Category: Insects.

Long weekend.

June 5, 2024 · 16 Comments ·

The clouds have come and gone since noon today but it was mostly sunny after I came home.

It rained in the village where I work but I could see no signs of any rain here in the village. The creek was really full though so the rain must have been heavy there. It was also slightly warmer today than they guessed yesterday but it still didn’t rise above 16C (60,8F) and it sounds as if we all love it at the moment 🙂

Buttercups. Can't remember the name on this one but I think it grows in North America as well.

I’m not a fan of spruces in our forests butt they do look great when the new growth comes.

I noticed that the dogs loves it as well, even old Nova had much more energy today and isn’t as badly bitten by mosquitoes as she was yesterday. We have also had a really strong wind blowing and that if anything helped a lot with those biting little nasties, they aren’t strong enough to fly around in such a strong wind 🙂 I noticed that they still sell annual lupine seeds (in this case the Texas lupine) here so I ordered some yesterday before they forbid those as well. I sowed some early this spring directly in the ground and they do germinate but rather unevenly. The biggest I have now will son open up the flowers but the latest showing is barely 10 cm (4 inches) high.

I was hoping that I would see damselflies down by the creek today because I've seen planty of dragonflies in the air now but had no such luck, The little Forest star thrives down by the creek.

We walked down to the creek after I had come home after work, as I wrote the creek was really full of water but the ground barely damp, They’re guessing that we’ll have much the same weather for at least ten more days and even though I feel sorry for those having vacation and wants warmer weather and sunshine I really have nothing against cooler weather even if it also means more rain. Then again I don’t have to water anything during that time 🙂 🙂 I do need to continue to water those trees I’ve planted though and will have to do that all summer because it takes so long for the roots to grow out into the soil. The first thing that will dry out is the old soil that was in the pot the tree came in so it is important to help those trees until the roots have started to spread underground.

This is what curled leaf disease looks like. Normally if it is this bad the tree will die rather soon but I did spray it with sulfur like last year and new leafs without the fungus are showing.

Sally and Salmiak sitting at the end of the road.

This is a weed extraordinaire :-) I thought I had managed to remove it but four years after the last I saw it came back again :-) Beautiful but invasive and the berries are either crap or taste nothing :-) — Flowering raspberry.

Malkolm is sleeping by my side and so deep that he doesn’t react when I scratch him, Nova is snoring so loudly that it actually should wake her up 🙂 Good for her that she’s almost deaf 🙂 🙂 Alma is almost never sleeping especially deep, thew slightest sound will make her run up from where she is and then she’ll run down the stairs 🙂 🙂

Yellow flag growing in the root zone.

It’s still hard to get photos of the tiny new leafs of the old Pawpaw 🙂

I used tto have lots of Foxglows in my garden when I moved here, suddenly they were gone so I sowed seeds last year to get them back :-) — Foxglove.

I’m not sure the dogs like the new toys I bought 🙂 I bought two “tennis balls”, They aren’t but they look like them but are bigger and there’s a kind of rubber guard around them. They play with them but as soon as the squeaky thing in them gives out a squeak the dogs get scared and leaves it alone 🙂 I also bought a ball looking like a small orange american football. There are places all around it where one is supposed to put treats in and then the dogs are supposed to chew on the ball so the treats sort of falls out. The problem is that Malkolm has figured it out but he isn’t strong enough to chew out the treats and Alma still can’t figure it out so she doesn’t tough it 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for a cup of cocoa and then to bed, they day has felt twice as long as it has been and I’m so glad that I now have a four day weekend 🙂

Have a great day!

Cooler days and soon long weekend :-)

June 4, 2024 · 6 Comments ·

Old Nova, she's 18 years old now and still going strong :-)

It is finally a bit cooler outside. Not so much when being in the sunshine but a lot when staying in the shadow. I had to water everything when I came home yesterday and suddenly it was evening and time to go to bed, so that’s why I didn’t write anything. Today the ground still was damp so I only watered the trees and bushes I’ve planted in the garden this spring. Well to be honest we haven’t had much of a spring this year, it went from winter to summer in a day or so 🙂 🙂

More and more wild flowers flowers now. Cooler and nicer in the forest but oh so many biting insects. The Swedish name for this flower is Hags' tooth. On our way out on the peninsula out to the bog.

Something is chewing on the new beans, have no idea what it can be but oddly enough only the ones sown in a straight line, I had a few beans left so I just put them down close to the fence and those are untouched. I also had a few peas left so I sowed those in the old broken wheel barrow, they seems to grow even better than all other plants I’ve sown this year 🙂 🙂 Lots of potato plants showing up in the vegetable patch I don’t use this year, I have instead sown seeds (not too successfully I might add) I haven’t had potatoes there for three summers and they still pop up 🙂 🙂 Can I cal them hardy now? 🙂 🙂 🙂

Despite the harw wind this place was packed with mosquitoes, that sort of dampens the joy of having a walk even in plsces where one loves to walk otherwise. The bog is now full with Hare tail cotton grass. They are already releasing their seeds now.

Yesterday we had a strong wind and walked out to the bog, normally that ,means the mosquitoes and flies will stay away from us, now we have so many mosquitoes that we were attacked badly when we arrives at the Birch woodland. So today with less wind we stayed at home, Nova is once again so badly bitten all over her head that I thought it would be cruel to bring her out to even more biting insects, it’s bad enough here at home to be honest. It’s a price we have to pay for having so many trees and bushes in this little garden of mine.

Malkolm grows so fast now.

Alma reacted as if she had injured the ball when it started to squeak, I don't think she'll touch it again until I've removed the squeaker :-) — Alma with the new toy, she loved it until it in, her ears, started to scream 🙂 It’s a squeaky thing in that ball and neither she nor Malkolm liked that 🙂 🙂

I had a little walk in the garden before the mosquitoes chased me indoors. The Black Walnut is flowering, the English is living and now have two branches. The trees I plated this year all look great and the Pawpaw from last year now have green small dots all over the branches, even the ones I thought had frozen. The green dots are tiny, tiny leafs. Also the Persimmon hybrid that dies but where the Persimmon root (Diospyros virginiana) now creates at least eight new branches 🙂 I’ve read that it’s fairly easy to take some of those branches to create new trees from. Well they will. technically all be the same tree but I did also buy a new real persimmon this spring so I hope that at least that I’ll get both male and female trees from this.

This is a favorite in parks and everywhere really, Rose rugosa. It is now seen as invasive and I have no idea how they'll be able to remove them all, especially since it does spread like wildfire :-) — Rosa rugosa, the Swedish name for it would be something like Grumpy rose 🙂

We call this Iris for Swords lily. — Yellow flag.

See all those new branches the Persimmon tree creates now when the hybrid is dead :-) — Lots of new growth from the roots of the Persimmon tree 🙂 The inoculation dies during this winter but the Persimmon root survived and now gives lots of more branches 🙂

I found Morning glories, peas, poppies and Californian poppies growing here now. The poppies refuse to grow in my garden but always grow well in the wheelbarrow for some reason and no summer without Californian poppies at my home :-) — The old wheelbarrow will look good this year 🙂

Tomorrow will be the last working day this week, we have our national day on Thursday and I took Friday off. The weather will be cooler as I’ve already said and they are guessing we’ll get rain as well. I don’t care as long as we at least have sunshine when we’re out on walks, the rest of the time will be good napping times 🙂

Have a great day!

Sunny, warm and unpleasant.

June 2, 2024 · 2 Comments ·

A Roe deer doe half hiding in the high grass, most likely the baby is there too.

Malkolm woke me up at 4 am today, so up we went so that he could go outside to pee. There was some morning mist just above the ground but instead of having our walk then we went indoors again and slept for an hour and a half instead.

The dog rose showed its pink buds for the first time yesterday. — I noticed that the Dog rose now is full of buds.

The deer was at almost the same place this morning. This one is actually closely related to the pink flower I've shown several times this spring.

It was still rather cool in the air when we finally went out but I could feel that it became warmer and warmer for every minute, so we just took a short walk before it went too hot for old Nova. Yesterday just before we went to bed I could see a Roe deer doe just on the other side of the gravel road and she was still there this morning. The grass is high so I think she had her baby there as well. She’s been hanging around for a while now so she knows us well and didn’t bother to even try and hide when we walked out the gate.

The Haunted tree :-) This is a favorite amongst all pollen drinking insects and also a favorite with spiders who there can get an easy meal. This trailer used to be where all the hunters gathered before the hunt started. The little tjärn still have some water visible.

I mowed the rest of the lawn and the outside parts as early as I could, then I did the laundry and the temperature dried it up within minutes. It did look like we would get thunder and rain again today but it all passed to the east and west of is. The day has been unpleasant though with the high humidity and temperature plus the fact that we’ve had very little wind, so we have mostly stayed indoors taking long naps instead.

The little creek is almost totally dried out but ferns will soon cover it.

I was outside for a few minutes an hour ago, the wind has started to blow but despite that I sweated like a pig when I planted some of the sowings (Hollyhocks and Morning glories). Also there were so many mosquitoes biting us that we all went in, closed the doors and now only have windows covered with mosquito nets open. They are guessing that tomorrow will be mostly cloudy and perhaps not warmer than 20C (68F) and that fits me fine 🙂

Today the first dog rose opened up.

My tree peony, bought last year, have already given me two flowers and a third is on the way. — My tree peony has two flowers and one bud now, unfortunately these flowers look down to the ground.

I wasn't sure if my lemon tree would survive last winter but it did anjd now it has lots of buds. — Lemon flower.

The second daylile flowers too now.

Have a great day!

Close but still no thunder or rain.

June 1, 2024 · 4 Comments ·

The path down to the creek is bordered with Dog biscuits. — The path that eventually leads down to the creek is full of Dog biscuits. I’m glad they have driven four wheelers there, otherwise we would have been drenched in water from the rains and morning dews.

Hot again today so it was really nice that we were able to have our morning walk in the early morning while it still was cool. Not cool enough to keep the mosquitoes away but cool enough for them to not attack us to hard 🙂 Malkolm woke me up at 3:27 am today but after he had been outside we all went back to bed and slept for another hour.

A Roe deer buck is eating in the field. — This wasn’t the only animal we saw this morning. It is a Roe deer buck.

Still lots of water in the creek. — There’s so much vegetation along the creek now that it is hard to see it 🙂

All the dogs are at the moment a bit wobbly in their stomachs so today I boiled rice and fish for them. Nova loved it, Alma loved it and Malkolm put his nose in the air and refused to eat anything until he realized they all had the same food 🙂 He did eventually eat all of his food but I can clearly say that he’s not a fan of boiled fish 🙂 Too bad for him because he’ll get this tomorrow as well 🙂

The path along the creek is very narrow now days. — The path along the creek is now so narrow that we need to walk in a line, something Alma have big problems understanding 🙂

There's a little brige at the both ends of the creek where we alk so I had to stand on one of those to be able to see more than a couple of meters of it.

My camera refused to do as I wanted so here are two rather bad photos of fox cubs running away from us. — Some previous owner of my camera thought it was a good idea to adjust the camera to being able to go through the photos when turning the shutter speed wheel. Idiotic since if I need to adjust the speed after just taking one photo instead of changing the shutter speed I then started to go through my photos already taken. So instead of actually capture these two fox cubs so it would be easier to see them I instead took several photos that an editing program then tried to make at least some better. We met the mother later on but it happened so fast that I wasn’t able to take any photos of it.

Thunder and heavy rain is nearby again but it looks like it’ll go either south or north of us. I wouldn’t mind if we at least got the cool air that always follow thunder but even if we don’t get it today it will cool down considerable next week. It’ll drop from today’s 26C (78,8F) to 14C (57,2F). It will stay that cool during the entire long weekend and I think I’ll enjoy it a lot, cool weather plus what they are guessing rain as well sort of forces us to just relax all the time 🙂

Nova didn't like that I wanted to go down to the creek, she wanted to go out to the bog. So she dragged her feet all the time until I let her go un leashed, then suddenly she had all the energy in the world :-) :-) :-)

Malkolm decided to not follow Nova and instead kept himself close to me and Alma.

Nova did stop and look after us every now and again :-) — Nova checked after us on and off, last time she walked away like this she too a wrong turn and it took some time until she finally found us. She’s more or less deaf so no use in calling after her 🙂

I moved the lawn, well most of it, when the grass had started to dry up some. I drank too little water while doing it so now I have a slight headache. What’s left will be moved tomorrow and it’s on the north side of the cottage and beside the woodland where the Pawpaws are growing. I do hope we’ll have a wind blowing because that’s where all the mosquitoes are and I have already been bitten quite a lot. I was bitten by a horse fly this morning as well, they’ve started their season a bit early unfortunately. Last month was unusually hot here and I guess that kickstarted them.

I do like the European Hornet, a gentle giant unless one comes too close to their nest. If one do one must run fast :-) — The European Hornets are back, favorites ogf mine :-)

Alma and Malkolm playing in the garden :-) — Alma and Malkolm had a few minutes to play before it became too hot.

It looks like both the thunder and rain will miss us so I better put together the new hose and spray gun so I can water the vegetable patch. Something is eating the beans I sowed but the rest looks untouched, the carrots however hasn’t shown them selves yet so I’m starting to wonder whether I’ll have to sow something else in that spot. I’ll give them a couple of more days before I do anything.

Have a great day!

Sticky flypaper.

May 26, 2024 · 2 Comments ·

I’m waiting for the rain and thunder, we already have the strong winds that usually comes with it. The dogs haven’t any energy to play. Every now and again they go outside to try and have fun but comes in again just to take a long nap. Even I joined them in one of their naps 🙂

We were up early today though, when it still felt a bit cool and the sun was shining. We took the short walk out to the bog and then back home again. None of them was especially enthusiastic about having a walk but they sure were when we headed back home again 🙂 🙂 🙂 I don’t blame them because there were about a gazillion mosquitoes out there and Nova is so badly bitten now that her face is a bit swollen and she has small wounds after scratching herself in the face. I can’t even imagine how bad it is for all the wild animals out there. Thankfully we don’t have any midges here. They are tiny and many and some years it can be so bad that if a Moose can’t get away from them all those midges actually can kill them. It’s a good thing this country have so many lakes they can flee out to.

So I haven’t done that much today, I’ve done the laundry and it dried up within a few minutes :-)I’ve watered the newly planted trees and also the Persimmon where the new branch is growing out plus the Pawpaw that survived the winter. I’ve also placed my summer tires in the car because tomorrow they’ll be put on and my winter tires taken off. I’m a bit late with getting that done to be honest 🙂 If the garage doesn’t have a car I can borrow I’ll just have a walk in Falköping while the job is done. I always do so when the car is in the garage and I always bring a camera. So if You want to see photos from Falköping wish that they don’t have a car, if You don’t wish to see Falköping just wish they have a car 🙂 🙂

If they don’t have a car I’m planning on buying a new garden hose and some other things while I’m there, that is if it takes long enough so that the stores open before the job is done and I have to go to work again. Some of them don’t open until 10 am and since I’ll be leaving my car at 7 am I might go to work long before that,unless the garage is really busy. Then again who says I need to go to work immediately 🙂 🙂

I haven’t done any dinner for work next week either, so I’ll buy something on my way to work for tomorrow and make dinner when I come home again for the rest of the week. I’m just looking at the thunder app and it is slowly closing in to us. It will feel good when it has passed and the temperature has dropped. I have done one more thing though, the first sticky fly papers now hang from the roof downstairs. A few have already found their way indoors even though I do have nets put up by the kitchen door and the windows. No matter what one does those flies always find a way in and thankfully they like to land on something close to the roof, those fly papers are heaven sent 🙂

Potatoes keep comming up even though it was three years ago I had potatoes in that patch 🙂 Those red leafs looking like clover is actually an Oxalis, a popular annual pot plant. Turns out it thrives in this climate so now it’s one of the more common weeds we have in our gardens. I don’t fight it , instead I embrace it and it does get cute yellow flowers 🙂

This is a native annual Geranium (not the pot plants You call geraniums because those are actually Pelargoniums).

Columbines comes in all kinds of varieties.

Have a great day!

The vet visit.

May 10, 2024 · 9 Comments ·

Salmiak, the beekeepers cat. He’s getting old now, I think he’s 17 years old by now and have used lots of his nine lives because he’s too friendly towards dog that aren’t friendly towards him.

We had meh weather here when I woke up this morning, misty rain and a bit too cool and since we were going to the vet in a few hours I said to the dogs “Going for a walk or sleep again?” To my very big surprise they all went indoors again 🙂 🙂 🙂

So I was wondering if it would be best to let Alma and Nova stay at home in the dog yard while Malkolm and I went to the vet for his shot or should I bring them and when we come home have that walk? Last time I left with one dog he never came back (Albin) so knowing Alma I thought it best to let her follow and Nova would be there to keep her company for those five minutes we would be indoors. It sounds good doesn’t it 🙂 🙂 🙂

I fasten my dogs in the seat belt when they’re with me on the roads, I could have had them in the back but the thought of getting hit from behind and what that would do to the dogs has always made me use the seat belts instead. So I thought everything would be easy when letting them in to the car. Malkolm and Nova were no problems, Alma started screaming as soon as I tried to get her in 🙂 🙂 After that she kept on screaming all the way to the vet and also tried to come to the front seats, so I had to push her back with one hand 🙂

So we arrived at the vet and thankfully it was still rather cool and cloudy outside so I lowered the windows and as soon as we started walking to the entrance door Alma screamed like insane and tried to dig her way out of the car. I shouted at her that no digging is allowed and oddly enough she stopped. No such like when it came to the screaming though. We came in and were shown to a room on the other side of the building and while we were waiting I could hear Alma very clear, it sounded like someone stabbed her over and over again 🙂 🙂 The vet hadn’t arrived yet so I hurried out, shouted at her to calm down and went in again.

I arrived at the room at the same time the vet did. Malkolm thought that when I was gone it would be a good time to both poop and pee on the floor 🙂 So the first thing the vet had to do was to clean the floors 🙂 He kept on smiling and laughing to himself because Alma was so loud by now that anyone hearing her could have called the police reporting animal cruelty 🙂 🙂 🙂 As soon as I and Malkolm were back in the car she went silent and slept the whole way home 🙂 🙂 🙂 She’s a wonderful girl that dog but sometimes I think she will be the reason for my death 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

Strong winds.

October 14, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

WE had a lovely morning with sunshine and slightly chilly temperature, The wind was strong though and the gusts even stronger. No hunters out in weather like that (and certainly not in the kind of weather we’re having now), so we went out for a walk. Nova finally got what she wanted so out to the bog we went.

The moose fly season hasn’t ended, I found out that after we had come home when one of them were walking on my neck, that fly is no more 🙂 Anyway, we walked out on the peninsula that she loves to walk to and while we stood there for a while I think I actually could hear two wolves howling. They must have been far away and the wind drowned the sound every time a strong gust passed by. So I can’t say that I’m sure I’m right but when that sound reached us the dogs suddenly were in a hurry to go back home again. Due to their reaction I’m pretty sure it was wolves howling.

Especially since it’s the last two days of the moose hunt premiere no humans would be out there shouting and to be honest I doubt that any hunters, even in the neighbor hunting areas would be out a day like today. Trees will be falling in these gusts so even an avid hunter wouldn’t risk their life today. So since the dogs were in a hurry we hurried back to the village. I can’t say I was worried though because they were far away and the wind wasn’t in the direction towards the wolves so they would be able to figure out where we were. They did calm down the closer we came to the village though.

Yesterday when I walked around in the garden I suddenly found the last of the cacti I had placed in the trees during summer. I had apparently placed it high up in the summer apple tree. It wasn’t damaged by the frost so I replanted it in a bigger pot and brought it indoors. I have no idea what kind of soil it should have but I think it is one of those living as an epiphyte on trees and I figure that epiphytes can’t get any lime from the rain water so it shouldn’t require lime in the soil, so I used some of the rhododendron soil I still have. I finally did find a spot for it but anything I now find outdoors that needs to be brought inside will live in the cool cellar during winter, no matter what it is 🙂

One thing I’ve really missed now when I realized that I can’t eat gluten is Digestive crackers. I used to eat them almost every week, preferable with some blue cheese or cheese like camembert or just a strong normal cheese. The ones I’ve found in stores are more or less inedible and only a person that lacks any kind of taste buds would eat them with joy 🙂 🙂 So I found a recipe on the net and baked them yesterday. They are much better than the bought ones but still just barely ok. Too brittle and way too sweet. The sweetness is easily fixed but fixing brittle is a bit more difficult. There are plenty of recipes out there though so I’ll continue until I find the best one.

The weather now is very different from this morning. The wind is even stronger and the gusts have reached storm strength. I can only hear it because my neighbors cottage an´d garage takes almost all the wind. The roaring in the trees when the gusts comes are so loud now that even Alma has started to look out the windows to see what makes that noise 🙂 🙂 Tomorrow will be sunny and less windy so I guess the hunters will be back but hopefully they’ll be gone before the sun sets so we can have a nice walk.

Have a great day!

It did.

October 8, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

Yes the frost did arrive last night and just as I was on my way to bed I remembered that I had the rest of the cacti and the orchid to move indoors. So out I went at around midnight with a light on my head to find all of them and to bring them indoors. I brought in all of them except for the thorny one and one more. I placed them in the patio because early frost almost never gets in there.

I brought those two indoors today when the sun shone and it looks like they are ok. I did wake up a bit late for once so most of the frost was gone but I found a few plants that still were more or less covered in frost. I don’t know how cold it had been but my cousin who were by the ocean had -6C (21,1F), so I’m pretty sure it must have been much the same here.

The hunters arrived early I guess so I knew we couldn’t take a walk in the forest and since I’ve never managed to make neither Albin nor Alma to behave when we meet joggers or bikers or anything remotely moving we no longer can take walks in the village. One screaming dog I can handle but two is just too much. Plus to be honest there are now days a couple of dogs more that really can’t behave either 🙂 🙂

To my big surprise however all the hunters left quite early so we did manage to take a walk out to the bog anyway. Guess if I was happy because both Alma and Albin had so much energy that they started to become pretty annoying 🙂 🙂 🙂 I don’t think it reached 8C (46,4F) today so I wore my bright yellow winter jacket. There was a bitterly cold wind blowing so if any mosquito had survived the night they were at least not flying around. There was one moose fly though and it fell down behind my t-shirt on my back. It took some time to get it but it did at least not bite me.

We’ve had our pancake Sunday and I’ve also made lots of rice porridge. This cold weather sort of demands that 🙂 I did forget to do the laundry though but I’ll do that tomorrow before going to work. Hunters will be out in the forest again so I’ll have plenty of time to do it then. Now I have to stay awake until at least 11 pm so I don’t wake up way too early tomorrow and mess up my working day 🙂

Have a great day!

The frost will arrive tonight.

October 7, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

The feeling on Monday the week I know I’ll also work on Friday is actually far worse than it feels to work on that Friday 🙂 🙂 Still it isn’t fun but when things works as they should it’s quite ok. Still I would rather not have to so I’m holding my thumbs for the lottery today 🙂 🙂

It has been a rather nice day even though a bit too chilly and a storm that arrived yesterday also continued for quite some time today. The winds were north north-western so arctic cold has cooled down our days rather a lot, we’ll have our first frost tonight so the radiators are working downstairs. I’ve also ordered a new radiator because Alma and Albin were playing so wildly one day a couple of weeks ago that the sofa fell straight into the radiator. The plastic “feet” to the radiator broke into thousands of pieces.

I guess I could have tried to just order new “feet”, if that’s even possible but since the radiator hit the floor pretty hard I do want to try it while I am at home to see that the hit hasn’t broken it. It is one of those oil filled ones and since no oil has leaked I’m pretty sure it still is ok and one can never have too many radiators. I have one old radiator left of those who were here when I moved here and one never know for how long that one will keep going.

The morning walk was really nice, despite it being a bit too chilly. The wind was so strong that no insect that values its life would fly around in it 🙂 The sun shone from early morning and did its best to make the day nice but it had huge problems with that 🙂 We walked in the forest though so most of the wind was stopped by the trees. Nova wanted to go out to the bog again but I persuaded her to walk down to the creek and there she could decide whether we should follow it up or down-stream. She chose up-stream and the older forest. We did however go out to the bog in a later walk when the wind had calmed some so she did get her way eventually 🙂

The moose hunt starts tomorrow so we won’t be able to have any walks for most of next week. The hunting leader did however say that there will be times when they won’t be out there and he will text me when that happens. Personally I would have liked to take a walk in the village again but since I’ve never managed to make Albin and Alma behave when they see something moving, like a jogger or biker or a dog that is happy to see them, we really can’t take a walk there any more. Also there’s still cattle in tye huge pasture so we can’t walk there either.

So I can look forward to a week when I don’t have to leave the cottage at all before I go to work every day 🙂 I’ll just relax close to a radiator, perhaps reading a book or so 🙂

Have a great day!

Chilly wind.

September 30, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

It looked really nice outside when I woke up in the morning and looked out through the windows but it wasn’t. The sun was shining but the strong wind we had was way to chilly. That changed later in the day thankfully.

Nova wanted to go out to the bog again this morning so that’s where we went. One good thing with the strong and chilly wind was that most mosquitoes and moose flies blew away. I did kill one mosquito so I had to get rid of a blood stain when I came home 🙂 and the one moose fly that landed on me is no more either 🙂

I was going to do so much today but I never came around to it. To be honest, all I’ve done today is to do dog walks, some of the laundry and pancakes, I have no idea what I’ve been doing for the rest of the day 🙂 🙂 So I guess I can say that it has been a good day 🙂

They say we’ll get sunny and warm weather tomorrow so I hope I can come around to start picking the apples on my apple tree. I did after all buy one of those fruit picking things, the ones one can reach way up in the tree without having to risk the life by climbing on a ladder 🙂 I’ve bought what I need to try and preserve apples the way we always can buy pear halves in. Apples can of course be stored in my cool cellar for quite some time but I really want to try this. Pears on the other hand can’t be stored at all to be honest so I guess that’s why one never see preserved apple halfs in the stores 🙂

Have a great day!

She’s a bit picky now days.

September 29, 2023 · 4 Comments ·

The old wheel barrow is finally starting to look nice again. Still not even close to having a night with frost here so now we’re 23days late of having that, I’m not complaining though 🙂

We’ve had a sort of meh weather today, sometimes rain, sometimes not but always a humidity that ate its way through the walls so I had to turn on the radiators. Warm though so they didn’t have to work for any longer period of time to dry out the cottage. Still we never went out on a walk but I did go to Falköping to get some light bulbs for the car.

The Common Spindle always has a nice color on its leafs.

My November cactus or Christmas cactus, back in the days they hadn’t mixed the species that much so one could still call them after the month or date they were flowering. Nowdays they’r so mixed that it can be anything really 🙂

This one is supposed to be a Selenicereus grandiflorus, we call them The Queen of the Night. It changed how it looked when I planted a cutting from it though so now I doubt that it is the queen. I sowed it myself for at least ten years ago.

It’s quite complicated to actually get the right light bulb now days, or perhaps not at all 🙂 🙂 I was pretty sure I should buy one called H4 but the computer in the petrolstation said H7. The woman working there said that one can have the same light bulb no matter which of the different lights one wanted to use. Back in the day it was one kind of bulb for low beam and another for high beam. So I bought the H/ but guess if I was surprised when I found a bulb in the car called H1 🙂 🙂 🙂 So to be honest I have no clue what so ever if I actually have the right ones or if it actually is the H4 I should use 🙂 🙂 🙂

This is the original plant, a nasty one that truly hates me and when ever I get close to it it throws one of those stems out and hits my arm. Last time I sat and tried to get those nasty little thorns out from my skin for oven an hour.

This is, I think, a Giant Bell Flower. It does however grow in almost darkness now days that it is pretty small instead. I’ll thin out the Laburnum so that the ground can get more light again.

The hips are more common now though and almost like a second bloom.

I’ve had the kitchen door open quite a lot despite the weather so the dogs have been able to go in and out as they’ve pleased but they haven’t pleased at all, so I guess they disliked the weather we’ve had as much as I have 🙂 🙂

The Jerusalem artichoke with what looks much like a lot of adult aphids on it.

I bought a small Chrysanthemum a week ago and now I’ve planted it. If winter is mild enough this one will be much higher next year and most likely have slightly smaller flowers as well. I really wanted another flower but this was all that was left.

Nova has become more and more picky with her food and since she is 17 years old she really needs to eat, which she doesn’t if it isn’t perfect according to her taste. So I’ve been mixing in what ever she has preferred at the moment, mostly some rather expensive blue cheese 🙂 🙂 That worked until a few days ago and then she just wouldn’t eat. So now I’ve bought some of those truly expensive tiny packages with luxury wet dog food and now she’s eating again 🙂 🙂 This one is called Ceasar and contains so little food that I doubt that even a Chihuahua would think it was enough. She loves when I mix it in to her regular food though so who am I to complain. I have however told her that this will force me to continue to work long after I really would have been able to retire 🙂 🙂

My Pawpaw (Asimina triloba) still looks fine and it looks like something has eaten some of the leafs.

I won’t bring in this orchid until it is hit with the first frost, after that I hope it’ll flower in late winter again.

The perennial Sunflower and what looks like a hoverfly resting on it.

So the photos You can see today are all from the garden. They are guessing that tomorrow will be sunny though (and even on Sunday as well) so we’ll see what road the old Lady will chose to walk in the morning 🙂

Have a great day!

They play dare :-)

September 23, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

DSC_0007 (4)

Today started rather nice, it was slightly cloudy when I woke up but the sun started to shine between the clouds while we were out walking. Also it was cool enough to keep most mosquitoes and moose flies away and that makes any day a good day 🙂 🙂

DSC_0024 (3)

I know I can’t have fallen asleep before two am and I woke up at six thirty am and I’m still less tired today than those days I’ve slept around seven to eight hours 🙂 🙂 I know the tiredness will come later but so far it feels pretty good. It si raining now and thunder just passed the village pretty close and I can see that more is on its way. There is at least no risk what so ever that any lightning will manage to start a forest fire, at least one thing we can than all the rian that has been falling for so long now 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0033 (4)

Also I was thinking of using my new lawn mower for the first time today so I guess I should than the rain for not being able to do that 🙂 🙂 🙂 Today and tomorrow will be a bit cooler but we’ll have more sunshine tomorrow ands no rain, after that it’ll get cooler again but there really is no use in looking at those guessings since they have problems guessing the weather that will happen in two hours 🙂 It does at least look like we won’t have any frost nights the coming ten days. Normally the frost arrives around September sixth but so far it hasn’t even been close to happen.

DSC_0046 (2)

We’ve had lots of fog during nights though, sometimes I haven’t been able to see the road at all when driving home 🙂 🙂 Deer has probably had a competition about who’s the bravest and can run out in front of my car as close as possible, also a badger must have been competing about that as well. The winner however was a bird that actually was sleeping standing on the road, He can’t even have been more than an inch from getting hit by my car.

The mum I bought. I would rather had bought a rust colored one but this was the one they had 🙂

The rest of the photos show what’s in bloom right now .

I managed to get some photos in my garden before the rain and thunder started. Not much in bloom right now. I bought a Chrysanthemum yesterday. I’ve actually only seen this one for sale in the grocery store in Kvänum but they’ve had Asters instead and i didn’t want that. It is the wrong color and filled flowers but I wanted one so I bought it 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’ll plant it in my garden and if winter is mild enough it will survive until next year. It will look quite different (much higher than now) and might not flower in time before frost but I still want to try it. The only problem now is that I really don’t have any space for it 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!