the burn pile and putting things away, I realized I hadn’t taken a picture of the wrapped garden. If you click through to the last image in the slideshow, you can see how that looks. Should we expect to get an actual frost, we can toss a cover on the wire frame on top. For now, the vinyl will act as a sort of greenhouse, keeping them warmer as our daytime temperatures start to drop. The open top should keep it from getting too hot. This bed has the only plants we have that like things quite a bit warmer, even during the day.

The real test will be how it holds up in high winds.

With my brother soon to arrive, and a smattering of rain starting, I headed into the garage to see what I could do on the isolation shelter.

I cut lengths of wood lath to use to secure the mesh on the bottom level, against the frame. I was just putting the last nail into the front section when they arrived.

It was pitch black out by then, and I ended up using the flashlight on my phone to help them see to open up the back of the trailer and unload the piece of equipment that was on it. That went into the barn, while the trailer itself got parked to the side.

Then they back the truck up to the barn and we unloaded it, assembly line style. That sure made things go very quickly!

They even had a couple of things they knew I could use in there, and I was very grateful for them! Those went into the garage.

We worked quickly to unload, and then they had to leave right away. They had a long drive home, and my brother still has to get up for work tomorrow. His job has him working with people in time zones around the world, so sometimes the hours get very unusual!

Before they got home, though, I got another message from them. They forgot their wooden ramp on the ground, that they were supposed to take home with them. My brother was concerned it would get rained on, so I went back out to put it in the garage.

It’s 16C/61F out there right now, and absolutely gorgeous. I’d be sleeping outside right now, if we had the set up for it!

Meanwhile, in the middle of all this, I got a voicemail message from home care about my mother. For some reason, they called my cell phone number. I was in the garage at the time, so my phone never rang. I started listening to the message as I went into the house, and promptly lost the signal. I had to go back outside to listen to the full message!

My mother was getting her first home care visit at suppertime, to help her with her medications. They will be coming in the morning and at supper, then one more time for her before-bed medications. The person calling me wanted to make sure to tell us that they wouldn’t have someone available for a supper and before bed visit this Sunday.

So I made sure to call my mother right away. It turns out they had called her, too, but didn’t mention to her about the day they wouldn’t be able to come. As we talked about her meds and the times, she started to get mixed up with things, and confused. I’m so glad we were able to get her to allow home care to come in to help with her meds!

The next thing will be the meal prep visits. Those are supposed to be every two weeks for bulk cooking. We’ll have to have some idea of what they can and can’t do for that, and plan my mother’s grocery shopping accordingly. Usually, I’ve been helping her with her groceries every week or so – sometimes, my sister is able to do it for her. With the bulk cooking every two weeks, that will change things, but I don’t know how, yet.

We’ll figure it out.

Meanwhile, I am now scheduled to go to her place tomorrow. She’s need to go to the bank this time – the one thing I can’t do for her – so she’s going to have to climb in and out of our truck.

I’m still amazed that she can do it. When we got the truck, I thought for sure, it wasn’t going to happen. With her car out of commission right now, we don’t have much choice. We do have a foot stool for her, and I have to give her a bit of a boost, and she manages it!

Still, it’s something we want to do as little as possible!

With that in mind, it’s time for me to finish this up and get to bed. It’s coming up on midnight right now!

Until next time, I hope you have a fabulous day! Or night. Whatever time it happens to be for you as you read this. 😁😁

The Re-Farmer

The catio has a roof! Plus, that vandal update

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With my brother and his wife on the way, I made sure to have the gate open for them, then started working on things outside, so I could keep an eye on things.

I didn’t realize until late last night that, in one of my posts yesterday, I’d said I would give an update on what’s going on with our vandal, but completely forgot about it when I hit publish.

Our vandal is out of the hospital, and I’m suddenly seeing him on the trail cam files quite frequently.

Granted, he has to go past our place to check on his fields, but considering he just had major surgery, it’s rather odd that he’d be doing this so often, when he’s just back from the hospital. I’ve seen his wife doing it while he was in the hospital, so it’s not like he’s the only one that can get it done.

There’s more to it than that, though.

Other than seeing him go by on the cameras, we’ve had no contact with him, even after the restraining order expired. He knows that I am willing to do things like that, and press charges for his vandalism. He’s not used to having someone stand up to him, rather than make excuses for him, so he stays away. I’m happy with that, as I really didn’t want to apply for it again. With the horrible messages and calls to my mother he’d been making, his number was blocked on her phone. My brother also blocked his number.

Yet, somehow, he was able to leave a message on his voice mail a few days ago.

We still don’t know how.

I have a copy of the recording, but could barely make it out. Probably because I was trying to listen to it on my phone. My brother was able to transcribe it, though.

Most of it was the usual weird stuff. He has invented scenarios in his head about what he thinks we are doing, and yells about it. This time, apparently my brother has a thousand dollar bottle of wine with which to celebrate our vandal’s death that he will have to put away for now. Oh, and my brother wants to put him in jail, apparently.

As always, he’s obsessed with this farm.

The property we’re on consists of two quarter sections. The one we’re on is all rented out except for the corner the house is on, which we are responsible for (and to keep an eye on the rest, in general). The other quarter, which is a half mile up and across the road, has no buildings or even fields on it and the whole thing is rented out to the same person. He, the renter, uses it for pasture and rotates his cows from there to here, regularly, along with other pastures he’s got for them. He’s very responsible when it comes to the land, whether it’s how he takes care of our field he grows crops on, or ensuring the pastures are never over grazed.

Well, our vandal had driven past the other quarter section recently (I only know this because my mother had tried calling him – which she should not have done – and spoke to his wife). In the message to my brother, he said that there’s a particular weed taking over and was ranting on how he took care of that piece of land for years – but also that he was fighting this weed on his own property. He was conflating the two things, so it’s hard to tell exactly if he meant he picked this weed on that quarter, as well as picking it on his own property right now, or just on his own property right now.

Either way, how could he have been taking care of that property for years, when it’s been rented out to the same farm family since my parents mostly retired from farming? I mean, we’re talking two generations renting from our family at this point. Plus, with the renter having his cattle grazing there, he would be on top of any invasive weeds that would affect the quality of the pasture, if they were there. So I honestly don’t know if this weed is actually there, or if our vandal just thinks that’s what he saw as he was driving by.

It’s also none of his business.

Either way, he ranted about how it’s going to ruin the farm, and that my “porkchop” daughters should go out there with a push mower to get it under control.

Yes. He said we should be mowing a pasture with a push mower.

Then he had a whole bunch of nasty stuff to say about me and my daughters (apparently, my husband doesn’t exist), with his usual lies about us having never worked a day in our lives (and by “work” he means a job he thinks is a “real” job, apparently), and trying to put him in jail, while demanding to talk to my brother about me, face to face.

It was how he ended the message that was the most concerning.

It was with a threat.

But of what?

Whatever it is, apparently he has something planned for before he dies, or after he dies, that is so big, even “the Pope will read it in a magazine,” about what we’ve done to him.

So his cancer scare and brush with death certainly hasn’t changed him in any way. If anything, he seems even more obsessed with the property – he is an example of what it means to “covet” something – and me, and my family. He has convinced himself we are trying to destroy him, so he is planning something to harm us as some sort of revenge.

*sigh*

I was hoping we’d be able to start relaxing a bit, but nope.

So while the gate was open, I wanted to be outside to make sure our vandal didn’t just suddenly show up.

One of the things I did was finally unwrap the sheets of clear plastic roofing material. I set up the saw horses and cleared space on the work table to support their 8′ length. They needed to be cut to 4′ lengths.

I marked out the centre of the panels, but wasn’t sure of the best way to cut it. I left it be, though, and went inside to have breakfast before my brother and his wife were supposed to arrive.

I timed it just right, too.

After they got here and my SIL was loaded up with tomatoes and a cantaloupe, she headed back home, and I went to help my brother.

He had a surprise for me.

One of the last times he was he, he checked on my mother’s car. We were able to get the compressor hose through a hole in the wall on that side of the garage, across the middle, section, and just reach the flat front tire on her car. We couldn’t reach the back tire, though.

He got me an extension for the compressor hose. One of those coiled ones that can stretch to 50′!

We can now easily reach the back tire on my mother’s care (which is starting to look low again), and I can even top up all the tires on our truck, without having to turn it around to reach the other end.

He is so thoughtful!

Meanwhile, since he was there, I asked for his advice on how best to cut the roof panels in half. After asking and seeing what I had, he suggested the jig saw, but to put painter’s tape over where I’d be cutting first. The jig saw, I had considered, but I would not have thought of the tape.

The hose extension set up and done, I helped him tie down a new tarp on the box of his dump truck, to keep the elements out, and the old tarp was getting worn out. The winds get really high out here, so we really wanted to make sure it was solidly tied down.

He’s already unhooked the piece of equipment he’d hauled out here, so as soon as the tarp was secure, he was off again. He wanted to come back with another load on his trailer before it got dark.

As for me, I followed his advice and used the painter’s tape over the line I’d marked. I could still see the line through the tape, so I didn’t have to measure and mark it out again.

Using the jigsaw worked, but WOW did it vibrate like crazy! So much so that the jigsaw blade and the line I was trying to follow were like trying to see with double vision! I was able to get it done, though, and pretty straight, too.

The cut edges were rough, though, so after removing the tape, I sanded the edges.

Leaving the panels still on top of each other, I left one end on top of the isolation shelter for later, then took the other end out to the catio.

Before starting on the roof, though, I brought over some of the wire that was used to hold the welded wire mesh rolled up. The bottom half of the catio is new mesh, with about 9 or 10 inches of overlap between old and new wire mesh. My daughter felt that some of the smaller kittens, should they require isolation in there, could potentially squeeze between mesh and get out, so I wanted to use the wire to “sew” it closed across the top.

I had help.

Gouda is no longer being kept in the catio.

Once he got over the scare of not being able to get out, he seemed to really enjoy his time in there. The Cat Lady thought she might have someone that could adopt him, but hadn’t heard back from them yet, so there was no point in keeping him in there longer.

When I opened the door for him, he didn’t even try to leave right away. As I was going back and forth with things, I suddenly realized, he was back in the catio, watching me!

Him and several kittens.

The cats quite like the catio! Especially the kittens.

Interestingly, after letting him out, Gouda seems to be extra calm, and wanting human attention more. He reaches out to my hands to get me to pet him – but if my hands are busy and I don’t pet him, he reaches out with his teeth!

He was not the only helper.

This little kitten was all over the top of the catio! When I was bent over to lace the wire through the mesh, she kept batting at my hat.

Yes, this is a she, and she is friendly!

I had other cats rolling around on the top of the catio while I worked, but this one, I sent pictures of to the Cat Lady, mentioning that she’s friendly. She seems to be the only female kitten that is friendly. All the rest of the friendly ones are male, as far as I can tell.

The Cat Lady responded that we should get her fixed soon, while she still is young enough to qualify for the special pricing for spays at the vet clinic we took Gouda to. That would be awesome! So, maybe next month, we’ll be doing her instead of two males.

I did as much as I could with the wire wrapping, but had to stop for a while. I ended up going into town to refill three of our big water jugs. I should have done a dump run, too, but after driving over that glass jar last time, I really don’t want to risk my tires. People on the local RM Facebook group I’m on have been talking about how bad the conditions at the dump have become in the last little while.

So I decided against going today.

Since I was not going to be around to supervise, I had to make sure the gate was closed up.

The good thing is, my brother has his own key.

By the time I got back, my brother was hear and had already started to load. After unloading our truck and leaving a daughter to put things away, I went to help my brother unload his trailer. He didn’t stay long after that, as he needed to start loading the trailer again when he got home, before things got dark. Nothing that’s coming here, though, so we shouldn’t be seeing them again this weekend.

Once we were done and he left – and the gate was locked again – I went back to the catio. I finished off with the wire wrapping, then brought over the hose. It had taken Gouda a while to figure out the litter box, and he’d made a mess on the cat hammock. I got that cleaned off before finally starting on the roof.

That catio now has a roof again!

The screws all have washers with neoprene seals on them, so water shouldn’t leak around them.

Since no cat will be in there overnight, I removed the empty food bowl, but didn’t bother removing the water bowl. The box nest went back in, though, as did the litter box, just to keep it out of the elements until I empty it and clean it for the next time it’s needed.

After this, we can finish painting the rest of it black, and replace the torn cat hammock that was removed. It will then be officially done!

Then I can get back to working on the isolation shelter. I really need to get that finished. Not just for the cats, but so I can get everything out of the garage and cleaned up, so we can park the truck in there again.

For now, I’m just glad to have that roof on. We’re supposed to get thunderstorms at around 5am. This gives the cats a bit of extra shelter they can tuck into.

After two weeks or driving all over, I’m happy to have one week of almost no driving at all, before it’s back to running around. This coming week, I expect to do grocery shopping for my mother at some point, but that’s about it. That will give me time to work on projects, but also get caught up on things like lawn mowing, and getting the loppers out to clear away saplings that are starting to take over some areas again.

Maybe even finally get back to working on those raised garden beds we’re supposed to be harvesting trees for!

If the weather holds. We may not be expecting frost, but by phone’s weather app is predicting thunderstorms on at least three days next week.

We shall see how it goes!

I’m just happy with whatever progress I manage to get right now.

The Re-Farmer

Morning harvest, bee bum, catio update, and today has been insane!

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Wow. What a day it has been!

And it’s just 4:30 as I start this!

Today is our average first frost date. Thankfully, there is no sign of frost on the horizon! As I write this, we are at 27C/81F, with the humidex making it feel like 30C/86F, which I think it down from the predicted high of 28C/82F – or perhaps we haven’t reached the high, yet! Today’s overnight low is expected to be 11C/52F Starting tomorrow, and for the next week to 10 days, the overnight lows are expected to be about 15C/59F or higher, while risk of frost might not happen for most of this month at all, though we might be dipping pretty close by the last few days of September.

While doing my morning rounds, I took recordings for a garden tour video, then did a harvest.

It was while I was recording that I spotted the melon that had split overnight, so I made sure to pick that one, even though it was still tightly attached to its vine. The other one, however, turned out to have already dropped from its vine on its own!

There are a few Royal Burgundy bush beans, and a few of the green Seychelle pole beans. No Carminat pole beans today. I picked a couple of Purple Beauty peppers, then some Forme de Couer and Black Cherry tomatoes.

With today expected to be so hot, I also did a deep watering of the garden beds.

I had to be careful at times, though!

I didn’t want to disturb the bumblebees!

While I was watering in the old kitchen garden, I decided to actually taste one of the Black Cherry tomatoes. Just in case this is a type I can eat.

Nope.

Gag city. Ugh!!!

Since I was still watering, I was able to wash my mouth out with the hose. Even then, I went hunting among the tiny strawberries to find some I could eat to get the taste out of my mouth.

So far, the tiny Spoon tomatoes are still the only tomatoes I can eat fresh, without gagging. At least I can eat tomatoes after they’ve been processed into a soup or sauce or something, unlike peppers. Thankfully, it’s not an allergy, so if they’re processed in a sauce, as long as I can’t taste them, I’m fine. If they’re still in chunks or there’s enough that the taste is noticeable, I still can’t eat peppers, no matter how appetizing I find everything else about them!

At least the family likes them!

While I was back inside and having breakfast (at lunch time…) I got a lovely surprise phone call.

The roof panels I ordered for the catio and isolation shelter were in!

Since I’m going to be out for the next couple of days doing other things, today was the day to pick them up. First, we had to get some things ready, and move the catio beside the house.

I had already moved the pots with the summer squash in them to make room. My daughter and I moved the swing bench into the garage, then we cleared and swept the patio blocks.

How to carry the catio was a bit of a conundrum. There’s really no way to grip it well, except by the very bottom, at which point, it’s not very stable.

At some point, I should add pairs of handles to the frame.

My daughter had the solution, though. She went inside the catio, where she could lift the whole thing herself by gripping the frame on each side with her hands, and using her head on the roof mesh to lift from the middle! The only thing that made it difficult was the plastic that’s covering the top for a temporary roof. There was just enough of a wind to catch on it and try and blow it away. My job was just to stabilize it while she carried it over to the house.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t set the back against the house, as we wanted. Thanks to the elm tree planted in front of the house, some of the patio blocks are lifted out of place by the roots. The catio is just wide enough that the front rested over the highest point, making the whole thing wobble. We ended up rotating it so that the back now faces the concrete steps and landing by the main doors.

My daughter put food and water bowls inside while I ran into the house, because the phone was ringing.

Some of the kittens already love the catio!

As for the phone, I’ve been playing telephone tag with the guy that heads the local home care department. I had called and left a message this morning, and sure enough, this was him, calling me back. I wasn’t fast enough, and he’d left a message. So I called back right away… and left a message! I was expecting to leave for the hardware store soon, so I told him how long I expected to be. Then I remembered that I will have cell phone signal while away, so I called back and left my cell phone number.

Thankfully, he was able to call back before I left!

I told him about what was going on with my mother, including her actions that may lead her to being evicted. We tried to make an appointment to get together, but the day he suggested this week is when I’ll be taking a cat to the vet to get its nibs nipped. The week after that, he’s away, while the following week, I had only one day available for sure – that’s the week we can expect the exterminators to be coming out to my mother’s again, and I want to make sure I’m there, so make sure things actually happen, and she doesn’t get evicted. After that, I’ll be doing our stock up shopping.

Given the situation with my mother’s possible eviction if she doesn’t let the exterminator in to confirm the bed bugs are gone, he asked if I were available this Friday morning.

I said yes. I didn’t even care what time. We need to get this process started!

I’m not going to be getting much sleep this month.

So on Friday morning, I will go to his office, and we’ll do as much of the paperwork as we can. My mother will likely need to make another doctor’s appointment, but she’s now refusing to see her doctor, because her doctor is black and female. My mother did have the chest X-rays they need within the past few months, though, so we might be able to skip that. She is still supposed to get a brain scan, and that’s on the waiting list, so that would just need a confirmation.

After I see him, we’ll go to my mother’s place to go over the paperwork, explain things to her, and get her to sign the necessary authorizations. Which should include at least having home care meal preparation done. I’m hoping to convince her to add medication assist, too, to make sure she takes her meds when she is supposed to.

So that is all arranged for Friday.

Once that call was done, I headed out to my mother’s town and went to the hardware store. Before picking up the items, I got a quart of black outdoor paint for the catio, as well as galvanized steel strapping to secure the last section of mesh, next to the door hinges. I was thinking of nailing through the steel strapping, but it’s too thick, so I picked up a box of the smallest wood screws they had that will still be secure in the holes of the strapping. Finally, I picked up some screw hooks, which will secure a cat hammock in the cat isolation house. While I was paying for those, I gave my receipt for the stuff to pick up to the cashier, so she could complete the invoicing part of it (it was already paid for), then call the folks in back to let them know what was about to be picked up.

The roofing material turned out to be in an 8ft long roll, which is longer than my truck box. I rolled back the cover so that it could sit on top of the tail gate, then secured it against the tailgate with a Bungee cord.

I’m so glad I picked up that set of cords, the day we got the catio!

I also got my two bundles of wood lathe, which I hope will be the last I need for the current projects.

Once all was secure, I headed home, remembering to stop at the mail along the way, in case an Amazon order came in early, which they sometimes do. There were a couple of parcels waiting that seemed oddly shaped. They turned out to be stuff my husband had ordered elsewhere, so we’ve still got Amazon packages to come in. The store the post office is in closes at noon tomorrow, though, so I won’t be able to pick anything up until Thursday. We’ll see what time I come back from the vet with a groggy cat!

The catio will need to be painted before the roof is put on, though – or at least the top of the catio needs to be painted before the roof is put on. However, I want to paint the bottom of it, which means flipping it, so that needs to be done first.

If I get out there fast enough, I cat get that done tonight. The paint should then be cured before it gets dewy during the night. I’ll talk to the girls about painting the rest while I’m gone, tomorrow. My younger daughter is the only one that can go in, to paint the inside.

Which means, I need to finish this off, get out there and get painting!

Updates to follow – eventually.

!!

The Re-Farmer

I understand that feel, and lots going on

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I spent much of today working on the cat isolation shelter in the garage, with a few treks back and forth to the house.

During one of those side trips, I found Syndol.

He looks so utterly content on that cat hammock in the catio! I could certainly relate to wanting a nap, that’s for sure!

This reminds me. I have been trying to think of ways to set up something similar in the cat isolation shelter. I expect to have a cat bed or two in there, anyhow, but I’m sure any cats in there would enjoy something like this!

We need to see if we have suitable fabric. Either that, or we can crochet something. I think I have enough strong, cotton yarn for something like this.

Speaking of the isolation shelter, I finally got some work on it today, which I’ll talk about in my next post. Since my brother was coming over with a couple more loads of equipment, I stayed outside so I could help as much as possible. With the first trip, they came and went very quickly. The triple axle trailer was just big enough for my brothers 1947 Chevrolet Loadmaster dump truck. !!! They had both trailers unloaded and were gone almost before I could get outside.

When they came back later, they unloaded the triple axle trailer first, so the guy could leave earlier – he charges by the house. It looks like this was the last load that needed the triple axle trailer. Anything else can be brought using my brothers own flatbed trailer. I helped him out as much as I could. It wasn’t a lot, but enough that he could get things done and could leave while it was still light out.

After doing all his own stuff, he also did a couple of things for me. When he came back the second time, he drove past me standing at the electricity meter, using my phone’s camera to try and get a picture of the reading. It was supposed to be sent in by yesterday, but I completely forgot. Being rather short in stature, I’d set up an old tire, still on the rim, under the meter so I could get a better angle on the camera. I still have to take several shots, and hope to get at least one where I can actually read the number.

One of the things my brother brought out last time was a step. Just a single step, about 4 feet long, that can be set up temporarily wherever needed. We brought it out, move the tire out of the way, and set it up. The ground is hilled around the post, and the middle of the step was on that mound, so it couldn’t sit flat. I was able to make use of some of the long pieces of wood salvaged from a pallet I’d cut apart. I cut 6 lengths that were about the same as the width of the step, though I ended up needing only four. I stabilized it with 5 pieces at first, but when I got on the step to test it out, I realized it was way too close to the post. I had to lean back, so as not to hit my head on the meter. After adjusting it a few times, I even found relatively level ground to set it on. The lengths of wood I put under it were not needed to stabilize it anymore.

They were added because I’m short. Now, I can actually look right at the meter and read the numbers! Yay!

The other thing my brother wanted to do was check under my mother’s car. It still had one completely flat tire in the front, too. It leaked air faster than I could pump it manually. After my brother tried to see under the back end, where the banging I’d heard was coming from, he asked about the compressor. I told him, the hose doesn’t reach, which surprised him.

It turns out there are several hose extensions hanging on the wall near the compressor, but none of them had ends that fit what is being used.

We ended up running the hose through the hole in the wall my brother had cut for the power cord. He threaded it through the wall by the compressor, while I pulled it over towards my mother’s car.

It was juuuuust long enough to reach the tire, once the nozzle was put back on.

It worked, too. The compressor got the tire pumped up faster than air could leak at the rim. Once there was enough pressure, it resealed itself, and now it no longer leaks.

Well. Somewhat. The tires went flat for a reason. The rear one that I’d pumped by hand (the compressor hose cannot reach the back tires) is still holding air, but it wasn’t as completely flat as the front tire was.

With that done, we left the compressor hose set up in the middle part of the garage, which is currently my workshop. It’s long enough that, once the truck is parked in the garage again, it should be able to reach all the tires.

As for checking under my mother’s car, there was nothing my brother could see that could have made that banging noise. Whatever made it is not out in the open. He thinks it’s probably something small, and not a major fix. The problem is, something small is something big, when we can’t afford to get it fixed. Unlike my brother, we can’t do this stuff ourselves! Even if I knew how, we don’t have the tools.

Ah, well. At least we got that tire pumped up! I’m much happier now. It’s not good for a tire to be flat like that for so long.

After that, we said our good byes, and he rushed off to drive home. I got a message from my SIL while I was working on this blog post, letting me know he arrived, safe and sound. It was full dark by the time he got home!

I don’t know if they’re going to try another trip this weekend. I hope my brother is able to take a day of rest, instead, but knowing him, he won’t! 😄

My brother is just amazing. He seems to be able to keep going, not stop, all the time. He’s always been like this, but he’s in his 60’s now, and still hasn’t slowed down! I don’t know how he does it. Even the guy with the triple axle trailer they hired had a hard time keeping up with my brother, and the guy with the trailer is only 17 years old!

Me, I’m lucky if I can manage to do half of what he gets done, and even then, I end up like Syndol, there, snoozing! Just not as cute. 😄

The Re-Farmer

Catio progress

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Well, I’ve done as much as I can, repairing and reinforcing the donated catio shelter. I think it’s going pretty well – and the cats already like it!

Here is a slideshow of what was done today.

In the first photo, a support is being added to the back of the catio. The catio is sitting on one end, and I was able to reach inside through the open space in the back that was soon to be covered with wire mesh. I found a scrap piece of wood I cut to fit snuggly between the the middle of top and bottom frame pieces – snug enough that it stayed in place, even while the catio was on its side. Once it was centred, it was attached with screws. This will prevent any potential sagging in the middle – because I know that cats will be jumping on top! – as well as giving something extra to secure the wire mesh to.

,The catio is 5′ 3″ long. The roll of quarter inch wire mesh I got is 5′ long. Taking into account the width of the frame pieces, that meant I could cover the back of the catio, with half an inch on each side with which to secure it to the frame. In the second picture, you can see that I stapled the wire mesh in place.

You can also see, there is no way those staples were going to hold. However, stapling the new piece to the frame kept it where I needed it until I could secure it properly. I was also able to staple both old and new wire mesh to the new support in the middle, which kept things from wobbling around too much.

I then went nuts with pieces of wood lath, which you can see in the third image.

With the metal corner braces screwed onto the bottom of the catio, it now had metal bits that were not flush with the wood. I didn’t want to be dragging screw heads on the ground, or getting grass caught in the metal, if we had to move it. For now, I’ve added pieces of wood lath – which are exactly the same width as the frame pieces – to the bottom, flush against the metal braces. Eventually, we want to add something to the corners, over the metal braces, so that there is no gap for a cat to potentially reach under and dig its way out. We haven’t figured out what do use for that, yet. All in good time.

Once the bottom pieces were nailed in place, the catio got flipped onto its front. The wood lath comes in 4′ lengths, and the catio is 4′ high, so that worked out perfectly. The new vertical support inside the back of the catio is wider, though, so I centred two pieces to go over that.

It wasn’t until I’d already attached the pair of them to the frame at one end, that I realized one of them was shorter than the other by almost 2 1/2 inches! That was okay, though. When I added the horizontal pieces at the top and bottom, they were each marked and cut to individual lengths, so the gap was filled that way. Last of all, the vertical pieces attached to the frame.

Framing the mesh on the back had to be done rather carefully. There’s only that half inch of mesh attached to the frame, and I wanted to make sure there were plenty of nails that were inside the mesh squares, so that if something pulled or pushed onto the mesh, the nails would keep it from getting pulled out from between the wood. At the same time, the nails couldn’t go too close to the edge, or the wood lath would start splitting. Plus, the nails I was using were finishing nails I’d collected from what the cats had knocked onto the floor over the winter. I’d sorted out all the finishing nails from the rest, but only by type, not by size. A lot of them were thicker nails that would also split the wood, so I had to pick through the lid I was using as a tray to hold them, selecting those that weren’t too thick or too long or too short… there don’t seem to be a lot that were juuuuust right.

The main thing, though, is that the mesh is now securely attached to the frame. There is enough overlap between old and new wire mesh that I don’t think it also needs to be “sewn” together, but if it does, the wire that was used to keep the roll of mesh together was set aside for this, just in case.

That done, there were still a couple more areas to patch up. On each side, the bottom corner near the back was rusted out. You can see the larger rusted out area in the next photo of the slide show.

I didn’t have to break open the second roll of quarter inch wire mesh, though. I had a small amount left over from when I made the soil sifter, a couple of years ago. The rusted out areas of mesh were cut out. After determining how large the mesh needed to be to cover the holes, I made sure to cut them so that the two sides that would not be attached to the frame had the lengths of wire ends sticking out. When the new mesh was lined up with the old mesh, those ends were twisted around the old mesh to secure the patch in place. Then pieces of wood lath were cut to extend beyond the patches and nailed into place to secure them.

You can see the finished larger patch in the next photo – with Syndol on top! He was very curious about what I was doing, to the point I had to be careful not to hammer a paw!

So the wire mesh is now all patched up were needed!

That was where I stopped for the day, but there is still some repair needed. Along the hinge side of the door, some of the staples have popped off, and some of the wire mesh at the edges have become detached from each other. The easy way to fix it is with more wood lath, but the hinges have to be kept clear. The door also swings all the way open, and any wood lath added would prevent that. I need to come up with an alternative that is super thin. I do have some metal strips that I used on the raised bed covers, but the holes in that are larger, for screws, not nails. I don’t want to use screws for this, as I’d have to put in quite a few to secure the mesh, and I don’t want to be making that many large holes in the frame. The metal is soft enough, I might be able to nail through it, though. I’ll have to test that out, when I next get a chance.

Which won’t be tomorrow.

Meanwhile, with things as secure as they are now, I set the catio upright again and opened the door wide.

Syndol immediately found the door and started exploring. I lifted him onto one of the shelfs, and he promptly settled in the cloth hammock that is still secure. It took a bit longer for several kittens to find the door and explore as well.

I got rained on a few times while working on this, and we’re supposed to get more rain tonight, so I found a sheet of plastic and set up a temporary roof. This way, the cats can go inside and hang out on the shelves or the one secure hammock, and take shelter from the rain. In the last picture, you can see Syndol inside the covered catio.

There are a couple of fixes I’m going to have to get my younger daughter to do. I’m too broken to be able to go inside the catio to do them.

One is to add more corner brackets to reinforce the top corners of the frame, as has already been done in the bottom corners. We won’t be adding the flat plates on top of the corners, like the underside of the frame has, since the top will be covered with roof panels, and that will add its own layer of stability to the frame.

The other fix is to replace the torn cloth hammock. Those are stapled in place, but we’ll figure out some other way to attach the new cloth.

This won’t be done any time soon, but the very last thing we want to do is pain the whole thing – especially the new wood that was added – black. The wire mesh will be painted black as well, so that it’s easier to see through. We could probably get away with just a quart of paint for this job, too, which should be in budget.

For now, I’m happy with the progress made. With the last little fixes, we can use it as an isolation shelter right now, until the real one is finished. We don’t have to rush that job, now.

I’m so very thankful that the rescue was able to pass the catio on to us!

The Re-Farmer