The hard part about making plans is, they get disrupted so quickly! :-D Even scheduled appointments and the like often get changed at the last minute. Even the medical appointment we had for my husband this morning was one that had been rescheduled twice before – and that turned out unusual. Continue reading
kittens
The dangers of kitties!
From when the kittens tried to kill my husband. !!!
Share this:
Let’s see if this works.
Share this:
Oh, those kits!
The outside cats are certainly entertaining.
First, they tried to kill my husband this morning. !!! As he went out to feed them this morning, they were all at the door. The usual tripping hazard! As he started to step down from the concrete stairs at the door, Doom Guy dashed under his foot. He moved to avoid stepping on him, and ended up stepping on one of the glazed bricks that are along the side of the entryway.
It was slippery.
Down he went! Continue reading
Share this:
Kitten Rescue!
Doom Guy and Beep Beep kept me company while I was cleaning up around the garage and fence line this afternoon. When I got to where I had to figure out some way to lift the post hole pounder, to free up the bikes under it, I went into the lean to on this side of the garage, to find something to help.
Since I was going in and out of it, I left the door open.
Of course, the cats went in to check it out. This is the only part of the garage they can’t squeeze their way into, so it was all new to them!
While working on the junk pile, I could hear meowing from the garage. I went in to see, and from the direction of the sound, figured Doom Guy was exploring under the counter. After a while, though, the meowing started to sound decidedly distressed.
So I went back to look again.
Which is when I discovered Doom Guy was trapped behind the counter.
The counter has open space under it, but it also had a back to it. Above the counter are boards covering the wall joists; likely to prevent things from falling off the back of the counter, where they could not be retrieved.
Doom Guy was somewhere in the wall joists!
Now, while we’ve been using this lean to for storing the riding mower, and a few other things, we were not going to start sorting and cleaning up the garage any time soon. So stuff that’s in there have been there for years.
Lots of stuff.
I ended up getting one of my daughters to come and help me. She came into the garage, just in time to see the top of Doom Guy’s head, before he fell back down again. He could climb to the top, but couldn’t get over the edge of the board.
So we cleared the end of the counter, my daughter climbed on top of it, and ripped the board that was there off completely.
The blue on the left is another section of board, blocking the space.
This is some of the stuff that was on the counter.
The shadow is Beep Beep’s tail. :-D
The wooden things on the ground are shelves, filled with nuts, bolts and other small items. All metal.
I’m glad the two parts were separate, because it took two of us lift each of them off!
The noise and bustle we made spooked Doom Guy into squeezing over to another space. I could only see him by using my phone!
We even put some cat treats at the top, to tempt him to climb up again.
At one point, I could hear him purring!
I even managed to move the counter away from the wall by a couple of inches. It couldn’t be moved too far, as that end is resting on a bit of concrete foundation. It would fall right off, if moved too far.
We left the garage to give Doom Guy some quiet, so he would try and climb again. After a while, my daughter came back. We could hear some scrambling, so she hopped onto the counter. As soon as he was close enough, she grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him the rest of the way out!
He was just covered in dirt and cobwebs!
He does not look happy. :-D
When he got down to the ground, she tried to give him treats there, but he was more interested in attention.
So his mom ate them.
My daughter took the treat container and, shaking it to make some noise, tried to tempt him away from the garage. Instead, he kept sniffing the spot where the treats his mother ate had been. So I picked him up and took him to my daughter, who got him over to the house.
I’m glad we were able to get him out of there. For a while, I was seriously considering cutting a hole in the wall, from the outside!
I haven’t put anything back on the counter, yet. A lot of what’s there might just get thrown out (why are there so many empty tool and tool accessory cases?). At the very least, I want to clean the end of the counter before putting the shelves back – and getting rid of all the dead Asian Lady Beetles that fell out when the board got pulled off!
I supposed the board should be put back. Maybe not nailed and glued in place again, though!
While fussing with things on the counter later on, though, something caught my eye, in between some pieces and parts, boxes and cases.
Was that a glass?
With liquid in it?
What on earth?
Oil.
Dirty oil.
Why is that there?
How long has it been there?
We’re going to have our work cut out for us, when we finally get to cleaning the garage.
Hopefully, no more kittens will need to be rescued!
The Re-Farmer
Share this:
He’s back!
One of the dad cats showed up again this morning, cooperatively posing for me outside our living room window, so I could get some photos! :-)
Dad cat is looking a little rough around the edges!
While he seems to be coming around more regularly, yesterday I saw – and heard! – him being driven away by Rolando Moon. Who can be just as mean to the other cats, too, we’ve noticed!
I think we are slowly but surely getting The Outsider used to us, faster than the other kittens! Yesterday, my younger daughter was using a stick to play with him (her?), and even managed to pet him briefly.
I played with her a bit, too, and she was willing to come close to my feet, but then seemed to realize how close she was and would run off a bit. Then come back again, to play with the end of the stick.
While all the kittens and their moms seem to have accepted him as one of their own, he and Doom Guy are getting to be quite the pair! I wasn’t able to get any good photos, but they snuggle up in the sun room, regularly. Earlier today, while taking something out of the freezer, I looked out the window to the swing bench. Much to my surprise, there were no kittens on it. Then I found the two of them. They were on the old dresser I use to hold the tools, snuggled up and looking out the window. That space is normally covered with bags of cat food, but we’re on the last bag right now, so it’s available.
I think, from now through the winter, we’re going to have to start buying 4 big bags of cat food a month, instead of the 3 we did last year. We could get away with 2 in the summer, so I would have an extra bag left over from month to month, but this month we’ve already gone through 3 and are into the 4th – though some of that was due to the cats dumping the bucket onto the floor and eating it all night!
Cat kibble in bulk. Bird seed. Deer feed.
Not quite what we were expecting to be doing, when we first moved out here!
Hard to believe, in just a few days, it’ll be a year since my husband and younger daughter flew out.
It’s been quite a year!
The Re-farmer
Share this:
Double-sided
Most of the kittens are pretty easy to describe. We’ve got the tuxedo, Doom Guy. The grey tabby, Corvo. Two orange tabbies, Jim and Bob.
Then there are the calicos. Or are they torties? Or something else entirely?
It doesn’t help that one of them is double-sided.
Here is Rosencrantz (or Guildenstern), side A.
This is side B. 
It’s like two different cats! When I see her (him?) from this side, I sometimes mistake her for Corvo, until I see the bits of orange.
Today has turned out to be remarkably warm – 13C! Well above the predicted high.
Time to go outside and enjoy it. :-D
The Re-Farmer
Share this:
Gotta be careful!
Seeing our furry visitors, it reminded me that, when I was out in the yard earlier in the day, I had noticed the cat kibble was almost gone. So I decided to top it up for the night.
We keep the kibble in the Old Kitchen now, so those were the doors I went through. The kittens were on the swing bench – 6 of them! They seemed to know I had food with me, which made their responses to me rather funny. There’s Doom Guy, who comes right up to me. The cautious ones, like Jim and Bob, sortof hang around, but are still not comfortable with me coming close, even with a bowl of food. Then there are the super shy ones, who are clearly torn between wanting the food they can see I have, and wanting to run away from me, at the same time!
As I went for the outer doors, however, they all dashed ahead of me and started for the bowls outside.
Just to be cautious, I looked around, and sure enough, there was our Pepe Le Pew, hanging out by the steps of the clothes line platform. Making himself look big at me!
So I put the food out for the cats, then got some video.
Just so you know, I am NOT really that close to him. This is zoomed in a bit.
Getting back through the sun room took a little more time than usual. ;-)
The Re-Farmer
Share this:
Warm
While checking around the yard, to see if any other branches came down during the gusts of high winds we had yesterday, I came to the remains of our straw bale.
Beep Beep and her boy, taking advantage of something warmer than the ground! :-D
Smart kitties.
The Re-Farmer
Share this:
Not sure how to fix this…
While out and about this morning, the kittens were out in full force. Including Doom Guy, who can’t seem to figure out that, if he wants me to pick him up, he has to be in FRONT of me, not behind…
I’m going to have little puncture marks, all up the back of my legs, thanks to him. :-D
Yesterday, I was able to clean up the platform to the clothes line. The line itself needs a bit of maintenance before we can use it. A bit more, if we want to set up three lines again, instead of the one that’s left now.
Whoever rebuilt this platform did a good job of it.
The original platform doubled as a dog house. On the side, where the mock orange is growing now, there was an opening, and we kept it filled with straw for the dogs. I even remember being able to crawl into it, myself, for some canine snuggles!
The cats can squeeze under the stairs. At least, the smaller ones, can. I don’t think Rolando Moon could fit through there. Nor the skunk.
Of the stuff that was on the platform, I’ve only kept the bin, as a potential shelter for the cats in the winter, and a piece of eaves trough that I am wanting to re-purpose, but doens’t fit anywhere else right now.
I noticed, however, that there is stuff underneath, so I used my phone’s camera to see what it is.
???
Why is any of that, there?
Who thought it was a good idea to shove it under there?
The only way for any of this to be there is by pushing it through the opening under the step.
How am I supposed to clean that up?
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 