Last night, this happened:
FINALLY an adoption! Now, if Dennis, Livia, Tricki, Angelo and Orlando would just GO, I’d be happy!
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Sights from around Crooked Acres.
The bunny Stefan brought inside last week. I only knew he had it because Corbie was circling him, and Stefan was growling at him – and Stefan NEVER growls. Bunny was unhurt, and hopped off into the horse field the next property over, hopefully to join his sibling from a few weeks ago.
Hydrangeas are blooming!
There’s this one Clematis plant in one of the front flower beds that comes back every year. I’ve pulled it up repeatedly, but it still keeps coming back, climbs the Hydrangea, and waves a big “HI HOW YA DOIN'” in the early part of summer. This year I’ve decided that I’m going to just give up. Whatever floats your boat, little Clematis!
We’ve been eating so much salad these past few weeks that I had Fred make me another small raised bed so I could plant more lettuce – Jericho Romaine – in it. (Yes, I know it needs to be thinned.) I HIGHLY recommend this lettuce – it does really well in the heat, and if you put up something to protect it during the hottest part of the day, you can keep eating it for most of the summer. We’ve been eating purslane on our salads, and late last week I picked our first zucchini, chopped it up, and tossed it in the salad. SO good. I live in hope that some day it will stop raining and the garden will have a chance to grow, and we’ll get tomatoes and cucumbers for our salads.
That’s a chocolate mint plant, which is growing in an old sink, near the raised bed pictured above. I thought planting in the old sink was a good idea, but it’s not draining very well (it’s sitting directly on the ground), so I’m going to need to transplant the mint plant before it drowns.
This is the garden as of Saturday. After I took this picture, it rained. And it rained and rained and rained. Monday I tried to go into the garden to look for another zucchini, and I made it three steps before I sunk in up past my ankles. I didn’t think I was going to make it out again! I’m not confident that our garden is going to bounce back from all this rain; we’re talking seriously about doing raised beds next year.
First row on the right: cantaloupe and watermelon. Second row and third rows: corn, with a few okra plants at the end of the corn rows. Next to the corn, growing up the fence: pole beans.
Far right: pole beans. Straight ahead: squash and zucchini (there’s more squash at the other end of the green bean row). To the left: tomatoes.
Straight ahead: tomatoes. To the left: cucumbers, growing up the fence. Past the cucumbers are peppers (jalapenos, habaneros, mini bells), and eggplant.
Itty bitty jalapenos.
Teeny weeny Sungold tomatoes. I’m hoping this rain doesn’t kill the tomato plants (any of the plants, really, but especially the tomato plants) because I’ve been waiting FOREVER for tomatoes.
Little straight-neck squash.
Cantaloupe and watermelon, growing on the same mound.
(Those are feed bags surrounding the cantaloupe and watermelons; there are also bags around the squash and tomatoes, and some of the peppers. Fred saves the chicken feed bags all year long, and then I cut the ends off, cut them up the middle, and anchor them around the plants with landscape staples. The bags do a decent job of holding down the weeds.)
Part of the flooding. Pretty much the entire property looks like this now – where there aren’t puddles, the ground is so saturated that it squishes as you walk on it. I am having some serious hatred for Mother Nature right now. I’ve (mostly jokingly) told Fred we should sell and move back to the ‘burbs.
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Dennis is so good with the little ones, but sometimes he feels the need to give them this look.
“I ain’t foolin’ with you, boys. I’d hate to have to HURT YOU, but if you don’t leave my tail alone, there’s gonna be some serious hurtin’ goin’ on.”
::GLARE::
This picture KILLS. ME. DEAD. That little open-mouthed hooligan (that’s Gilbert) and Dennis’s resigned look are just perfect.
“This is YOUR FAULT, lady.”
He thinks I don’t notice when he’s sweet to the babies, and I try not to make a fuss. But when he licks them on their little heads and they do the slow-blink Eyes of Lurve, I have to squeal a little bit.
Dennis looks SO MUCH like Kara here. If you showed me this picture and told me that was Kara, I’d believe you except for the part where Kara would never let that many kittens get so close to her without hissing and running off.
Dennis is a little disgusted by the way those kittens nurse on that blanket. But they love it SO MUCH that I don’t have the heart to take it away completely. They only have access to it at nap time, otherwise I put it away.
“You guys are GROSS!” The wee brown tabby to the left is Mooch, the buff tabby in the middle is Grant, then on the upper right is Gilbert, next to him is Marshall, and the little antisocial kitten at the bottom of the picture is Blaster.
Twinsies! I love how we have two brown tabbies, two buff tabbies, and two orange and white tabbies upstairs now. Three matching sets!
Grant is all ::GRAB:: with Dennis’s foot.
Then Marshall wandered along, and Dennis grabbed him. Please note that he’s got both front arms wrapped around Marshall, he’s bunny kicking him with the back legs, and is also making sure that Marshall is clean, and Marshall is all “Ho hum.”
::SQUEEEEEE::
Cleaning Grant.
“You taste funny, kid.”
SO sweet.
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Old Man Suggie and his toes.
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Previously
2013: Paws up, y’all!
2012: “Wahhhhhhhh! I am STARVIN’!!!!”
2011: No entry.
2010: So, meet Lieu.
2009: No entry.
2008: I love the Paw o’ Doom. It cracks me up.
2007: “All full up on the petting for now, thanks.”
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.