Category: Cloudy.

Insurance companies aren’t there because they love to help, they are there for the money and nothing else.

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No it didn’t look like this her this morning but it’s the test photo and it looks so much better than what it did in the real 🙂

Sunshine in the early morning and lots of wind so almost no insects around to annoy us 🙂 Nova have had a really good day again, healthy appetite and lots of energy so we walked down to the creek and followed it down-streams. She walked unleashed so sometimes she was far behind us and sometimes the opposite 🙂

   

There are three fields with buckwheat, first time I’ve ever seen buckwheat like this.

No Red deer today but perhaps wolves was close, hard to say when the wind is strong and carries smells quick and far away. Alma kept on looking around us all the way down to the creek but after that nothing like that at all. The only animal we met (excluding birds who flew high above us was the Fox we meat quite often and I think it is the same fox we can see sometimes in the cow pasture outside the cottage.

     

It rained some just before we came home and the weather has been mixed with some showers, lots of clouds but also lots of sunshine. Always a bit tricky to be outside when the weather changes so often and quickly 🙂 So we’ve only been outside for short moments and since Alma is in heat I really don’t want her to be outside if I’m not there 🙂 Thankfully still no signs that Malkolm has any interest in her in that way. I really should have neutered her long time ago but I need to take a week off from work so I’m with her while she is healing. After that it’ll be Malkolms turn.

Lingonberry.
The first Hedgehog mushrooms, they are just as delicious as chanterelles.

 

Like always I let Malkolm off the leash the last part of our walk and he is really good in coming when I call him 🙂 Unfortunately I had to leash him because of a cat from the farm up the slope. I really don’t want him to chase it and get hurt by that cat, they are all semi wild and know how to defend themselves so Malkolm wouldn’t know what hit him and I really don’t want to go to the vet during a weekend, emergency vets costs a fortune even if they really don’t need to do anything because it’s a false alarm 🙂 🙂 🙂

   

The fox sat there and just looked at us 🙂

Almost all animal hospitals here in Sweden have been taken over by venture capitalists so costs has sky rocketed and since the insurance companies get their money anyway they don’t complain. It is actually cheaper for us to travel a week to Spain for a week and get the procedure done than to do it here. People complain of course but since the insurance companies walk hand in hand with the venture capitalists nothing happens. Just remember that insurance companies aren’t there because they love to help, they are there to make lots of money and really doesn’t care about anything else. That’s why I have put aside money for my dogs so I don’t have to deal with insurance companies that always find ways to not have to pay anyway.

     

It is time for something to eat and perhaps a last cup of tea for the day 🙂

Have a great day!

The first autumn colors. This maple always starts in the middle and sometime those leafs fall off before the rest of the tree get yellow leafs 🙂
I walked up to my mailbox and said hello to this pig 🙂
A Kestrel.
The church in Vilske-kleva.

An unusual sight.

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WE were lucky to have sunshine this morning and I could see morning mist in the village when looking out the window. I knew we wouldn’t get out in time to catch it with the camera so I took a couple of photos from my window. It was so chilly outside so I could see my breath when breathing 🙂 🙂

                  

It was much warmer just a few minutes later when the sun started to heat up the air. Nova has had a really good day today, so we walked down to the creek and followed it up-stream for a while. I didn’t spray the anti tick spray on any of us otherwise we would have walked down-stream instead. I saw an owl flying away from us, a rather big one but I know very little about owls so I have no idea what kind it was. But we met some other animals that I did catch with the camera, Red deer. For You Americans they are as big as the Elk/ Wapiti.

I rarely see Red deer here, sometimes a couple of does but today I also saw a youngling and a bull, a very young one because the antlers are really small.

   

They are usually really shy here but today they were in no rush at all even though they knew we were there, Alma made it impossible not to know where we were 🙂 🙂 🙂 I thought that we also would meet wild hogs, due to how Alma behaved but I guess they weren’t that interested in meeting us 🙂 No flies while we were walking but the mosquitoes were quite active. It must be other species flying around this time because suddenly those bites itch again. Yesterday my feet itched so badly that I had to use a cortisol ointment 🙂 🙂

Looks quite good with the pink flowers and silvery leafs but the silvery colors is unfortunately mildew, we have unusually much of that this year.

   

It didn’t take that long after our walk that the rain arrived, heavy showers and a strong wind so the dogs refused to go outside unless they really needed to 🙂 So now the dogs are quite restless and I can see in their eyes that they accuse me of the rainy weather and oddly enough it isn’t better if I open the other door 🙂 Less rain tomorrow they’re guessing but Sunday will be nice they say. I’ll believe it if it happens 🙂

     

Nothing on tv tonight. Back in the days when I was young Fridays were the big family tv day in the weeks. Families gathered in front of the tv to watch something fun for all. These days they seems to have given up totally since so many stream programs and can see anything any time. I don’t stream anything and only have the free channels and now during summer they all show reruns that we already have seen loads of times 🙂 🙂 We have one channel called the Knowledge channel, my favorite channel that shows science programs but even that channel only show reruns now.

     

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and perhaps have some more of that cortisol ointment all over my feet 🙂 🙂

   

Have a great day!

A rainy day with lots of Ice cream :-)

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Today we haven’t done much at all. The rain they first said would come but later that it wouldn’t actually did come 🙂 🙂 🙂 So it has rained from early morning till early afternoon. When the sun finally did show itself the humidity made the world feel like a steam bath. It wasn’t until we had some wind that it actually became quite nice outside. The ice cream lorry came yesterday so I have been eating way too much ice cream 🙂

I wish I could say it was fog in the distance but it was a shower passing by.

I’ve topped the tomato plants now and also removed most of the leafs, now I want the plant to concentrate its energy towards ripen the tomatoes.

So we have stayed indoors most of the day but has been in the garden some when the wind arrived. Malkolm jumped over to the neighbors and if they don’t mind it I won’t either but they do need to be at home 🙂 I don’t want him to become an adventurer taking long trips all over the place 🙂 I once had a dog who did that and I didn’t have a clue 🙂 🙂 I thought he walked down to the neighbors horses and spend time with them, he loved everything in this world but especially those horses.

The Himalayan cypress still look really good.

The Morning glories are finally showing more flowers. This one does at least grow up the fence, most of the other finds the grass much better 🙂

The Aronia is full of berries, I really don’t like them but the birds do. I’ll cut down the Aronia to ankle height as soon as the berries are gone.

Turns out that he visited the entire village 🙂 🙂 🙂 I learned that when he was no longer here. I passed villagers that asked where he was and it was so sad that he no longer lived because he was the most wonderful dog they had met and even people who didn’t even live here but were friends with villagers came and told me how sad it was. Turns out that he every now and again took long walks in the village and since I was the only one having dogs here in the village at that time everyone understood that he just was very social and made sure he wouldn’t leave the village 🙂 🙂 🙂

   

My Aaron’s rod is really high now, above three meters anyway.

His brother Hector did also take small tours but towards the forest, he wasn’t especially social at all even though he liked people too so instead of visiting the neighbors he had a Fox friend 🙂 🙂 🙂 We met the fox when he was rather young and for some reason he and Hector stayed to play with each other (Hector was a youngster as well). The fox never came especially close to me but Hector and his brother were never leashed so Hector ran out to him in the fields when we met.  I’m pretty sure that if Malkolm would have his own small walks he would be very much like Orvar, Hectors brother.

     

To be honest I think Hector was autistic, he didn’t like to be patted, wasn’t especially cuddly and never understood how to play with other dogs, The only thing he liked was to stand on the stirs to the upper floor and then he expected me to have my head towards his, nose to nose, and then we would stand like that until he thought it was enough 🙂 🙂 If I wanted to leave earlier he just kept on standing there until I came back and did it all over again 🙂 🙂 His mother wanted to kill him as a newborn puppy. Good thing she was listening to me all the time but she wan’t happy about me not letting her do that. Instead she was mean, every time anything bad happened to her she ran and bit Hector, even if everyone around could see that it was Ovar’s fault.

     

Well that was a long time ago now but I do miss those two a lot 🙂 It is time for a last cup of tea for the day and perhaps more ice cream 🙂

 

Malkolm is now slightly higher than Nova.

Have a great day!

The rebellious stage has begun.

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Mostly cloudy today but really nice. Just warm enough and no wind. The no wind did make the flies too happy but only while we were walking in the forest, here at home they mostly kept away. So I could walk around watering the plants that need extra attention without going crazy 🙂

     

Today I scolded Malkolm for the first time, three times actually 🙂 🙂 He has now gotten the idea to pull out my potted plants and then start to chew on them. He’s getting his real teeth now so I guess it itches something awful in his mouth right now. I caught him in action so I thought that it would stop after the first time but oh no, he tried again 🙂 He really look miserable after scolding him and refused to go inside after the first time, no such behavior the other times though, he almost looked proud instead 🙂 🙂 I think the time of rebellion has started 🙂 🙂

     

Otherwise I’ve mostly listened to the radio and the Olympics and I’ve also napped so I’ve only missed to nap twice during my vacation, always feel nice when I can keep a promise to myself to almost 100% 🙂 🙂 They warned about showers passing by but so far nothing has fallen here. They’re guessing that we will get rain tomorrow as well but the amount and when keeps changing all the time. I won’t mind if it will rain the entire day, sort of fitting since I’ll go back to work on Monday 🙂 🙂

Nova has had a bad day today. The walk was tough for her so I let her off the leash so that she could walk in her own pace. I haven’t noticed any signs of wolves in the area so I’ll do the same tomorrow.

   

My cold has come back, yay. I don’t have any fever but my throat is sour and my nose is runny. Summer colds are the best 🙂 🙂 They stay long and close as an old friend 🙂 🙂 So now I’ll have a cup of tea with lots of ginger in it and hope that will stop the cold from going worse.

These are the Guava seedlings, they haven’t grown much in the cold weather we’ve had but look really healthy.
Here are the Apricots, I have one more but I test planted it amongst the Siberian nepeta. It doesn’t look happy because the nepeta is too invasive.
My two peach seedlings. The one to the right was the first tree Malkolm decided to chew on 🙂
My strawberry plants are thriving now, I’ll get plenty of strawberries if the warm weather continues for a while.

Have a great day!

I’ve found two small squashes beneath the leafs, perfect size to have in the dinner.

He doesn’t look too guilty after chewing on my plants 🙂 🙂
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Through my kitchen window early this morning.

We didn’t get a morning with cool air and morning mist, instead we had fairly warm morning with a thick layer of clouds above us. So instead of having a really nice and cool walk we had a walk in the forest where flies and mosquitoes reigned.  Still we’ve had worse walks so I’m not complaining too much 🙂

One of the cats living at the farm next door.

   

I think there was just one horsefly flying around and it found my hand so now it itches something nasty. Another one found me when I mowed the outside space but that one will never bother anyone else any more 🙂  To be honest this year has been pretty good when it comes to flies, with that I mean fairly few. If we get in to an area where suddenly lots of flies fly around it means animals are close, most likely wild hogs because there are always many together and therefore draws more of those annoying insects.

     

I had to go to the store in Gudhem today because the package with the Red Mulberry tree had arrived and it was just in time, the soil in the pot was so dry that I had to put it in a bucket of water as soon as I opened the package. As soon as the soil was wet I planted it in a bigger pot and I think I’ll keep it like that until next spring, down in the cool cellar. Now I have three different mulberry trees. This red one, a white mulberry with tasty berries and one called Mulle which is a Morus accidosa. I can’t find any info about M. accidosa so I think it must be some kind of hybrid. It gives black berries, really tasty ones, but they are smaller than the ones the Black Mulberry tree gives. So lets now hope we get a mild winter so that they all survive plus of course the Pawpaws and persimmons 🙂

 

Snails and slugs live in paradise when they find my Root zone.

So this is the last week on my vacation and I’m desperately hoping for that lottery winning 🙂 🙂 🙂 I wouldn’t hesitate to quit my job immediately even though that is frowned upon (I really don’t hate my job but I’m not crazy in love with it either 🙂 🙂 ). Normally we have one month to work after we’ve given notice but since I wouldn’t plan on going back to work again ever so why bother 🙂 🙂 🙂 However until that happens, most likely five minutes before I leave this earth 🙂 🙂 🙂 I will have to keep on working, at least until I can retire and I think I’ll start with part time retirement when I’m 64, just a few years left 🙂 I think I would be really pi…d if I died before I could retire 🙂 🙂 🙂

     

It is time for a last cup of tea for the day and later on I’ll watch Midsommer Murders, unfortunately they show Death in Paradise at the same time in another channel but since I’ve watched all the murders in Midsommer from the beginning the choice is easy tonight 🙂

     

Have a great day!

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It looks like all but one of my sown Petunias will have this color.

We’ve had unusually much sunshine today  since we weren’t supposed to have any 🙂 Still mostly cloudy anyway and it has been just enough warm so it has been rather nice, we even had a nice walk later in the day because the flies in the forest really didn’t care much about us. Well there was this one horse fly that insisted on paying me a visit and I can happily say that she will visit no more.

This time it is evening fog I show.

   

Yesterday I went to a pet store rather far away, a work friend lives just beside it so I had a cup of coffee first. He has one of those really modern and I guess rather expensive coffee makers so I think it is impossible not to make a really good cup of coffee 🙂 The pet shop is rather big and it turns out they sell snakes, spider, turtles, scorpions and aquarium fish. I have nothing against snakes so I took a look at them, I think it was mostly boas and pythons of different sizes but I skipped to look at the spiders and scorpions 🙂 🙂 🙂 I bought myself some fish and went home again. Took a bit longer than it should since I got a bit lost, I also was a bit lost on my way there too so now I’ve seen places in this county I never would have otherwise 🙂 🙂

Lots of Rowan berries this year.

 

I’ve never seen this butterfly before so I’ve asked the knowledgeable people on FB what it can be.

We had our nap, so so far I’ve still only missed to have one during this vacation 🙂 It was a bit too noisy today though, I have a neighbor with five horses and they are making hay bales and that tractor of theirs have been working quite a lot lately 🙂 I think I snoozed for twenty minutes and today I wished it could have been more because Alma woke me up at 3:10 this morning and it took some time to fall back to sleep again. No stomach problems though, just needed to go an hour earlier than usual.

     

I went to the grocery store in the village where I work today and they had cheap strawberries and cherries as well, so when I’m done here and have had something to eat I’ll make some jam. It is hard to find cherry jam here and if one would it costs a small fortune and since strawberry jam works for anything that needs jam I thought I might as well do some of that as a well. The few cherries I get from my sand cherry trees won’t go far and they are still unripe, just like the three plums I’ll get 🙂 🙂 and my strawberries gives the odd berry but they tend to start producing berries now, really odd since all other strawberry plants give berries in spring and early summer 🙂 🙂

     

I better stop writing here and go downstairs to clean those berries and the jars so I can start making that jam. Also the dogs are waiting for me to have a couple of sandwiches so they can get a slice of cheese each 🙂

Have a great day!

A bit too close :-)

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100% humidity, no wind but towards the cool side should still make a rather nice day but both the dogs and I thought the humidity was just too much and that it made it feel much warmer than it actually was. We walked down to the creek in the morning when it still felt a bit cool but the flies were nasty and there were a few horse flies that tried to bite me. Oddly slow so now there are fewer horse flies to worry about 🙂

   

Winter food for the cattle. Lots of beans in it this year, they’ll cut it down and make silage from it.

I think we were close to wild hogs because Alma became a bit excited and looked straight at the point where we met one last week. We didn’t see or hear anyone though, I guess they too thought it felt a it nasty with the humidity and kept as still as they could to avoid the attention of the flies. We did see a Roe deer though but now Alma rarely cares about it. She has become so much better on our walks now and I do hope it continues that way 🙂

Roe deer don’t eat the beans, they only eat the most delicious herbs, that’s why they have problems surviving the old fashioned winters when the ground used to be covered with snow.

   

I got warnings from the lightning app when we had our nap but since the sun shone I really didn’t think much of it. Not even when the rain started to pour down because I really couldn’t hear any thunder. The dogs wanted to go outside so I opened the door so they could see how the rain was pouring down it was even too much for Malkolm. Just as I was about to close the kitchen door the lightning hit. I was close to peeing in my pants if I should be honest 🙂 🙂 🙂 I saw how it came from the mountain and passed my neighbors cottage rather close and hit the ground around 100 meters (much the same in yards) behind out cottages 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’m so glad that I had almost closed the door because it is amazing how much it sounds 🙂 🙂 🙂

     

No rain tomorrow they’re guessing but the humidity will stay at 100% or close to it. Almost no wind but a bit of sunshine so I guess it will feel like living in a steam bath tomorrow. Well I’ll go to the pet shop tomorrow and will be closer to the big lake so I hope that helps some.

   

I took a look outside my bedroom window and realized that almost the entire eastern top half of the apple tree is covered in white bryony (Bryonia alba). It’s a poisonous vine that when it’s older can cover entire trees. It’s something I never would bring to my garden and it isn’t native here but back in the days people thought it was a great vine to cover big areas. It spreads easily with birds since they eat the berries. I did taste one berry when I was a kid and it tastes horrible 🙂 🙂 🙂 So even if one can die from eating the berries one need 40 of them and I’m pretty sure that no one can come even close to do that 🙂 🙂 This one is a young plant and only had three vines growing up from its root, still it managed to cover so much of the tree. They always grow where it is the hardest to get rid of them.

    

So we haven’t done much today, even before the rain the dogs preferred to stay indoors. Sunshine at the moment but still a chance/ risk of more thunder. I don’t mind thunder as long as I’m not caught outside when it arrives. I have had to chose between being the highest point in the fields or hiding beneath tress, a sort of choice between having plague or cholera 🙂 🙂

Ten seconds after I took this photo the lightning struck 🙂

The smell from the Woodland tobacco is wonderful but it only smells in late evenings and nights.

I took a photo from below on the bryonia, we call them dog turnips 🙂

It is time to have a last cup of tea for the day and perhaps I’ll have a couple of oatmeal cookies 🙂

Have a great day!

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Nothing much has happened here in the village since Sunday, just as I like it to be. We’ve had our walks, no morning walk today because I had to go to the town Lidköping. I have needed new insoles for my shoes and since they are custom made for my feet I had to go to the hospital to have them make new ones.

   

The Troll grapes are slowly but steadily getting that deep blood red color I like so much. Seems to be pretty unusual, most becomes just bright red.

Back in the days one had to stand in some kind of clay? so they could make molds so they could make those insoles. Now days they just scan the feet and viola the machine makes new ones. Especially my right foot had changed quite a lot and is now rather flat. While I was there I also had a look on their shoes and they picked out two that would fit my feet much better than the ones I can buy in the stores. Even though both looked like some kind of running shoes one of them, looked like old people shoes 🙂 🙂 🙂 I know I’m getting old but I don’t have to advertise it 🙂 🙂 It was quite wide and the soles were not flat to the ground but instead sort of bent upwards at the front.

None of the dogs saw him and he didn’t see them because of a few dense and low pines. We looked at each other for a while and then he trotted away.

 

The other shoe was perhaps the same with the bending of the sole but not as wide and looked more like a “normal” shoe. Plus they are black and less visible to the world 🙂 and more expensive. The insoles are for free because I really need them but I’ll have to pay for the shoes (ok not as expensive as they really are but still) aren’t necessary for me to be pain-free. It’ll take a week to make those insoles so I’ll go to the hospital again on August first. Next time I’ll bring a camera because Lidköping is a really nice and beautiful town and is places at the shore of our biggest lake, Vänern. It is the third biggest natural lake in Europe. I live just as close to our next biggest lake here in Sweden to to the opposite side, Vättern. It’s Europe’s sixth biggest natural lake.

   

Many years ago the politicians in that township did some smart financial decisions so it’s a well of town where everything is nasty expensive and even the rough areas looks like people living there are quite wealthy 🙂 🙂

     

WE went out for our first walk as soon as I had come home again, I had stopped in Skara to buy soil at a sort of Garden center. I write sort of because they have no space outdoors to grow anything but lots of what You would find in a garden center indoors. They had lots of trees and bushes on sale but I actually resisted to but a Magnolia stellata and lots of carnivore plants to have in the big pot outside 🙂 I must have to admit that if they had had a magnolia seiboldii I might have fallen and bought it 🙂 🙂 I’ll spend money on Thursday instead, I’m going to a pet store that still sell aquarium fish. It is getting pretty rare over here now days, from what I’ve heard they have new rules that acquires them to take training courses to get a license to sell aquarium fish and from what I’ve heard it’s bl…y expensive. Also it isn’t allowed to sell cats or dogs in pet stores, don’t think it never have been allowed to since they opened up pet stores.

Kirengeshoma koreana.
Hardy fuchsia.
Chinese catalpa.
This is a common weed around here, easy to keep in control though so I have a lot in my garden. The flowers are quite small but just look how beautiful they are. I sometimes wonder why they don’t try to get them to grow bigger flowers so it fits the flower beds instead of always use the same flowers for our gardens ?

Any way I’ll try to remember to bring a camera then. Well it is time to stop writing, have a cup of tea or two and later watch Midsommer Murders, I really like that series and it took me quite some time to understand that Midsommer is a huge fictional county, not a small town as I thought 🙂 🙂 🙂

   

Have a great day!

There are places that need water, so why does all of it fall here?

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Now I know how effective that anti tick spray is, it is very much so. It had been raining all morning and I thought that since Malkolm would be so wet while walking around most of it would drop off pretty fast so I skipped it since he actually hate that smell. It’s a long time since I’ve picked so many ticks of any of the dogs who has lived here. Nova was the only one that didn’t have any and I guess it is because she walked after us all  after we just had walked there, so no more walks without it, no matter how awful it smells 🙂 🙂 🙂

     

My shoes hadn’t dried at all since yesterday so today I had to wear my winter boots 🙂 🙂 They are light brown but by the time we came home all the water had made them dark brown 🙂 My feet were dry though so 🙂 I placed my shoes towards the south heading wall and even after a day with at least some sunshine they still aren’t dry. I guess it doesn’t help when the humidity stays at 100% or just below 🙂 There will be even more rain tomorrow and much of the week. There are places on this planet that desperately need rain so why does it all have to fall here 🙂

Lots of Rowan berries this year, perhaps I should make some yelly or ade when it is time. They need a couple of frost nights to become less tart and then putting some honey in it will make them rather yummy 🙂

This is a rather unusual flower, it is a parasite and has no chlorophyll of its own. The Swedish name for it would be Pine wort in English.

I haven’t done much today, I was going to bake some bread but then I found two packages with hard bread I had forgotten so I skipped the baking 🙂 We did have our nap, I realized we napped for almost two hours but I can already say that it will not keep me awake after the usual bet time 🙂 Oh I forgot I also now potted some of the Quince seedlings. I must admit that I mostly had forgotten about them, so some have grown in a 90 degree angle, I’ll need to find some sticks so I can direct them in the right position again 🙂 Two more Giant Sequoia seeds have germinated as well but unfortunately none of the Dawn redwood seeds. Well they might need one more winter before they wake up, they do look ok when I check if they still exists.

Lots of lingonberries this year.

This one is rather delicious and it looks like it has a thick layer of clear coat put on it. It’s actually a thick layer of slime that protects it from pests, easily removed though and I usually pick lots of it.

It is time to go and look at at least the beginning of which team will be the European champions in football (soccer) England or Spain. I always hope for England but they have a tendency to never win when it really matters 🙂

I’ll get at least two pink poppies this year and if You look at the top of the photo You can see the leafs from the Californian poppy, no summer here without it 🙂
I wonder if he will continue to have that quilted fur in his neck when he gets older?

   

Have a great day!

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It has been a fairly nice day here, not much sunshine but warm. No rain so far but according to radar photography it’s on the way and we’ll get lots more both tomorrow and on Monday. It’ll stay fairly warm though so I won’t complain too much.

     

Lots of people in the village seems to have been busy today, I’ve heard hammering and lawn mowing plus what could have been someone trimming hedges. I haven’t done much at all, besides walks with the dogs the only thing I’ve done is to placed a “pot” (well it is actually an aluminium foil thingy for food 🙂 ) with Quince seedlings that needs to be re-potted. I have several more to re-pot but I need to buy more soil before I can do that. 

Lots of wild raspberries and they are so delicious!
The Shrike really like this area, so easy for them to see their prey.

   

The morning was quite nice, there was a bit of ground mist when we woke up and even some sunshine but as soon as we came out for our morning walk the sun was gone. Didn’t matter really because it was slightly cool and very few flies annoyed us while we were walking along the creek. We saw a hare running in front of us and two roe deer but that was it. In a way a bit boring but in a way quite nice since Alma has been reasonable calm for two mornings in a row and that’s pretty unusual 🙂

 

I think we might have beavers in the creek again. The water level is really high on one side of the road but rather low on the other.

I gave the dogs their first raw hide bones today. Long time since that happened because Albin was allergic to everything so I couldn’t really give them that. Nova have had before but this was the first time for both Alma and Malkolm 🙂 Nova really didn’t want to chew on it so instead she hid it beneath her 🙂 Alma really liked it and so did Malkolm even though he was a bit slow chewing it. So in the end Alma stole all three and wasn’t the least ashamed of what she did 🙂 🙂 There is one piece left and Alma took a look at me and dropped it on the floor 🙂 🙂 Malkolm is now doing his best to hide it and every time Alma comes close he takes it and chews for a while again 🙂

       

It is time to give the dogs their dinner, I haven’t had anything either, well ice cream but I’m not sure that counts 🙂 Tomorrow I’ll start packing all the card board in the car so I can take it to the recycling center. I have so much now that the kitchen will look very different when I’ve removed it all 🙂 I have absolutely no space to have it in this cottage, I have one closet and this winter mice found it so now I need to find where they came in and try to block it, I also need to buy new clothes 🙂 🙂

   

The first time she stole the chewing rawhide.
The second time she made sure that Malkolm didn’t notice her leaving 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The new compost.

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This morning was sunny and quite chilly with some morning mist hovering above the ground. It wasn’t supposed to be like that but since the sky was clear blue I thought I had some time before the more cloudy weather would start. It started as soon as we came outside the entrance door 🙂 The sun had evaporated the fog so it rose and then created a evenly grey layer between us and the sun. It had also warmed up the air a lot so the few flies we have here were really annoying.

     

All vegetation was soaking wet, both from the rain yesterday and the morning dew. So we just walked down to the creek, followed it up-stream and turned back homewards again. We did see a Roe deer and when we just had turned around to follow the creek down-stream again a wild hog gave us a friendly warning that it stood hidden on the other side of the creek and that we shouldn’t try to go over to that side 🙂 🙂 I never saw it though but it did sound as if it was big 🙂 🙂 🙂

     

I had just done some laundry when a package arrived. It was the new compost I’d ordered, the one that looks like a tombola and that one shall spin every now and again plus it is supposed to stand in direct sunlight so the things inside it sort of get so hot that it in a way boils into compost. I was naive to believe that it would be put together already in the package but oh how wrong I was 🙂 I also believed that it as most would be just to sort of pop it together in to the compost. Turns out nothing of that was remotely close 🙂 The package was rather flat and when I opened it the first thing I noticed was a bag with a zillion screws and Screws and nuts. I have to say that they had packed it really nice and there were even some Screws and nuts extra so it didn’t matter that one of the screws was defect.

 

I think this is the first year that the Beekeeper will get cherries on this little tree.

So I unpacked it all and at that time it was cloudy and not too warm. I started to put the pieces together and I’m really happy that I am ambidextrous (for those of You who don’t know what that is, I am both right and left handed since birth) because I think it would have been pretty tough to reach all the screws from the outside to the bolts on the inside otherwise. So I stood there in a bad posture of course and then the sun broke through warming up the air even more plus trying to fry my back 🙂 I’m glad I remembered to put the middle piece in while I still could (a sort of wall in the middle to make two compartments, when one is filled but not really ready to use one has a second compartment to start to fill up), it would have been impossible otherwise.

They had packed everything really well and I now have more plastic than the world needs this year 🙂

Each segment had to be screwed on individually and overlapping the previous one with eight tiny screws and bolts. I also got a screwdriver and for some reason I just can’t understand a pair of very thin gloves that only would have made me drop anything smaller than a tea cup 🙂 🙂

In this photo I thought I would show the middle wall but forgot to brighten up the photograph 🙂 🙂 🙂

So every time one puts anything in the compost one is supposed to spint it a few times and one must also spin it around every now and again so it composts evenly. This one is supposed to be totally smell free.

The normal flies acted pretty calm while I stood there sweating like a pig and to my surprise only one horse fly tried to bite me! Last winter really thinned out the fly communities and also the ticks seems to have been culled hard thankfully 🙂 Still plenty of them around though but clearly fewer than before. I moved the compost to the sunniest place in the garden, just in front of the vegetable patch and put in the fruit peels and other things in to the first compartment 🙂 So all needed now is that the sun actually makes a try to shine for more than an hour a day 🙂 🙂 I’ll have some twigs as soon as I’ve started to prune the bushes that now have grown too much and removing small plants that has spread too well with their roots. I do have a rather wild garden but even I have a limit to how wild it can become 🙂 🙂

My garden raspberries aren’t especially tasty but the birds love them.

I do however have plenty of wild raspberries, they truly behaves like weed 🙂 The wild one are probably the most delicious berries we have this far south in the country. We have even more delicious berries up far north but they can’t give any berries this far south.

The Elderberry tree suddenly started to flower 🙂

The dogs are sleeping deeply right now. Malkolm on my left side and the other two in my bed. They’ve enjoyed a sunny afternoon being outside playing but quite often come in to drink lots of water. The weather will be mostly rainy this weekend but they’re guessing that our early mornings will be almost cool and sunny, so I better get up and go outside with the dogs as soon as we wake up 🙂

Doesn’t Malkolm look worried here? Two seconds after I took this photo he attacked Alma 🙂 🙂 🙂

   

Have a great day!

I slept away an entire day.

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I normally don’t have fog coming in to the garden unless it is pea soup fog and it was that today.

I think we all now are getting rid of our ailments. The dogs stomachs are much better and I finally woke up without a sour throat. I was really tired yesterday so both the dogs and I slept almost all day. The morning was quite nice and cool with some sunshine so we could have a nice walk before the rain and thunder arrived. I’m not sure for how long I slept but it was several hours and I woke up an hour before my usual bedtime and went to bed again and slept the entire night 🙂 🙂 🙂 I think the dogs slept the entire time as well but My sleep was so deep that I didn’t hear the thunder at all so they could have had a party while I was in the land of dreams 🙂

Most of it was gone before we went out though.

   

I was oddly enough really tired when I woke up this morning so I didn’t have the energy to go out with the dogs while we had a really nice and thick fog, we even had fog in the garden. We’ve only had one short nap after that and I woke up to heavy showers and thunder. As I woke up I remembered that the kitchen door was open so I had to dry the floor from the little lake that had formed in the kitchen 🙂 🙂 🙂

 

Still some visible water in the tarn but it is a deep hole so the grass is actually growing on roots coming from the vegetation around it.

The morning wasn’t especially cool when we finally went out for our walk so the flies were quite happy to greet us in the forest. To be honest there weren’t that many out there but the ones that were annoyed us enough. There’s unusually few flies flying around this summer, not that I mind but we do need these flies so the birds will have enough with food to raise their young ones. I remember not to long ago when one had to stop at petrol stations because the windshields were just disgusting covered with dead flies, so far this year I’ve had one fly crashing in to the windshield. It is nice to have clean windows on the car but something are clearly wrong out in nature now days. To be honest though, I have so many in my garden that it might be that they all have moved here 🙂 🙂

   

I drove to the big grocery store in Falköping this morning. I don’t live in a tourist area so there weren’t many cars on the road. I bought what I had forgotten to write down on my list last Tuesday 🙂 and then some 🙂 I tried some new gluten free cookies they had gotten and I must say they were for once really yummy. If it is something I’ve learned since I got to know I can’t eat gluten is that most baked things taste like shit so even though I was hesitant I bought two different cookies and to my really big surprise they didn’t taste disgusting 🙂 I’ll see if they can get them in my usual grocery store because what they have are abominations to mankind 🙂 🙂 🙂

My first hazelnuts 🙂

My Himalayan Cedar looks great.

My Gardenias seems to like staying outside and this is the first flower to open up.

The perennial sunflowers are early this year.

They are guessing that we won’t have any rain tomorrow and 20C (68F). No sunshine though but they said that about today as well and we had plenty of it in between showers. They’re also guessing that the three days after that will give plenty of rain but mostly after noon each day so we’ll be able to have our morning walks without getting soaked. Well the grass will be dripping of both rain and dew so my feet and Malkolm will be really wet. Malkolm won’t mind though and Nova will walk after both him and me so she’ll mostly be rather dry when we come home.

     

It is time to go downstairs and watch the English Antique Roadshow. There’s always someone there who had an old aunt that was a Russian grand duchess or similar and they always pretend that they are so surprised when the jewelry they brought are worth a small fortune 🙂 🙂 🙂 Ours is so much more dull when it comes to that and sometimes the owner of the object tells from the beginning they already know the value of what they’ve brought. To be honest if I had something worth loads of money I wouldn’t want the world to know, it would be just like asking to be robbed one day 🙂 🙂 🙂

A cat from the farm was visiting the Beekeepers so I guess both Sally and Salmiak were indoors 🙂

Have a great day!