outside cats

Today’s roundup: they want out!

/ Re-Farmer / 5 Comments

I’m glad we got as much of the mowing as we did, yesterday. It has been raining on and off since last night, and today they are predicting thunderstorms, with possible hail and tornadoes (?!?!) this evening and overnight.

We may get high winds, but tornadoes are not an issue where we live. Water spouts on the lake, maybe, but these weather systems tend to move to the south of us. I checked the weather radar and it looks like we’ll probably get hit by the edges of the system. So I am expecting rain and high winds, but the main body of the system looked like it’ll hit the city. Which means my brother and sister’s places will likely get hit harder than us.

While doing my rounds this morning, I spotted a Rosencrantz.

We think she has a litter of kittens, somewhere, but so far have seen no sign of them. She comes here for food, then disappears.

I had both Creamsicle and Potato Beetle joining me this morning, but they were not happy with each other. Moments after I took this picture, Creamsicle attacked Potato Beetle! I actually had to break up the fight. :-(

I checked the gardens, and the sunflowers. There are now about 26 sunflowers sprouting, that I can see.

The one on the left is an Early Russian, the one on the right is Giganteus.

Then there is this one.

Deadeus.

Looks like something just bit the top off!

Back in the house, I had to help my daughter with the kittens.

They can climb to the top of the stairs, now, and they want out!

So we spent some time, distracting them.

Dave came down to babysit, while Beep Beep went upstairs. :-D

They really like the lilac branches, and my box of wood chips. This, it’s okay for them to get into. I have a separate, sealed, container for sawdust.

So it looks like today will be an inside day. Time to catch up on little projects I need to finish. Maybe even spend some time with the kitties, and practice carving on that spoon blank that came with the carving kit. :-)

And mabye playing a bit of Civ VI. I used to play Civ II, years ago, but didn’t like the newer ones. Loved Alpha Centauri. Then I moved on to Age of Empires, and others in the series. I stopped playing completely for a while, because the games user interfaces changed so much, I couldn’t figure out how to to the most basic things. The tutorials were no help at all. Civ VI became available for free recently, and I am finding it has become user friendly again, and actually fun to play. Perfect for a rainy day.

Well. Until it starts storming, and we shut all the electronics down! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Morning critters; a bird attack?

/ Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

As usual, in my morning routine, I visited the kittens.

David dashed downstairs to visit them, too.

It’s so funny to watch how he interacts with them! The kittens are quite happy to include him in their play, while he seems torn between “I wanna play, too” and “stay away from me, you strange creatures.”

Speaking of strange creatures…

… Creamsicle was in fine form this morning! What a drama queen. :-D

After dropping my daughter off at work this morning, I decided to play a bit of Pokemon Go before heading home. I was parked by a gym and playing the game when I heard something hit the side of the van.

It was a goldfinch, at the middle window.

Now, my first thought was that the bird was disoriented by reflections in the window and accidentally flew into the glass.

But it stayed, fluttering away at the glass, making its way across to the front door’s window, and sat there, at the bottom of the glass, looking at me.

When it seemed to be staying there, I opened the camera on my phone. I thought I’d lost my moment when it seemed to be flying away, but nope.

It went to the front windshield and proceeded to try and peck its way in!

This went on for several minutes! I did try and get video, but my phone’s camera does not do zoom well, and the video was horribly pixelated.

I don’t know why the bird did this, but it certainly made my morning! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Morning smiles – and kisses!

/ Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

I had some extra company when I visited the kitties this morning.

Both Two Face and David came down with me. It’s the first time Two Face has been in the basement for a while.

She immediately began grooming kittens.

They, however, were far more interested in climbing me, and wrestling each other, on my knee!

So she started grooming Beep Beep, instead. :-D

Also, that’s all 5 kittens climbing one leg. Only Leyendecker kept climbing, so he could tackle my hair. The other 4 battled each other with kitten ferociousness, all at once, on my leg.

:-D

The last while, I haven’t seen the outside cats much while doing my rounds. With so many of the cats ending up indoors, I suspect they are going where there are more cats around outside.

This morning, Creamsicle came to join me, and boy, did he want attention!

He was very affectionate.

I got Creamsicle kisses! :-D

What a beauty he is!

Just look at those gorgeous eyes.

He even let me carry him around as I continued my rounds. He’s such a sweetie. We’re still hoping to adopt him, but once they get big, no one is interested in cats anymore. :-(

Today has turned out to be a much cooler day. Downright chilly, compared to the last few days! Perfect weather to work on the lawn. :-)

Time to get outside and make some noise! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Final Frost

/ Re-Farmer / 3 Comments

At least, we hope it is the final frost!

With the sun rising so early this time of year, much of it was already melting away, but there was certainly plenty in the shady areas.

It made the weeds look very dramatic! :-D

Butterscotch took advantage of my checking on the mulched sunflower rows.

She is no longer stand-offish, but now revels in snuggles and wants me to carry her around when I do my rounds!

What a mercurial cat.

Of course, I visited the babies first thing, this morning. Beep Beep was waiting at the door when I opened it, and dashed straight through. I let her be, and allowed David to come down with me for a while.

The kittens were happy to see a human to climb!

At point point, David settled himself down under the worktable, and his doppelganger came over to check him out!

After a while, I managed to catch him and put him upstairs, so I could give the babies some wet cat food. David is a real greedy guts, so there was no way I could do that with him still downstairs! This was also why I was okay with Beep Beep going upstairs for a while; the kittens got a chance to eat some wet cat food before she came back to finish it off.

I think Beep Beep is realizing she’s got a sweet deal going on right now. She hasn’t been trying to get outside at all.

She’s been living pretty rough for most of her life, and was pretty lean and hungry when we moved out here. I think she’s due a spoiled retirement. She’s one of the few yard cats left that my dad used to take care of, so she is also a connection to him, for me. My dad really enjoyed the yard cats. :-)

Hopefully, my day of rest has been enough, because there is lots to get done. I’ll need to stay in town for a while, after dropping my daughter off at work, most importantly to pick up prescription refills that had been ready, yesterday! I had no idea. :-( A dump run is way overdue, too. By the time I get home, it should be warm enough to uncover everything in the gardens. The cloches certainly did their job; they still had frost on them on the outside, while the insides had condensation that was not frosted at all. The new garden bed with the carrots and beets is still in shade, but should be warmed up nicely in just a couple of hours, if not sooner.

Along with prepping to continue with transplanting, I’m going to have to switch priorities on the mowing, and at least get the area to the barn done. We will need access to the doors, and it’ll be easier if the grass there is mowed, first. If things go to plan (which is never a sure thing! :-D ) my brother will be coming over tomorrow to help me with the trailer frame. Specifically to deal with these…

Most of the old screws still stuck in the frame are just bits of metal sticking out. I simply don’t have the tools to take care of it. My brother has an angle grinder he plans to use. I had hoped I found on in the garage, where the lawn mowers and snow blowers are stored, not long ago but it turned out to just be the box for one, full of teeth.

I was able to pick up some drill attachments to clean the rust off. I was hoping we’d be able to paint it, too, but won’t be able to pick up more of the paint we need for a while. We’ll see what’s left in the budget after the van is done on Monday and, hopefully, my mother’s car gets fixed. That can be done after the trailer frame has a bed added to it, which I believe my brother has got what is needed to do that.

I will just have to maintain awareness so as not to overdue things. This time, I only needed the one day to recover after unknowingly pushing myself too hard. There have been times I’ve needed several days.

It’ll be good to see my brother again.

The Re-Farmer

Looks like I ran out of spoons

/ Re-Farmer / 11 Comments

For those who are not yet familiar with the Spoon Theory, visit this link.

Today has been turning out to be a very non-productive day. Right from the start.

The first issue was waking up in pain. Particularly in my hands. Every joint in my fingers, stiff and sore. I know osteoarthritis is setting in (inevitable, given some of the jobs I’ve had in the past), but most of the time, they’re fine. Some days, however… well… let’s just say they’re “not fine.”

I woke up fairly early and started getting ready to do my usual routing, which now starts with bringing fresh water for the kitties. My husband was using the kitchen, so I sat down on the couch for a bit to let him finish.

I basically passed out for nearly 4 hours.

It felt more like a few minutes.

My entire body is feeling achy and sluggish, I’m in a snarly mood, and I’m in a brain fog.

Definitely a reminder that I am not really all that able bodied. I didn’t feel like I’d been overdoing it over the past few days, yet I clearly have, and my body is making sure I know it.

Well, at least it’s a good day to go into recovery mode. It’s too wet to finish mowing, and too chilly to finish transplanting. Manual labour outside is not going to be much of a thing, today.

And so, I will share some smiles with you, instead! :-)

I’ve been posting so many photos of our adopted cats and kittens, I rarely get photos of the two that moved out here with us. Last night, DahBoy got to entertain us!

One of my daughters was in my doorway when DahBoy demanded up.

He did not want up on her, though. She was just a way to get to his real goal.

No, not the top of the door, either!

He wants the top of the linen closet. He knows there’s space up there, and he wants in!

Will a human assist him? No? So how is he to get down, now?

Oh, look! A handy human.

I got that last shot a split second before he leapt onto my shoulder, then vaulted the rest of his way to the ground. :-D

This morning, while visiting the kittens, I had to very carefully step my way around kittens that were determined to climb my legs. They didn’t stop until I gave them some wet cat food.

Even during the feeding frenzy, Saffron and Turmeric were more interested in me than the food! They’re not as into the solid food thing, yet. Especially Saffron, who would much rather climb a table leg. LOL

Once outside, I had another cat I had to dance around. Potato Beetle was quite determined to walk in front of my moving feet and flop onto the ground. That is, when he wasn’t doing this…

What a goof!

At least they’re entertaining. ;-)

Ugh. It feels like such a wasted day, today, and it’s only mid afternoon!

Hopefully, a day of recovery means I can get things done tomorrow. I really need to get those transplants in.

The Re-Farmer

Gardening progress: sunflowers are in!

/ Re-Farmer / 1 Comment

Today has been a lovely, cool day! Perfect to get those sunflowers done.

I had assistants.

When I started filling the holes with the soil mixture, the Potato Beetle decided to sit his butt over one of the next holes! My first thought was that he was taking a dump and I went to push him away. He just flopped onto the ground and looked at me as if to say, “Yes. Rub my belly. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”

Then he moved over to the next hole and sat over it, watching me. When I moved to fill that one, he went to the next one and lay down.

With his butt over the hole.

What a weird cat. :-D

Creamsicle was also fascinated by the holes.

I have no idea what he was seeing down there that was so interesting! :-D

The soil mixture in the little pool got quite a lot of rainwater, along with the water I’d already put into it, so it was quite saturated. I was still finding pockets of dry peat, though! Still, this was perfect, as it meant I didn’t have to drag buckets of water over the very rough ground to water the soil mix, first. I could just go straight to planting.

I decided to alternate the two varieties. The row still marked with flags starts and ends with the variety that can grow 10-12 feet high, while the other row starts and ends with the variety that can grow 6-8 feet high. The varieties ended up lining up with each other where the two rows overlap.

And that will be it for today, with it being Sunday. I just did what had to be done, before we got more rain (if we get more rain; we’ll see if the forecasts are right for a change).

Next, for this area, we will be adding a straw mulch, little by little, as well as taking the opportunity to dig up the burdock that’s starting to come up, as well as the self-sown trees that are showing up.

Tomorrow, weather willing, the priority will be to get more of the squash transplants in. Quite a few more are ready, now. And I might even be seeing some of those gourds finally emerging, too!

Putting in a garden this year is really changing what is being worked on outside. The original plan was to spend the first 2 years cleaning up the inner yard, the next year or two working on the outer yard, and moving beyond the outer yard as we could, after that. With my husband ended up in the hospital for 3 weeks last year, and many trips to the city to see specialists, things got more focused. Which worked out, since we ended up focusing on cleaning up where the old wood pile used to be, and finding that wonderful soil we have planted the carrots in. For this year, we will continue to work on cleaning up the spruce grove, but will also have to get things done in the outer yard, and now keep up on the garden beds. Oh, and build that new outhouse as a cordwood practice building, too.

First, the garden needs to be planted.

Then, we can mark out where we want to put the cordwood building and start clearing the space and removing sod. Cleaning up the spruce grove, etc., will continue in between stages of building. I’m hoping I can borrow my brother and his trailer, and visit a salvage yard for materials to use as a floor/base. I’m thinking along the lines of pavers, but who knows what else we might find! :-)

Little by little, it’ll get done!

The Re-Farmer

I know what I’m doing tomorrow!

/ Re-Farmer / 5 Comments

Today I took my husband into the city for a medical appointment, but of course I had to check the kitties, first!

They are getting more and more active! We’re going to have to put them in something deeper, soon, so they don’t start crawling around the basement. At their size, there are too many things they can get into, that we couldn’t be able to get them out again! :-D

My husband and I left early enough to hit the post office, first, and ended up swinging by home again to drop things off. My husband had finally got his retroactive disability tax credit, and he used some of it to get a much needed new computer. Not something we wanted sitting in the van while we were in the city!

His appointment went well, though the drive was quite painful. It was for some tests in Nuclear Medicine, in the same hospital as the cardiac clinic. I was not allowed to come in with him, though. We arrived early, as is our habit, and I expected to have lots of time to walk around on a beautiful day, playing Pokemon Go. They must have taken him in early, because he was done much faster than I expected. Which is a nice change, even if the reasons for it are not to nice. :-/

His computer was not the only thing to arrive in the mail. I got a parcel I was expecting to come in tomorrow.

My Yukon Gem potatoes have arrived!

Which means I need to get them planted right away. Looking at the forecasts, tonight we’re supposed to reach 0C (32F), and that’s the coldest it’ll get overnight from now on.

I had been thinking about where and how we would plant the potatoes. With our rock hard soil in most places, I decided to go with a completely new and different method from what I’m used to. Here are some videos about what I am going to try.

The only thing is, I don’t have hay, nor was any available. I just have straw. I hope it will do as a substitute. I’ve seen other articles and videos that used straw, so I think it should.

With this in mind, I made use of the frames from the goat catching pen we’d made. The long sides are roughly 8 ft x 4 ft. A perfect garden bed size. So I am using them to mark out where I want to put the potatoes.

I will remove them, after I’ve finished covering the seed potatoes. For the 6 pounds of potatoes I have, this should be enough. I soaked the areas thoroughly, and will soak them again tomorrow before we start again. We are expecting some rain tomorrow (I hope!), but it won’t be much. By Sunday, we are supposed to hit 21C!! (70F) so I want to make sure it’s all thoroughly covered and watered before the heat hits.

We are also going to have to watch out for the Potato Beetle!

He kept us company while we started on the future potato beds.

I had considered setting them up where we’d covered with straw last year, as I am sure we won’t be having as many squash to transplant as I had hoped. There’s still a possibility that more seedlings will come up before the end of the month, so I figured I may as well just go off to one side, instead.

How well this works will help us decide what to do as we increase the amounts and varieties of potatoes we grow in the future. If we can get a good crop, without having to plow or till this hard, rocky ground, that would be really awesome!

The Re-Farmer

Morning adorableness

/ Re-Farmer / 7 Comments

Before I head out to visit my mother (outsider her window… :-/ ) for Mother’s Day, here are some adorable, furry worms to make you smile!

I’m glad Beep Beep used this cardboard nest we set up to have her kittens in. The box is the base from a case of cat food tins. Not only did it turn out to be the prefect size, but it makes it easy to slide in and out of the crate (which is on its side) to check on the babies.

The concrete floor is pretty saturated this spring. Under the crate, there is a puddle of moisture. A bit like condensation created by the warmth of cat bodies above. The crate keeps the cardboard from contacting the floor, so it stays nice and dry.

As I was petting the babies, this little mini-Beep Beep (right down to the orange spot on her forehead!) grabbed my hand…

… and started licking my fingers!!!

Yeah, I melted into a puddle of goo over the adorableness of it.

Then it was time to tend to the outside cats, and we had quite the crowd this morning!

At the top left is Rosencrantz! She stared showing up again very recently. I wonder where she goes, when we don’t see her for weeks at a time?

In front of her is Pump Shack cat and in the top middle is Junk Pile cat. While I was able to pet Rosencrantz this morning, these two just won’t let us near. :-(

Butterscotch and Creamsicle are eating on the right of the photo, and Potato Beetle was with them, but he found me more interesting than food!

Why?

This is why.

He just HAD to fling himself bodily across my feet and start rolling! He eventually slithered his way across my feet, around my legs, to eventually end up sitting at my other foot, looking up at me, as if to say “why haven’t you picked me up yet?”

He did it one time while I was looking at something else, and I did end up stepping on his tail a bit. At some point, this guy is going to have to learn that moving feet are not a place to drop in front of! :-D

Happy Mother’s Day!

The Re-Farmer

No, I didn’t forget!

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

After an oddly sleepless night and a fair bit of running around, I just didn’t have the energy to post earlier today.

I did, however, get kitty pictures! Here’s a bit of cuteness to make you smile. :-)

That one smooshed kitten… :-D

Creamsicle was very demanding about being picked up this morning!

The Potato Beetle is a trusting soul. Trusting that when he flings himself to the ground in front of my feet and start rolling, I won’t step on him!

The cuteness. It just oozes out everywhere! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Morning cheers

/ Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

Today was a day to work on a whole bunch of little things that needed to be done or started – and a surprise breakage. Rather than do one huge post, I’ll split them up into a bunch of little posts.

But first, here’s something that cheered me up this morning.

Of course, there was checking on the babies.

It’s going to be interesting in the basement, when these guys start getting more mobile!

While doing my rounds, I had my furry escort, including Creamsicle…

He’s about 10 feet above my head in this photo! Of all the cats, he seems to be the one who loves to climb the most. :-D

What a great way to start the day!

The Re-Farmer