This evening, I was able to get the other side of the first half of the gate painted, while the second half has been set up, scrubbed and washed, needing only to dry before it can be painted. It was still quite went when I went out to do my evening rounds, so that will wait until tomorrow.
One of the things I had to consider, when setting the sun room up so the moms could leave, but the babies stayed, was that other cats could get in, too.
Which Doom Guy did.
When I came through the old kitchen to check on them, he immediately ran in, only to find himself trapped when he tried to leave!
We had some new, furry visitors to our feeding station this morning!
This is a first for us to see raccoons! :-)
They are so fuzzy!!! Like round little bears. :-D
This morning, I also figured out a way to let the mama cats out of the sun room, while keeping the babies in.
I noticed a whiteboard I had in storage, and gave it a try. The whiteboard is too slippery for the kittens to climb, and even if they managed to climb up the jugs I shoved against it to keep it from tipping, the marker ledge should keep them from being able to climb over. The remaining question was whether or not the moms would jump over it, and if they would knock it down when jumping back.
As my daughter and I were heading out to go to town, I heard a noise and saw that Beep Beep had jumped it, without knocking it down. When I came back later, however, it seemed the Butterscotch hadn’t figured it out yet. So I just lifted her over. You can actually see her in the photo, at the old dog house, where she promptly went to eat some grass! She has since returned to the sun room, and the kitten gate is still up, so it seems to be working.
The kittens, meanwhile, were content to ignore the set up.
They had all been sprawled on that blanket until they saw me moving around. A few came to check things out, then stayed to play.
This one, however, just luxuriated…
Cutest.
Thing.
Ever!!!!
In other things, we have not been able to work on painting the gate again, yet. We had a good rain during the night, so it was still wet when we went into town. I’m hoping to get some more done this evening, once it starts to cool down a bit. At least the area that’s already painted is no longer tacky to the touch! Tomorrow, I’ll be driving my mother to a medical appointment, so if I get some painting done today, that’ll give it plenty of time to cure tomorrow. No rain is predicted overnight, so that should help, too. We’ll see how it works out.
With today’s rain, it’s been a fairly quiet day, but I still have some fun things to share with you.
Like this adorable shot I got last night.
This little tuxedo has really taken to being handled – and climbing us like trees!
On the down side, after climbing back and forth on my shoulders, he then jumped down onto the back of the swing bench before jumping/falling down to the concrete floor. :-( That’s a long way for such a tiny kitten!
I got this shot, this morning.
Three of those 6 kittens are hers. :-D One of hers and one of Beep Beep’s were off napping on the blanket on the floor by the tool dresser. They’re all like one big litter now! :-)
The kittens have discovered that they can get into the bottom drawer of the tool dresser from underneath. They couldn’t, however, get back out again. We now keep that drawer open a few inches, so they can get out from through the top of the drawer, instead.
I have also found I can no longer open the top dresser drawer. I don’t know why, yet, as there are too many kittens around to safely move things and find out. That drawer has the tools I used most often, so I rather need to open it at some point! :-D Thankfully, the tools I use every time I work to clear the trees are kept in an open shelf above, instead, so I can at least access those.
On my way to pick up my daughter, I found the barn swallows working on their nest. They were flying around so much, I didn’t even try to take a photo, and got a couple of short videos, instead.
When I was a kid, I always saw these birds building their nests under the eaves of the barn, but I’ve never been this physically close to them before.
Yesterday evening, we had someone watching us through our kitchen window.
Big ole Nicky the Nose is making himself at home! Just look at that face! Just look at that…
… eye…
I went looking at some better pictures we got of Nicky, just to see if this is normal. :-D Turns out that his right is eye, indeed, slightly smaller than the left, but not normally squished up like that. Not sure what’s going on in this picture! :-D
Meanwhile, while doing my rounds this morning, I discovered this, in the bird bath.
Yup. That’s a layer of ice on there. Not a thin one, either!
It’s June 2, and we’re still going below freezing overnight!
This is going to be rough on people’s gardens. :-(
We’re supposed to get a high of 16C (60F) today, then tomorrow, we’re supposed to hit 25C (77F), with possible thunderstorms by evening, and stay high for the next week or so.
So… the weather we typically would have been getting in April.
If we’re going to have thunderstorms on Monday, we’ll have to do something about the gates we’re working on. Not good weather for paint to cure outdoors!
Today, the girls and I headed into the city for our monthly shop.
We took advantage of the trip to accomplish a few things, and ended up going to 5 different places covering half the city. It made for a long day, but we accomplished what we needed, and then some.
I have a whole bunch of things to share with you today, but the first thing I want to share is some good news. Our van didn’t need to get any work done on it today!
A couple of nights ago, it got cold enough overnight for the furnace to turn on, only to hit highs in the 20’s, half a day later!
Yesterday was supposed to be my day to finally get the mower out – which required taking the snow blowers out first, taking out the riding mower, then moving the snow blowers to the back of the shed until winter. I also made room by taking out the two broken push mowers my brother had tested. I stuck them in another shed at the old hay yard. There used to be a tractor in there, but that is one of the things that disappeared before we moved in.
Once the mower was cleared, I topped up the oil, filled the gas tank, checked it over and…
Posting is going to be a bit light over the next few days. Hopefully, I will be able to upgrade my WordPress account by this weekend, giving me more storage for photos. I am hoping to continue doing the before and after posts that I did while cleaning and clearing the yard last year. I will also be restarting the Critter of the Day posts – we’ve been seeing all sorts of new birds I’m excited to share with you!
It’s been a surprisingly chilly spring. It’s warm enough during the day, but even last night, we got another frost warning, and we’ve had our furnace turning on during the night!
Which leaves me feeling very behind on my work outside. I just hope this means we’ll have a longer fall to make up for it.
Meanwhile, here are some of the things I see as I do my usual routine.
With the kittens getting more mobile, it was time to clean up the sun room as much as we could. Moving out the furniture to wash the concrete floor is not in the cards while we are using it as a kitten maternity ward, but I definitely needed to move things around so I could bring the cat cave box to floor level, and get the broken glass out from behind and under the plastic couch.
I decided the best way to accomplish this was to put all the kittens together into a box, but the box into the old kitchen, then open the sun room up. This allowed the moms to finally go outside, while the kittens were safe in the (much cooler!) old kitchen.
Which meant I had to do continue more clean up in the old kitchen. Specifically, the corner beside the wood burning cook stove that the cats keep getting into and mucking about.
I ended up filling 3 garbage bags of some gross stuff, plus a recycling bag that will go for electronic disposal. On top of that is stuff that will need to be put into storage, and stuff that will be kept. I’ll post more about that later; come back tomorrow for a guessing game photo! :-D
But first… kittens!
This is the smaller box nest that we made for Beep Beep to give birth in, but Butterscotch moved her babies into, instead. That pillow and cat bed are just covered in cat fur! *L*
With my daughter’s help, we got the gridwall off the top of the cat cave we created for the winter, and put it back into storage with the others in the old kitchen. Once that was clear, I could start moving things around more easily, and without needing help. The crocheted blankets, floor mat and bath transfer chair went outside to be hosed down.
The floor mat was immediately claimed by a very pregnant Guildenstern (or Rosencrantz?), with Doom Guy keeping her company. I had the doors to the sun room and old kitchen open, and we had cats all over the place, checking things out!
Except Beep Beep and Butterscotch. They eagerly took off. Butterscotch came back rather quickly, but it’s 9 in the evening now, and still no sign of Beep Beep.
When I finished cleaning things up, I brought the kittens back into the sun room, putting all of them into the bigger box nest so I could set up the smaller box again.
Butterscotch ended up nursing all of the babies. Well. Almost. Butterscotch has only 6 teats, so she can’t nurse all 8 of them at once.
After moving the kittens back into the sun room, but before Butterscotch came back, I left the outside doors open, so it wouldn’t get too hot in there, while I put the crocheted blankets on the clothes line to hose them down.
I ended up having to close the door, because they were running around so much, one of them found the open doorway and started going outside!
It was one of Butterscotch’s babies, and she was back by then, so I closed her up inside again. Her babies continued to explore, and one of them discovered the smaller food bowl.
Yes, he started eating! Sort of. He wasn’t figuring out that “chewing” thing and was basically swallowing pieces of kibble, then coughing them back up again. :-( So we took him out of the food.
This was his first solid food!
Later on, after everything we done and poor Butterscotch was being engulfed in kittens, I went looking around for Beep Beep.
I never found her, but someone else found me.
Doom Guy wanted up.
As you can see, he was not messing around with that!
He never made it all the way up, but I now have a new batch of scratches on my leg. :-D
I’m sure Beep Beep will be back soon enough. If nothing else, she’ll be feeling the need to nurse soon.
I’m so glad to finally be able to get the sun room cleaned up as much as I could, even if it wasn’t as much as I wanted to.
Don’t forget to come back tomorrow to play the guessing game!
The Re-Farmer 