So last night was cold, the temperature dropped down to a bit lower than 19C (2,2F). The sky was clear so there was nothing stopping what was left of the heat from going straight out to space. Tonight will be even colder they say and it is already -16.4C (2,48F). The weather sites says it’s only -13C (8,6F) at the moment and won’t fall that much more 🙂 🙂 🙂
We did go out for a morning walk when it was slightly less cold but the dogs changed their minds after a while. Malkolm refused to walk where there was less snow for some reason so his paws got really cold and I did warm them up but that did only help for a short while. Thankfully my neighbours had to buy food so they helped me with a few things because I had no wish what so ever to be out driving when it was that cold 🙂 🙂 🙂
They say that it will be much warmer the coming week and even above 0C (32F) from Wednesday and for the rest of the week but since they can’t get what temperature we have now right why would I believe them about what might happen later in the week 🙂 🙂 🙂
So it has been a lot of tea drinking most of the day, so I have already had that last cup because what goes in must come out 🙂 and so far not all has come out 🙂 I think I’ll make myself some warm sandwiches and try to stay close to the radiators for the rest of the day 🙂 🙂 I truly hate winter!
No big difference today compared to yesterday but it didn’t snow for once. It will start to snow again tonight but after that the two big weather sites once again have different opinions. Yesterday it was the Norwegian site that said nasty cold during the winter and the Swedish just bitter cold, today it’s the opposite and according to the Swedish site we’ll have snow falling for two days while the Norwegian says one.
Yesterday evening I thought it would be very cold here because my brother living on an island by the sea had it much colder than here and so was a friend living by our biggest lake, Vänern. That never happened here, it was just the normal cold temperature so I feel like that was a sort of win for us here because it’s always much colder here during winter. We get it back when summer comes though because it’s always a couple degrees warmer here. An old garden enthusiast said it’s because of the big bog, it is so big that it makes its own miso climate. Big lakes and oceans evens out the temperatures while big bogs like this one do the opposite and so far I’ve never been able to prove him wrong 🙂
No mice in the box trap this morning but later in the day when I had let the monster down there, she sits outside and looks at me until I open the door so that she can walk down, I heard a rumble that can’t be anything else than she chasing a mouse. I haven’t checked if I can find any victim but she usually eat up her victims so I’m not sure I would even find any signs of it.
I had to pick up a parcel in Gudhem today. I have a couple on the way and all have different delivery companies so I was a bit unsure what it was I was going to pick up 🙂 Today it was all the stories that the Grimm brothers had collected. All these stories comes from different origins and to get one story, like Cinderella, they had to combine several local stories to one. Some of those local stories were so bad, even for that time, that the brothers actually had to censor them 🙂 🙂 It’ll be interesting to see if they are anything different to what I read when I was growing up because those stories shouldn’t be read to children (but they were because I grew up in the stone ages 🙂 🙂 🙂 ) and if they were censored I can’t imagine how bad the original stories were 🙂 🙂 🙂
It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and I think I’ll start reading those stories when I have that tea ready 🙂
Hunters were out in the forest this morning because it didn’t snow, they wouldn’t have if it had snowed they said 🙂 So I drove to the supermarket while they were out there. I actually woke up pretty late today, at least the last time 🙂 The dogs needed top go outside just before four am and afterwards we went back to bed for a while 🙂 I woke up well after eight am 🙂
The smaller roads were no fun to drive on but the big one to Skara was pretty good actually. The reason I drove today was because of snow warnings the coming days. Now when I look at the biggest weather sites they really can’t agree. The big Swedish one says snow and the same temperature as today (around -6C (21,2F) but the Norwegian one, the one I trust the most, says no snow but bitterly cold. I don’t want it even colder but then again I don’t want more snow either 🙂
Wild hogs had been working on the forest road before the hunters arrived 🙂
I used a big brush when I went out to remove all the snow in front and on the car. It was so fluffy that it only took a few minutes but the snow on the car had melted to a thick ice sheet.It was more or less impossible to remove that on the car roof but the ice on the windows was sort of fragile so I didn’t even have cold fingers when I was done 🙂
I’m so glad that our hunters are a bit lazy because instead of walking to where they are supposed to be they take their cars. To be honest I can understand them because it is so hard to walk on this fluffy and dry snow because nothing can get a good grip while walking in it. Anyway that helped me a lot when we finally could have a walk because the cars are so heavy that I could walk in the car tracks and actually get a grip. Only when walking on the road of course but still. I walked in their foot steps in the forest and that didn’t help at all 🙂 🙂 🙂
There were lots of tracks from mostly wild hogs and roe deer and the occasional fox as well but this weather make the animals stay where they are. I guess it’s just nice to get out and get fresh air and saying they’ll hunt is just a good excuse to get out of their homes 🙂 Well it is time for that last cup of tea for the day but I think I’ll instead have a last cup of coffee. Waking up so late as I did today sort of mess up my day, I don’t have a headache as I usually get when that happens but my brain is sort of a few seconds behind if You understand what I mean 🙂
So it is the last day of the year and it did at least end with beautiful weather but a bit too chilly for my taste. It was cloudy when we went out on our morning walk but as soon as we reached the cottage again the sun showed and continued to shine for most of the day. The sky is still clear and it is already much colder than they were guessing it would be.
The new year will not start as beautiful though, soon the temperature will rise, even above 0C (32F) and snow will start to fall and it will continue to fall for at least two more days. This time the snow will stay for a while because it doesn’t look like any warmer winds will reach us for the coming ten days. Also no sunshine either so I can’t say I like it at all 🙂 🙂
I usually try to plan my shopping for either Fridays or Saturdays if possible but they have put out a warning about extreme slipperiness tomorrow plus all the snow they’re guessing will fall but I didn’t realise that before I had put the ribs in the oven. I hate standing in line in stores so I let the ribs be almost done, shut the oven off, left the ribs in the oven and drove to the supermarket before too many people with panic because they’d missed some ingredients for the food tonight arrived or needed something to give to the host of the evenings party and I was lucky 🙂 🙂 They started to arrive when I was on my way out of the store 🙂 The ribs were perfect when I came home 🙂
No fireworks around here tonight, not a good idea to have when we have a big field filled with bulls in the middle of the village 🙂 🙂 🙂 I will be able to hear the fireworks from the towns around us, Like Skara and Falköping and perhaps some from the village Gum. It sounds like muffled thumps but I’ll most likely be asleep anyway so I won’t even hear that 🙂
It is time for that last cup of tea and I’ll most likely read something because tv isn’t what it used to be 🙂 🙂
I wish You all a good ending of this year and a good new year!
I’ve slept bad for a few days now and the closer I came to today the worse it got. I haven’t had especially many hours of sleep to be honest and the reason? The annual vehicle inspection 🙂 🙂 🙂 It doesn’t matter how new my car has been and also knowing there’s absolutely no wrong with it, I still have a slight panic when it comes closer 🙂 🙂
These are taken through my kitchen window so they are a bit blurry.
I had the appointment at 7 am today and my first thought when I woke up was, why didn’t I take one later in the day 🙂 🙂 🙂 Don’t get me wrong, I really think we do need this since I want my car and the ones with me in the traffic as good as possible but I just can’t stand it 🙂 🙂 🙂 I knew it wouldn’t pass this year because there’s a clonk sound when I drive over bumps or potholes, I didn’t know why though. Turns out the spring to the front right tire had broken. At the bottom and just a little so it is still safe to drive it. I was also tole that the Lamda value, something to do with the exhaust fumes) was a bit too high. 1,03 is ok but my car had 1,05. My car had that problem last year as well but and it takes a few minutes to fix so no bigger deal.
They build “tipis” several years ago and it looks like they still use them, It’s for the grandkids to the forest owner.
So now it’s over for this time and I know I’ll sleep like a baby tonight 🙂 🙂 Well below 0C (32F) this morning but there was no ice on the car! I had it on the inside instead 🙂 The humidity here is almost always high so it creeps in to the car and when one doesn’t drive every day it builds up inside and I’ll have to dry it off as soon as the motor works and heats up the ice. I drive perhaps once a week now so I’ve just accepted it 🙂 The weeks before when I drove to pick up parcels however I had no such problems at all.
The horrible wind we had yesterday was even more so today, not even the forest managed to keep it away. So I’m now for the first time this winter wearing my winter jacket. The wind will calm down towards Friday but instead we’ll get snow!!! I had hoped we had seen the last of that white garbage this winter 🙂 I know it was stupid because if we’re unlucky winter can continue here until early May but it was a long time ago that happened.
If I had known if we would have an early spring this coming year I would have started the sowing now. Some I think I need to sow now, perennials, bushes and trees that needs a period with cold temperatures to be able to germinate. I also have some things that needs a long growth period before they start to flower, like tomatoes for instance, but it is way too early to sow them now, too warm indoors and too little daylight so they grow slow enough. Not even having a greenhouse now will help a lot with that.
There’s a newly dug hole in the old tree stump, I wonder what animal lives there. Could be a water vole, Ratty in the Wind in the willows are a water vole, I only see them as big aggressive monsters 🙂 🙂
It is time for that last cup of tea for the day. I baked two loafs of bread earlier today. I’ve already had a couple of slices but one can never have too many when they are absolutely fresh 🙂 I haven’t caught a mouse in two days now. I know there’s at least one still here, I could hear it earlier today. I hope they haven’t learned that they’ll get caught in the box trap 🙂 🙂 The monsterkitten has been down in the cool cellar so I’m pretty sure she’s after it and hopefully successful in taking it.
Sunny and cold weather is back again. I do like the sunshine of course but the cold temperatures could stay away. Well at least we can see all the stars at night when the sky is clear and we do see a lot of stars here. I would be able to see even more if I went out to the bog where there’s very little light pollution but being lost when walking at a huge bog when it is cold isn’t that funny 🙂 🙂 🙂 plus the risk of walking in to wild hogs or moose is a bit too big I think 🙂
The wind blew like crazy yesterday but like so often it didn’t reach the garden and we were quite protected in the forest when being out walking. They weren’t that lucky in the northern parts of this country where , from what they say on the news, three people died, lots of trees fell and even some roofs blew away. Norway was hit even worse but I don’t know how much damage happened there. Our storms are usually much more worse when our winters are warm so I guess we should be happy about it getting a bit colder again 🙂
Nothing much has happened here but I’ve had my old Peugeot standing outside my neighbours garage, it was supposed to be a spare part car for the Peugeot they already have. Well he didn’t take much but instead started to wonder about fixing it instead because the huge Volvo they have drinks petrol like an alcoholic on a bad day so today we wrote the papers so that he now is the owner of it 🙂 One less thing costing money that I don’t have to think about 🙂
Lately some scientists have warned about the Gulf Stream will get weaker and that it would mean the climate up here in Scandinavia would change towards the extreme during winters. Well it turns out that it isn’t happening. They’ve studied the force of it for thirty years now and if anything is happening it’s the opposite. The melting ice from the northern parts of Greenland seems to drop earlier and therefore instead strengthening it. Reporters from Swedish Television made a visit to those studying the Gulf Stream and they said that they haven’t noticed any weakness of the stream and since I do truly dislike winter I really enjoyed hearing that 🙂 🙂 🙂
I have the last cup of tea for the day right beside me. It would be nice to have a cookie or something with it so I might make myself a mug cake after this. I have lots of fresh ginger so I might have some in it. I was quite old when I first tried fresh ginger and was really surprised over how different it tastes. I don’t have any citrus fruit otherwise I would have put some of that in it.
We woke up to a foggy world and the weather reports said fog all day long. I knew the hunters wanted to hunt for hare today but guessed since it was so foggy that they wouldn’t. It is really difficult to cook hare so it actually is edible so to sit in fog not being able to see what they hunt would be a waste of time and also if they would shoot anything it could just as well be their hunting dog. It happens way too often and beside traffic it is actually hunters that are responsible for killing more dogs than any wildlife would do.
Still they came for some reason and stayed for much longer than normal so I was quite annoyed the whole time 🙂 🙂 They sort of destroyed our morning just by coming here and make us have to stay at home. Yes I could go out but why risk ones life for not being able to take a walk in the early morning 🙂 🙂 🙂 They did however leave before the sun set so we did manage to have a walk anyway. For a couple of times it even looked like the sun would make an appearance anyway, it was close but never happened.
I sat in front of the tv watching Tangled and suddenly remembered that when I was a child we had all those storied the Grim brothers had written down (and H.C. Andersens stories as well) I read them so often that they in the end fell apart. So I went online and now a book with all stories written down by the Grim brothers is on its way home to me 🙂 Those stories usually don’t have the happy endings Disney show us and it’s the same with H.C. Andersens books, the little mermaid has a horrible ending but I guess it wouldn’t be a great thing to show in a children’s story now days 🙂 🙂 🙂 I really need to find Andersens stories too 🙂
I’ve had lots of christmas leftovers today and still managed to squeeze down lots of rice porridge 🙂 I’ll have the rest of the porridge as breakfast tomorrow. Now however I’ll have that last cup of tea for the day and later on watch On the Tracks on tv. They say we’ll have fog in the morning tomorrow but most of the day will be sunny and warmish 🙂 By the way! Do You remember that I told You about finding two kernels/ seeds in the Kaki fruits (the Asian relative to the Persimmon fruit)? I put them in plastic bags in damp paper and then in to the fridge. Both have managed to germinate! So now I’ve planted them in pots and placed them by the kitchen windows 🙂
So the important parts of Christmas, or Jul as we call it, is over. I’ve baked gingerbread and failed something spectacular 🙂 🙂 🙂 It’s like eating hard bread and at first they don’t taste much but after a while the mouth is burning, I think there’s just to much ginger in them 🙂 🙂 Still they go down with lots of cold milk 🙂 After that I grilled the ham and had the first slices on a couple of vörtbröd sandwiches 🙂
After that I went out with the catch of the night and guess who had returned for a fourth time? Yes the mouse with the short tail. This time however it was in a bad shape and it didn’t make the trip to where I now let them out again. I guess it takes just too much energy for a small yellow-necked mouse to do those long trips, especially in snow and cold weather. I went back for the dogs so we could have our morning walk.
More snow had fallen during the night and it continued to do so until at least noon. Small tiny flakes so it didn’t add that much to be honest, just enough to cover our tracks from yesterday. Snowy days makes the world very quiet, especially since no one was out driving tractors or cars. We did hear a few birds tweeting and a couple of ravens as well. So when one suddenly hear three big moose running in the forest it will be a bit stressing 🙂 🙂 🙂 The best thing is just to stop and hope they don’t run over you 🙂 🙂 We didn’t see them this time but running moose in a dense forest do make a lot of sound 🙂 🙂
I had a christmas lunch around 1 pm ad it feels like I won’t have to eat anything more this week 🙂 🙂 I didn’t think it was that much but christmas food is anything but light 🙂 I napped in my recliner for a while before Donald Duck and his friends celebrates Christmas (The Wonderful World of Disney). We’ve seen this hour long program at 3 pm every year since 1960 and we know most of it by heart now. It is actually one of the most popular reprograms we have here in Sweden and even though they sometimes makes changes in it we don’t care, not as long as they don’t touch Ferdinand the Bull. Last time they tried to do that and show the ugly duckling instead the complaints were so many that they showed him after the original program and is back again since then 🙂 We Swedes can tolerate a lot but not that 🙂 🙂 🙂
I’ve had a few of my gingerbreads with lots and lots of cold milk and now I’ll skip the tv and read some book instead and I doubt I’ll have anything more to eat. I will however have that last cup of tea but that’s it.
They said the chance/ risk, depending on how one look at it, that we in southern Sweden would get a white christmas was slim to none, so I wasn’t especially surprised when I let the dogs out this morning that we had snow on the ground 🙂 🙂 🙂 Also it continued to snow for quite some time and the temperature has dropped so we will have a white Christmas here this year.
I had a parcel waiting for me at the grocery store in Gudhem so I decided that it was best to pick it up before we went out on our morning walk. I had ordered an aquarium book from 1942 so that I would have something to read this christmas plus the fact it is so old that I would be able to read about cold water fish people since long has forgotten about 🙂 I had hoped to find shredded coconut as well because I had forgotten to buy some when I went to the store yesterday. There’s nothing mice seems to like more than shredded coconut. Unfortunately they didn’t have any but it did remind me of potatoes when I saw the last two bags they had 🙂
A sort of a second flowering 🙂It is actually quite hard to see these huge animals as long as they stand totally still.
This morning the box had trapped three mice! This time a definitely recognised one of them. Some time in its life it had lost a part of its tail so it was easily recognisable. I went out with them before I drove to the store. We went out on our morning walk as soon as I came home and walked much the same way as when I released the mice. We passed the last little field before entering the forest and something caught my attention. I didn’t see them at first but then I saw them, three moose! One big cow, one calf and the third too small to be an adult moose but still too big to be a calf. I’ve seen them before a couple of times and felt happy that they’ve survived the hunting season so far.
The dogs didn’t see them but they understood they were somewhere near 🙂 I must say that Alma has come a long way, just a few months earlier and she would have gone berserk 🙂 🙂 For once she actually started to follow the scents on the ground instead of screaming like obsessed and whining like she has gone crazy 🙂 🙂 We didn’t see any more big animals but both Alma and Malkolm kept their noses to the ground for the entire walk 🙂
I have actually been rather active today because when we came home again the first thing I saw when I went down in the cool cellar was that the trap had another prisoner. Well if that mouse with the short tail come here again I just as well get a cage and have it as a pet 🙂 🙂 🙂 It wasn’t the least stressed to see me, rather the opposite to be honest 🙂 🙂 It had taken it slightly more than two hours to find its way home again 🙂 🙂 🙂 So I just took the trap and walked even further away before I released it again 🙂 🙂 🙂 I was worried for a while that I for some reason had all forest mice and yellow necked mice in the entire area but I think I’ve just caught the same ones all the time 🙂 🙂 🙂
After that I made the gingerbread dough. The recipe said that I should have agave syrup and coconut fat but since I’m not a millionaire I used normal syrup and butter. The dough will rest until tomorrow morning before I make the cookies. I will however not be without anything nice to eat today because my neighbours daughters (six and three years old I think) wanted me to have something as a christmas gift, so they made me some fudge and butterscotch to have during christmas, well it won’t last that long because it was delicious 🙂
After that I baked two loafs of Vörtbröd, they came out rather nice, I and the dogs have already tried a couple of slices with a christmas cheese 🙂 So tomorrow I’ll bake the gingerbreads and also grill the christmas ham. I bought a small already cooked one because now days we really don’t use the water it was cooked in as they did back in the days when every calorie one could get was important. They used to heat it up and dip stale bread in it the get up all the fat still in the rather salty water. It has never been a favourite of mine so I buy ready cooked instead.
It is time to have that last cup of tea for the day and of course some of the christmas candy my neighbours gave me 🙂 Tomorrow is our big day of christmas and if I get some time over I’ll write something here 🙂
I haven’t caught any mouse in over a day and a half now 🙂 I won’t say hooray yet because since I do have a sort of semi wild garden there’s most likely more just waiting to come in 🙂
I was lucky to get a photo of our smallest bird, the Goldcrest. It rarely sit still for more than a second 🙂
We couldn’t have our morning walk today because the hunters came, I doubt that they had any luck though. So I was even late with getting the sod far last mouse out of the cottage. It didn’t suffer because I put in plenty of food before it was caught 🙂 So cross Your fingers and hold Your thumbs for good luck so none of the rest out there decides to move in 🙂 I guess it’s useless to hope but anyway 🙂
Dark and murky all day long, ok the day isn’t that long anyway 🙂 Only less than 23 hours left before it oh so slowly turns towards longer days again. In the beginning the sun will rise slightly later though and at the same time set later as well but in a few days even the mornings will turn again. No one will notice much for quite some time though but just knowing make life better 🙂 🙂
It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and I’ll have my vitamin D at the same time. I do still get a lot of vitamin D anyway since I can be outside in the daylight despite not having any sun but that’s not really enough anyway.
Dark and grey again even though we almost could see the sun for a few seconds in the afternoon 🙂 We were supposed to have rain but it missed us. Perhaps a good thing because there’s so much water in the creek now that if we would get lots more it would overflow.
I could see a few ravens in the sky but no other bigger animals, they tend to stay where it is calm and today was nothing but. We did however see a big forest machine in the distance and the sound from it stressed Alma so much, she really doesn’t like strange sounds or any change what so ever. We managed to have a walk without her freaking out too much anyway 🙂
I realised how old I am now when I was on Reddit and looked at their different forums about aquariums. Back in the days when I was a kid I learned one way to have and keep an aquarium healthy and have never really changed my ways as it has worked well. Today having an aquarium is high tech! They fertilise the plants, use CO2 as well and they even use soil and having soil in aquariums was something they always said was a big no no.
They also test for the, for me, most odd things like ammonium. Can’t remember that I ever had a problem with that, must smell horribly if that happens 🙂 🙂 I don’t however think necessarily were better back then but it sure was less complicated and less expensive 🙂 🙂 Anyway when I looked at those forums I started to remember all the old books I read until they broke and realised I don’t have any left and started to look on the net. So now I have two of those books I read and a third is on its way. These are of course old school because I’ll never start with any of that they do now days 🙂 🙂 The book that’s on its way is printed in 1938 so it’ll be interesting to see how things have changed since then 🙂
It is time for that last cup of tea for the day. There’s absolutely nothing I want to watch on tv so I guess I’ll be reading those two books all evening long 🙂
So I had another little mouse in the box trap this morning, I do hope that’s the last one for this season 🙂 But just in case more will visit I’ve now bought a small travel cage for hamsters on our eBay called Tradera. So if they’ll get caught while it still is dark outside and to be honest it seems to be dark all the time now, I can put it in there until the daylight returns. I guess it’s best to give them some peanuts during the time they’ll be in the arrest 🙂
Today it was so dark that I had to put the camera on ISO 5000 and the photos still came out rather dark, so most of them are being brightened up. The colours did look a bit odd so I changed it to black and white as well (any coloured photo I might put in was taken yesterday). To make it even funnier it has rained all day.
At the beginning just drizzle but after a while we had heavy rain instead plus a small storm was passing by. Didn’t notice much of it here in the garden though, the neighbours cottage and garage plus the forest took all of it instead 🙂 That wind did bring warmth with them so we might even reach 10C (50F) on Wednesday.
It is time for that last cup of tea for the day. I have a slight fever and a slightly sour throat now, Don’t know how I got it since I barely leave my home. I noticed my neighbours were at home as well today so I guess they have it too. It doesn’t feel like an influenza thankfully t I’ll drive to the supermarket tomorrow morning and buy some ice cream and rose-hip soup 🙂
The Cottage by the crane lake. 