Nice hat, sister. The last of the herd is finally fixed and chipped. No future kittens, no lost souls. If you haven’t microchipped your pets, please consider it for their sake and your sanity. In some places, it’s even becoming mandatory. The managing body varies by country but the Canadian version (run by EIADP) has an easy-to-navigate web … Read More →
Small (Cheap) Beginnings Grow Into Big Yields I wandered past an old post here where I planted a few discount lilacs. I seem to recall them being end-of-season markdowns around $8 each but that memory is fuzzy. You can see above what five years of full sun and good topsoil can do. All of them are easily six feet tall and burst … Read More →
Brother on the left, Sister on the right This is apparently my life for the foreseeable future. Presented here with bonus internal dialogue.
An Attempt From Pillow Peak We’re slowly figuring out how legs work. Day 21 and counting with both nicely above the weight danger zone after what now seems like 4-5 days premature. Here “Bigger Brother” gives it his best shot. Wobble, wobble, wobble. More Spork Here
New arrivals less than 12 hours into their first day. This back story begins with grief and despair but fear not for it has a good deal of hope and joy towards the end. Seems to be a lot of that in this pandemic year. Regular viewers will remember two of my dear sweet girls (cats) from some of my videos. The sisters literally dropped … Read More →
Half Price Dairy Math Below Milk and dairy are some of my most troublesome pantry staples when it comes to maintaining both fresh supply and budget integrity up here in market-price-controlled Canada. Tinned evaporated milk can occasionally take the edge off those needs (and makes for better Mac & Cheese anyway) but sometimes you need the genuine fresh article. Just … Read More →
Clean, Scoopable, & They Smell Good Too If you don’t know any cats, this could be the least interesting thing you watch all week. If you do have little paws in your world, here’s a video followup to my wood pellet discovery that can save you big bucks on your litter budget and how to make a quick DIY “reverse sifter” for … Read More →
Snowballs on a Stick I haven’t had much chance to swing at landscaping efforts out at the farm this year. That gets expensive and I have other more pressing priorities. I’m also still facing weekly flood or drought out there since I don’t yet have a well and am at the mercy of the creek and hand-carried buckets. Back … Read More →
Cat Scooping Serendipity * Here’s the video update of my homemade sifter that shows pellets in action… and it only costs a buck! Some shopping links to less DIY sifters coming soon. We have a lot of trees in Canada. They’re all over the place. Because of that we end up with a lot of tree-based manufacture from … Read More →
Beware Tiny Invisible Bite-y Things While making my Waldorf salad the other day I noticed in reading that three of the four main ingredients regularly pop up on the ‘dirtiest vegetables’ list. I’m not just talking about farm soil and legged pests but the toxic chemicals used to inflate the harvest of many commercial crops. Not being an alarmist on … Read More →
Hide it behind the toaster and tell everyone it's modern art The windstorm left me reading a bit more about homemade antennas. Some real world experimentation has shown that in our particular reception area a different design worked slightly better than the Gray-Hoverman and was easier to build. In other words cheaper and smaller, about the size of an average saute pan. The GH still worked … Read More →
Applesauce Cleanup On Aisle Three The leftovers of a few storms landed on our doorstep this week and sadly, I lost an apple tree in the mayhem. At least it was a roadside specimen that was in a hard to pick location. The ground there along the drainage ditch stays fairly soaked which I suspect softened the soil enough for … Read More →
I might attach decorative spatulas next I haven’t had a subscription service for mass-market television in more than a decade. Some of the cable and satellite bills people pay every month astound me and I laugh quietly to myself when I read that ‘cord cutting’ is all the new rage. Who knew one of the pillars of my hermit lifestyle would … Read More →
Literally translated as Wind & Water - Neither of which you want when shifting the furniture I’m admittedly a person of strange hobbies and habits. Since I can’t yet afford to build the (very) small house of my dreams, one of my favourite outlets is to diagram small space structures and live vicariously on paper. It dawned on me last weekend that in my current living space of ostensibly three rooms … Read More →
At Ease in the Deep Growth Some might question the wisdom of acquiring a twelve year old truck with a few rusty corners and a broken radio. Then again, I’m used to getting strange looks from people so naturally I did just that this week. So long fun little red car. You were a blast but you can’t haul plywood and … Read More →
Desktop Greens Coming Soon With the snow still raging outside, the cost of Canadian food is rising inexplicably and ridiculously compared to the rest of the world. It’s time to take salad matters into my own hands. Herbs too for that matter. Maybe even some micro-greens like radish, mizuna, or amaranth. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I’ve been … Read More →
Fashionably Warm Feet At All Costs The latest snowstorm has knocked out my power, internet, water, and generally comfortable living for the last four days… and counting. Usually it’s a few hours, perhaps overnight, but the nature of the heavy wet snow this time has made repairs particularly troublesome because of all the tree fall. While I applaud the work of … Read More →
The first dig out of the season. Nothing like an hour shovelling to start the day. I always revel in the first snow of the year. Probably a holdover from getting days off school when I was a kid but the truth is I’m really good at getting snowed in. My pantry is deep and my catalogue of books and videos is vast. I’m easily entertained and fed. Of course with … Read More →
Loads of fun in the snow. Can't haul plywood and hay. So I’ve had my little red car for a few years now and love it. I drive barely 5000 kilometres a year but those that I do manage are enjoyable. All wheel drive is handy in the snow and let’s face it, red is the colour to have. About the only drawback to the Juke … Read More →
The final paint job will be better I’ve been struggling with finding a solution to my home building needs. With the recently plummeting Canadian dollar, the timber frame kits previously mentioned I found down in the States have effectively become 25% more costly to Canucks like me in just a few short months. That means I’m back to exploring other methods of … Read More →
"My what soft lips you have", said the Big Bad Wolf Autumn is here and for me that means chapped lip season. You know my consumer outrage when I feel like I’m being ripped off. Case in point, lip balm. I was partial to those tiny jars of the stuff so conveniently kept in a pocket this time of year. I went to stock up at … Read More →
Cluck. Cluck. Mwraaaaw. As promised, a few photos from across the road at North Farthing. Leghorns and Silkys and Toggenburgs, oh my. Meet “Goat”, “Sugar”, “Stewie”, and the flock. Now with video! More Spork Here
A Nickel of Pest Control I love when homemade solutions to a problem work better than the commercial answers, especially when the former is a mere fraction of the cost. Thus was the case when the late summer harvest brought a tiny menace to my doorstep. In August with garden produce in full swing and the heat at its peak, … Read More →
Actual Neighbour Eggs There’s an old saying that goes “you can pick your friends but you can’t pick your family”. Somewhere in between those two extremes are neighbours. Certainly you can select your neighbourhood carefully but it’s never a sure bet on what might move in next door. I can barely fathom how people co-exist in high rise … Read More →
