I’ve started a routine of putting cat kibble out for the kittens in the evening, when we tend to see them out more often.
When I came out through the sunroom, where we keep the cat food and bird seed, I startled Butterscotch and the one kitten that followed her to the food bowls by the house, so I made a point of putting kibble out near where her kittens are, first. Then I went around to the garden shed, where Beep Beep has her kittens, and put more there.
I never saw Beep Beep’s kittens, but in the time it took me to move from one area to the next, Butterscotch and her babies were hungrily eating together!
The bigger orange tabby couldn’t squeeze her way in, so she went around the other side.
Too cute!
If it weren’t for the size difference, we probably couldn’t tell the orange tabbies apart!
I also got video. :-D
That was about as close as they would let me come, though Teeny Tabby did let me touch her (his?) back while eating, a couple of times. I’m not sure if Teeny was being braver than the other kittens, or hungrier! :-D
Some video from the storm we had a little while ago.
Though we had quite the light show at midnight, we were very fortunate. Across a lake to the west of us, a tornado touched ground, causing quite a bit of damage, and resulting in one death. The Reeve of that municipality declared a state of emergency to deal with the damage.
Today turned out to be a nice and productive day, despite the rain this morning.
After driving my younger daughter to work, my older daughter and I went to the city to do the rest of our monthly shopping. An unplanned stop at Walmart, where I got some canning supplies I hope to use to preserve chokecherries, though I have yet to decide what I will be doing with them; a quick trip to Costco – or at least as quick as any trip to Costco can be! – and then to the grocery store we discovered after our last trip. We had lunch before we started that last bit of shopping, going through their kitchen area, for some Chinese food. To be completely honest, it was hardly the best Chinese food we’d ever had, but it’s been so long, it was absolutely amazing! Talk about hitting the spot!
Of all the things to miss about city living. The dizzying variety of ethnic fast food! :-D
We took advantage of the incredible international sections of the store to get a few things we normally wouldn’t – including a couple of ingredients for something I want to try that I will save for its own post. We haven’t been doing a lot of cooking in the heat we’ve been having, and pretty much no baking at all. Our sourdough starters, sadly, did not survive. The Rye of SourOn was the first to go, and even though my daughters were using Sir Sour Alot almost every morning to make hotcakes, in double batches, it basically went black over one hot and muggy night.
When things start to cool down later in the year, and we’re not doing so much yard work, we’ll get another Alaskan sourdough going and start baking again. Until then, we stock up on bread at Costco and freeze most of it. We’ve been going through bread rather quickly, since no one wants to cook in the heat, so we’ve been having lots of sandwiches! :-D
For now, the less time in the kitchen, the better, which means our grocery shopping trips are filled with more things that can be eaten cold, or with minimal cooking.
We finished early enough that we went straight home to unload before heading back into town to pick up my daughter from work. We were able to make a stop at the beach in the process.
It was much windier at the lake, and the water was so choppy!
Some people even braved the waves!
I’m not sure I would have been willing to do that, but then, I’m not a very strong swimmer.
The water gets so murky when it’s like this! Not that it’s ever clear, given how shallow it is, but on days like this, it’s pretty opaque!
The weather had cleared up around our area by then, so after we got home, I went straight to mowing the outer yard. I’m still mowing a drive-able path to the second gate. We have yet to fix the barbed wire gate. I’ve decided not to make another barbed wire gate, and will instead pick up some fencing wire to use instead.
Now that we have power to the barn, and my brother fixed the melted plug end of the line to the storage shed, I should make a point of going around the areas I mow with the weed trimmer. Though I will not be focusing on the outer yard for clean up, other than what’s essential, I also don’t want to give things a chance to get overgrown where we need to access them. Tall grass is one thing. Nettles, burdock, thistles and self-sown trees are something else entirely!
After I finished with the mowing and was coming back to the house, I noticed Butterscotch’s kittens were out. I got some cat kibble for the kittens and refilled the water bowl by where Beep Beep has her babies. Beep Beep’s kittens were out, too, but only the tuxedo stayed out while I was around, and did not like me being there. So I went back to Butterscotch and her babies as they ate. I actually got to pet the teeny tabby! That itty bitty kitty is turning out to be the braver of the lot. Unfortunately, none of my attempts to get photos turned out. Ah, well.
The fridge and cupboards are stocked up, the freezer is full, the outer lawn is mowed, and I got to pet a kitten.
Our froggy guest had been staying in our kitchen window daily, leaving at night and returning by morning, for a few days. Then it didn’t come back and I thought that would be it.
A couple of days ago, it started coming back again, and I am so happy to see it!
While topping out the outside cats’ bowls with kibble, I decided to leave a bit extra beside the old dog house for Butterscotch. There’s some old carpet that was dumped there that the kittens climb all over, and that’s what I put the kibble on.
While doing my nightly walk around the yard this evening, I saw the kittens, digging into a fold of the old carpet, trying to find some last pieces of kibble! The kittens are eating solid food now. :-)
Then Butterscotch came out and went over to me for some pets, before going to the food bowls.
So I got more kibble for the kittens.
Soon, Butterscotch was back with them, and they were all eating kibble!
One finished before the others and decided to explore. This one actually came fairly close to me – but not too close!
They’ll get used to me, eventually. :-D
I knew zooming in with my phone to take pictures wasn’t going to be the best, so I took some video, too.
Unfortunately, I was being eaten alive by mosquitoes!
We got hit by a short, but intense storm today. Severe enough to warrant shutting down the computers.
I got a couple of videos, so when the storm passed, I turned on my desktop, and began uploading the videos.
Then the power went out.
It was just for a few seconds. Then it came back on. Then off. Then on again. Then flickered a bit.
So much for my uploads!
I didn’t try again until after picking up my younger daughter from work. Thankfully, my older daughter and I had put on the new windshield wipers, first! Turns out that we have to open the hood to be able to access the wiper arms, which meant I could barely reach, and couldn’t see. The wipers the van came with were broken and kept together with electric tape, which had come off some time ago, so the ends on the driver’s side blade were just sort of flopping.
Changing wiper blades should be easy. Just pop off the old ones, pop on the new ones. But no… that would be too easy! I got the old wiper blade off, but there was a piece attached to that arm that should have come off, too. It wouldn’t. After a while, I figured I’d put the old blade on and try again later. That didn’t work; a piece broke off, instead. So later on, I backed the van out of the garage so we could see, then popped the hood.
Of course, that’s when it started to rain. *sigh*
After righting with it for a bit, and another piece breaking off, I drove it back into the garage while my daughter got our tool kit (with all the stuff in the garage, do you think there are any actual usable tools in there? Nope!). While waiting, I got the passenger side blade changed. That one came off easily, and the new blade popped right on, the way it’s supposed to.
It took a pair of pliers and elbow grease to get the driver’s side arm bar clear of the broken bit. Once that was done, the new blade went on quite easily. Yay!
It made all the difference while driving in the rain!
As for the videos, I’ve had some trouble uploading them; I think the power outage happening while I was trying to upload them the first time messed things up. As I type this, the second video is still uploading, after the file got rejected three times! But it seems to be fine now.
After the storm, I did a walk around to see if there was any damage. A few branches had come down, but nothing serious. I did another walk around after picking up my daughter, and there were even more branches down. No roof damage, though, which is the main concern. :-)
The sky is clear, now, and it’s looking lovely out there. The rain is much appreciated!
