I didn’t get to do much posting yesterday, because most of it was spent outdoors. We had our company come over, and we spent many happy hours around the fire. This will probably be the last really pleasant weekend of the year to do that, so we were really happy to be able to drag things out as long as possible!
My day, of course, started with feeding the outside cats.
I think I counted 21, or maybe 23, cats at feeding time. Quite a crowd!
The girls decided to take advantage of our plans to use the fire pit and went out several hours early. There was quite a build up of ashes, so that got cleared out to make room (getting dumped near the main garden area, so it can be used to amend soil in the beds). I’d found another fire brick and it was added to the others that were set in there previously, so there is now a sturdier base to put the Dutch Oven on, the next time we used it.
Once that was done, the girls started working on clearing away the branch pile that was against the collapsing log building nearby. It took about four hours, but it got done!
There were a few logs that are too big for the fire pit and need a saw to break down. Once the pile was gone and the ground raked up, I found a half buried metal pipe, with another piece of metal under it, both of which are now leaning against the wall. I also uncovered a surprisingly loose large rock. It came out of the ground quite easily, but I put it back so no one would twist an ankle in the hole it left behind. Since my daughter has plans to use rocks to create a wall to frame her daffodils and irises, along the edge of the old kitchen garden, I was quite happy to find it. We will be able to make use of several more that I could see, once we are able to start clearing the far side of the building. There are dead trees that need to be cut down, so it won’t be a small job!
While the girls were working on cleaning up the branch pile, they had a major breakthrough with Plushy.
This is Plushy.
We have been trying to socialize this one for ages, with little success, but yesterday my younger daughter managed to reach her ears for some scritches.
Ah, the magic ear scritches.
Before long, she was accepting pets and cuddles, and stayed with the girls as they tended the fire, even to the point of accepting belly pets! Even I was able to pet her, when I joined them!
Which hasn’t continued into today, unfortunately. I’ve been able to touch her, but she moves away before I can pet her.
Also, she is confirmed female.
Unfortunately, it looks like it’s too late for the possibility of adoption, as the potential adoptees have arranged to adopt a pair of kittens. But who knows. It might still happen, of we can continue the socializing!
When my BIL and his family arrived, they had quite a surprise for us – two big bags of kibble! My SIL said it was one bag for the cats, and the other for the skunks! 😄 We actually have not bee seeing skunks much at all for quite some time! We know they’re still coming around. I’ll even see one running by the garage security camera at times, but we’re not getting the sort of visits to the kibble house that we used to. They didn’t know it, but they’ve saved us from likely having to get more kibble before our usual monthly shop.
The socialized kittens, by the way, were in heaven. The entire family are cat people.
I’ve taken to calling this one Baby. He basically took my nephew over and claimed him as a bed. All the most socialized kittens got more human attention in one evening then ever before! 😄 They had a blast! Unfortunately, while she certainly hung around, Plushy was not one of them. She skulked about and watched, but once more people showed up, she was done with human attention. I don’t think it will take too much effort to get her more comfortable with people, though.
All in all, it was a fantastic evening, and we really enjoyed it. Even my husband was able to join us for far longer than he’s been able to previously, though when my daughter checked on him later, he was seriously medicated for it. It was worth it to him, to be able to spend time with his brother and family, though.
We’re already talking about doing it again in the spring – before the bugs are out in full force! The last time they were here for a cookout, the mosquitoes were so bad, even though we were all using bug spray, we ended things far earlier than we had wanted to. I’m quite looking forward to it!
Well, we had our visit from my mother and sister. I wasn’t sure what time they’d be coming out, so I took advantage of things; after unlocking the gate, I got the lawn mower out and started with the sides of the driveway outside the gate, then began working my way back. Little by little, I’m trying to reclaim areas we normally would have mowed, but got too overgrown with all the flooding and rain we got. Some areas will simply not be done this year, but there are areas in the outer yard I really need to clear. Using the scythe is no longer an option for most of it; the hay has simply been too flattened by the wind, and the blade would be gliding over more than cutting.
I had gotten most of the driveway done by the time they arrived. It turned out they stopped somewhere else along the way. My sister gave me two big bags of cucumbers. I didn’t get a close look at them until after they were gone, and they are HUGE! Too big to pickle without slicing them, first, but definitely enough to pickle, if we want to.
They immediately started with a tour of the yard and gardens, with my mother going straight for the Red Kuri squash hanging on the chain link fence. They are pumpkin orange right now, and she thought they were ripe already. I told her they will be a much deeper, almost red colour when they are ready, which is when she asked what I could already see she was shooting for – she wanted one for herself! I’m actually quite surprised, as she does not like to try new things (in fact, ever since we’ve been able to garden after moving here, she has been chastising me for growing things that she never grew!). These, however, are very cute, so maybe that made the difference. 😉 She even asked how to prepare them. That was an encouraging start to the visit!
As we made our way around to the beds with the late garlic, yellow pear tomatoes and kulli corn, she went straight for the garlic bed, then asked for a couple! They are smaller than they should be, but very close to being ready to harvest, so I dug up the ones that looked the most mature. When I went to wash them off with the hose (no need to cure, since she’ll be using them right away), I decided to pop inside and grabbed a small plastic bin, trimmed the garlic and added a couple of the tomatoes we have ripening in the old kitchen, and some of the beans I’d harvested this morning.
By the time I came out again, they had moved to the cherry tree. There are still cherries on it, and my mother was very insistent that I must harvest every single one of them. I’d already told her we’d picked lots, and added that we were okay with leaving some for the birds, but she started picking what she could reach herself. She just couldn’t bear to leave them. My sister and I ended up helping her until she had at least some to take home, though I doubt she’ll be able to eat any of them, even though I tossed away the worst looking ones.
As we got closer to the main garden area, she saw the one crab apple tree that is doing well, with apples that are looking quite red now. We are planning to wait maybe another week before starting to harvest them. She said she was going to go over to take a look, so I went and gathered some onions of different types for her and cleaned them up for the bin I prepared for her to take home. By the time I was done, she was at the tree – and loading up the basket in her walker! When I caught up to her, she was going on about how I needed to pick all the apples. LOL
My sister commented on how few crab apple trees are left. There are three new dead ones that need to be cleaned up, two of which don’t look dead because the suckers growing from the bases are so big. Then there’s the big one I want to take down, because it’s sickly, and I want to protect that one good tree that’s left. By the time it’s all cleaned up, we might be down to just two crab apple trees. 😞
While picking apples, my mother got curious about what she was seeing at the trellises, so we wandered over. Taking the smoothest route for her walker meant going past the silver buffalo berry, now mulched with wood chips. It took both of us to explain to her that the tiny saplings I was trying to show her were going to be berry bushes, and that we planted them just this past spring. She seemed to think they had come through the wood chips on their own, for some reason!
It was nice to go through the trellises with my sister there to comment on how she always used trellises, especially for peas, and how it’s so much easier to harvest with them. Using trellises was one of the things my mother kept giving me a hard time about, because she never used them – but she never gave my sister a hard time in her decades of gardening on her farm!
Going through the other beds, we got to talking about just how much water we had all over, and the effect it had on our gardening. In all the years my mother gardened in this area, neither of them remember there ever being standing water in it. Considering my mother gardened in this spot since before I was born, that’s more than 50 years they can go back over in their memories!
As we continued on, they both commented on our reddening tomatoes – my sister’s tomatoes are still green. Even though I’d already added ripe tomatoes for my mother to take home, she wanted a couple more of the “long ones” – the Cup of Moldova – to take home, so I grabbed some of the ripest ones. It was too much for her to get to with her walker, but my mother was quite impressed by how our one giant pumpkin that’s turning colour is looking. The second one hasn’t started changing colour, yet, so it took her a while before she could see that one, too.
Then we made our way around to the old kitchen garden, where they were curious about the beds covered with netting – and why. With kittens running around all over, they didn’t have much trouble understanding the need. 😁 My sister was happy to see that I’d transplanted mint into some of the retaining wall blocks, when I mentioned I am trying to get rid of the rest that’s taking over the garden. It turns out the original mint plants these are from are from my late grandmother!
They both got to see other flooding damage in the drowned out lilacs by the storage house, but were happy that the grapes have survived. When we made full circle and my mother sat for a rest, we got to see more kittens running around – and my mother actually started calling to them! Not that these ones are trained to come when called, like our barn cats where trained to come for some fresh milk. I was, however, able to pick up some socialized kittens, and my mother asked to hold them! It seems she is okay with cats when they are outside. Just not inside! 😄
While my mother rested, my sister went into the old workshop that is now being used as a warehouse, jammed full of my parents’ stuff. She wanted to take their old photographs, so they don’t end up damaged in there. There was something in there my mother wanted me to bring out for her to take home, so I did that and left my sister to it, while I visited with my mother a bit more.
Then it started to rain.
I asked if she wanted to come in, but she said it wasn’t too bad yet. It was enough that I went and put away the lawn mower, though! When it started to rain harder, I asked if she wanted to at least go into the sun room, but that was when my sister came back, carrying a box covered with a vinyl table cloth she’d found in one of the other boxes, to protect the photographs inside, asking my mother if she was ready to leave.
So they left soon after. All in all, the visit turned out okay. There were a few times my mother tried to make digs at me, one of which went right over my head. I knew she was making a dig, but there was clearly something behind it that she thought I knew. I have no idea what it could have been. So it was a failed dig! 😄
It continued to rain for some time after they left but, once there was a break, I headed outside again to make some adjustments to the new trail cam. After checking the files this morning, I saw the position had to be changed. I want the camera to cover the space in front of the sign, without having the frame filled with the back of the sign itself. With the wide angle lens, there’s a sweet spot I need to find, between the sign on one side, and the post it’s mounted on, on the other. Because the dimensions of this camera are larger than the previous one, that required moving the mounting plate completely.
Here is was before, with the mounting plate attached in the exact same spot as the old plate, which was also damaged from when the previous camera was ripped off.
Whoever took it could have just unscrewed the camera from the mount, without damaging anything at all.
Before changing the location of the mounting plate, though, I took the camera inside (away from the mosquitoes!) and adjusted the time, so it’s no longer 12 hours behind. I hope. I thought I got it right the first time, so we’ll see.
Here is the new set up. It’s just far enough away from the post that it’s no longer in the way of positioning the camera where I want it to be, but also close enough to add extra support to the camera. As tightly as I’ve made the various adjusters, the camera is top heavy, and it wouldn’t take much for it to just flop over.
The mount is now a bit lower. Hopefully, that will work out. The main potential issue I foresee is that it might get triggered by blowing grasses now. I do have the sensor on medium, rather than high, sensitivity, though – a setting that wasn’t available on any of our previous cameras.
There is one other thing this camera does that none of the others do. They all include the date and time in the images. The newer camera also included moon phases and temperatures in Celsius and Fahrenheit. This one all that, plus a battery life indicator. Right now, it reads the batteries at 100%. That will be so handy! The other cameras had bar indicators on their screens, not in the images. With the older cameras, the batteries could last a long time on one bar. With the one that disappeared, it didn’t use up the batteries as quickly, but when the batteries did finally get low, it would proomptly just die – and when that happened, not only did the batteries need to be changed, but I’d end up having to reset the date and time, too.
It should be interesting to see how much the solar will prolong battery life.
Now that the adjustments have been made, I’ll see what needs to be tweaked after switching out the memory cards, tomorrow. Theoretically, I could use BlueTooth to connect with it and see the files, but I really don’t want to be standing outside with the mosquitoes while fussing with my phone and looking through files! 😂
Oh, there is one thing different about the files I discovered. I have it set to take stills, then video. With the previous camera, after uploading the files, I could just go through all of them in chronological order. This one stores the video and photo files in separate folders. I can see the advantage of that, but I’m not quite sure if I like it or not.
I’ll get use to it, I’m sure.
So far, though, the camera seems to be working out fine. If it continues to work out well, it would be worthwhile to get a second one for the driveway, since the camera there is starting to have issues, and I’m not sure how much longer it’s going to last.
*sigh*
That’s a lot of time and money going towards having multiple cameras, all because of our friendly neighbourhood vandal.
Ah, well. At least we sometimes get cool files of deer and awesome farming equipment going by, too! 😁
With today supposed to be a warmer day, the family decided to go have a cookout in the fire pit. May as well get some use out of it now, because we might not be able to use it in the summer again!
My original plan had been to do my usual morning routine at the computer, then decide what to test the new Dutch oven with. Making a damper had been suggested, and that seems just the quick and easy thing that would be perfect for a test recipe.
I was just settling in at my computer when the phone rang. It was my sister. Where we going to be home today? Yes… She then started telling me something about Holy days, and she wanted to bring us some chicken, when the phone started screaming and the signal was lost.
My sister had gotten rid of long distance service on their land line, and has been using her cell phone for long distance calls. The problem is, she’s in almost as bad of a cell phone dead zone as we are!
She called back a little while later. She hadn’t realized the line had gone dead at her end – the screaming noise was only at my end! – and had been talking for a while. :-D When she realized just how much I’d missed, she cut it short and just said that they were going for a drive and wanted to swing by. They could be here at around noon.
So we decided to start the cookout earlier, so they could join us. Which meant no time to experiment with the new Dutch oven this time. We’ll have to plan a day for that. One of my daughters headed out to get the fire going, since it took a long time to get and keep a fire going when the girls had a cookout before, and stayed outside to tend it.
I admit that we are not the best of housekeepers so, of course, the place was a disaster. They did say they would only swing buy, but I thought they might want to come in for tea, so I went on a whirlwind cleaning spree. :-D
The fire was down to cooking stage by the time I was bringing the tray of food when my sister and her husband arrived.
Sort of.
I saw their car pull up the driveway, very slowly, stopping a little past the garage. I figured they’d drive up to the gate, but no. They backed up, then turned to park in front of the garage.
They didn’t want to drive through the “lake” and leave muddy ruts in the soil.
They also didn’t have rubber boots, because, why would they?
Which meant they couldn’t get to the inner yard. Or the house.
So it was a short visit, outside in front of the garage, as I slogged through the mud to them with my rubber boots!
I finally got the rest of the story, too.
My sister and her husband wanted to follow scripture for Holy days. They are Christian, but of a sect that also follows Old Testament Jewish traditions. They wanted to get all leaven out of the house for the Sabbath, and realized they had some breaded chicken cutlets in their freezer.
Rather than throw out good food, they offered it to us, while also just going out for a drive together. Something they haven’t done in a very long time.
That was very kind of them. It’s a shame they couldn’t come any closer to the house, though! They would have gotten their shoes completely soaked and muddy!
After they left, the girls and I had our cookout. My other daughter made tea and coffee for us, and we cooked up some hoagies to bring in for my husband, too.
I just had to take a picture of the set up.
I found it so funny to see the fancy tea cups with coffee in them, and the giant coffee mug with my tea in it, sitting on the very convenient concrete blocks. The lids did a good job of keeping the ashes out of their coffee!
Unlike my tea…
The grill my brother and his wife gifted us with could be swung over as needed to toast the buns.
My younger daughter doesn’t like hoagies, so she’s the one with the normal sized wiener. We only had regular hot dog buns, though, which are comically too small for the hoagies.
It was far windier than I expected, but it helped keep the fire going! We ended up staying out for at least a couple of hours.
We do enjoy cookouts. We need to build a more permanent shelter from the rain and wind, though, seeing as how we’ve had two tent shelters destroyed by weather already. I wouldn’t mind making something that can still be moved, though.
When we build our outdoor kitchen, sheltering walls are definitely going to be part of the design. Wind is a major and near constant issue. We all really enjoy cooking and eating outdoors, and would love to have a nice, comfortable set up to do it.
All in good time. The area I’m thinking would be best to do this – well away from any trees – is not far from where that old shed that lost its roof is located. We have a lot to do in that area because it can be made into a useable space!
Just one more thing on the list of stuff we plan to work on over the next few years. :-)
I took advantage of yesterday’s warmth with a trip into town. At one point, on the way back, I was driving through precipitation that couldn’t make up it’s mind if it was snow or rain! LOL We actually hit 3C/37.4F, which was a couple of degrees warmer than forecast.
Then the temperatures plummeted overnight. While the actual temperatures remained above -20C/-4F, the wind chills brought things down colder than -30C/-22F Apparently, there was even a storm last night, though it seemed to be well to the south of where we are. We got hit with high winds, mostly.
As I write this, we are at -17C/1.4F with a wind chill of -28C/-18.4F
While I was doing the cat stuff outside, most of them just stayed in the cat shelter and watched me though the windows. They still had lots of food in the kibble house, but I also toss some inside the entry of the cat house, where I have another food bowl. I don’t put much in there, since I don’t want to encourage other critters going in there. That food bowl was empty.
Some of the cats did come out for some warm water; the heated water bowl does the job, but when it’s cold like this, I like to give them water that is actually warm, and they really seem to appreciate it.
Then they all just disappeared! Not into the cat house, but running off around it, with some running under the storage house.
I discovered why when I turned around as saw we had a visitor!
My younger brother’s dog had come for a visit!
He just thrives in these temperatures! The colder it is, the more he loves it.
They have yard cats too, of course, so when he comes here, he expects to be able to come right up to ours and play! Butterscotch and Rolando Moon (and Beep Beep, if she were still outside) are more familiar with him, as he used to visit my late father all the time, but the other cats where born after we moved here, and the sudden appearance of a fluffy giant is rather frightening for them! Meanwhile, he just wants to play. :-D
As I was finishing my rounds, I managed to get him to follow me down the driveway and start heading home, but as I came back, he was suddenly bounding beside me, leaping and jumping in the snow, trying to get me to play with him!
Unfortunately, the winds made staying outside any longer than I had to, out of the question.
My goodness. I just glanced at my weather icon on my computer and noticed we’ve already started to drop in temperature. Looking out my window, it’s a clear and sunny day and looks like it should be quite pleasant out there, but we’re now -18C/-0.4F, with the wind chill down to -31C/-23.8F We’ve already hit the high of the day, and it is expected to keep slowly dropping from now on until tomorrow. We’ll have one more mild day tomorrow, then temperatures are supposed to plummet for a few days before getting mild again. With concerns over the vehicles, we plan any outings around the forecasts, which means quick run to check the mail and pick up more bird seed and deer feed will be done tomorrow.
Unlike our furry visitor, we do NOT thrive in this cold, and neither do the vehicles! :-D
Today, I got to meet a couple of people in person, finally!
The first was the owner of the cows. :-D
I had expected him to come earlier, so I was a bit surprised when I saw the cows still in the outer yard. They had gotten into the burn barrel again, so I went out with a big garbage back to pick up the mess and put the burn barrel pieces into a pile again. I decided to put the bag into the garage and headed that way, only do see the door was more open than I left it (with no handle, I didn’t close it all the way), and stuff was scattered around. When I came over, I found a cow inside, standing by the van! Continue reading →
When my daughter opened the front door to feed the outside cats, we found a furry neighbour sitting at the front door of my brother’s van, looking right at us! My brother’s dog had come for a visit.
He’s a skittish sort, so as soon as the outer door was opened, he ran off and hid behind the van. He wouldn’t come back around until after my daughter went over to the food and water containers, then he followed at a distance.
Also, the screen door window frosted over in the few seconds I stood at it, taking photos. It did make the shots look at bit more artsy. LOL
It may be warming up today, but not by much, yet! The dog is just loving the cold, though.
Then he joined the cats for a New Year’s treat of left over turkey bits and gravy. As long as my daughter didn’t look directly at him, or try to interact with him, he would come close.
I look forward him being comfortable enough to let us pet him. He is so beautiful, with such a sweet temperament.
I’m glad he and the cats get along fairly well, because I expect we will be seeing lots more of him.
You can certainly tell which of the containers got the leftover turkey bits.
Last night, we were blessed with some awesome visitors. My son from another mother and his Lady Fair came with their mechanical beast of burden and three animal side kicks.
It was fantastic to see them as they have their own major move, even farther than ours.
So we had our New Year’s dinner early and stayed up to the wee hours. Good company, good food and good conversation. Can life get any better?
Well, it could have for our own cats, unfortunately. While DaBoy would probably have settled in with our animal visitors fairly well, especially since we shared our home with the two cats for some time, his mama was far less tolerant. When she saw the dog, much to my surprise, she didn’t run off. No, she was the one who was going to chase him! The poor dog was just trying to be friendly, too, but she would have none of it.
After much crashing and banging and knocking over of things, we had to close up our own cats into the office for the night. We moved their food, water and litter in with them, of course, and would pop in to give them some loving, but they were not happy campers. Mama has always been more of a bundle of nerves than her much more laid back son, but her frazzled mood rubbed off on him a bit, too. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him growl before! Even while they were on my work table, where a bed was set up for them, and I pet them, she wouldn’t stop prowling back and forth, in between freezing and staring at the space under the door. She could tell when the other cats were in the hall, no matter how quiet they were. And if the sound of a dog coming down the hall reached her, the growling would start as well.
That cat just doesn’t know how to chill.
Our animal guests, however, were much more relaxed.
Just look at those eyes! What a dream of a dog.
Despite having cats for so many years, we’re actually kinda dog people. We just haven’t been able to have dogs for one reason or another, but somehow managed to have lots of cats.
Getting a dog is definitely one of our plans. Until do finally do, we get to love on other people’s dogs. Like this beautiful beast. Such a gentleman, too!
The cats enthusiastically explored every nook and cranny they could, and disappeared a few times in the process. I think they still remembered us, but it has been long enough that they weren’t quite comfortable enough for cuddles. At least not from us. But we at least got to pet them, eventually.
Sharing some love.
And of course, they got cuddles from their human. They are so hilarious. They just love being held like babies and snuggled close.
They also found the catnip pillows to play with, which was quite hilarious to watch.
Getting photos, however, was a challenge! They hardly ever stayed still long enough. Plus, with a black dog and a black cat, they are notoriously difficult to get photos of.
“Get that thing out of my face, or else!”
They tend to be just black blurs, so I’m happy to have managed a few good shots with my phone camera.
One of the cats, however, knows what’s going on when that phone comes out, and does NOT like getting her photo taken! Not even while getting cuddles.
Can you imagine road tripping across the country with these three? Awesome!
It was a grand visit, all round. I am so glad they were able to stop by and stay the night. Who knows how long it will be before we can see each other again, in person.
The Re-Farmer 