Category: Nature reserve.

A sunny and wind free day for a change.

For once we’re having a day when the sun shines, no wind and after the ice cold morning a relatively warm day and I’m not at work πŸ™‚ Also a low pressure with rain and possibly snow is slowly entering the country and it looks like it’ll miss us here πŸ™‚ Something must be wrong and in one way or the other I’m sure I’ll have to pay for it πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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We walked down to the creek early this morning and even saw a few deer. Nova and Malkolm walks really good when leashed but Alma has after all that has happened here gone back to being impossible. She whines and shouts plus pulling the leash all the time. It hasn’t been easy for her losing her best friend like that and now when Malkolm is here being over protective.

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He’s fascinated by the creek and its running water πŸ™‚

Today I wondered where she was because she hadn’t been indoors for quite some time. So I went out through the kitchen door and it wasn’t until I walked over to the other side of the cottage when I heard her barking like insane πŸ™‚ She was down by the now rather big lake behind the garage so the sound couldn’t really reach the cottage. She was probably defending us towards something horrible like deer or pheasants πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ Well it could have been wild hogs too and she was smart enough to not trying to reach what ever it was because then she would have become wet and she really doesn’t like that πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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Later on we went out to the bog and she was just as impossible then as she had been in the morning. I do hope she calms down when Malkolm gets bigger and doesn’t need her protection but I doubt that πŸ™‚ Otherwise it has been a calm and nice day. I’ll need to bake some bread though but the day is still young and there’s plenty of time to do that. I could also start with the laundry but I really don’t feel like doing that πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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The lake behind the garage is getting bigger and bigger, normally it’s a swamp there πŸ™‚

The dogs are sleeping and I really would like to join them but I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to sleep at all tonight if I did that πŸ™‚ I would have liked to start doing things in the garden but the nights will stay below freezing so no use in doing that, I could mow the lawn though because when nothing else is growing the lawn sure does πŸ™‚ I have to put the new lawn mower together first though so bread baking it is πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

Storm again.

I could find five House sparrows in the wild rose, can You find them πŸ™‚ I had at least the big original photo to look at πŸ™‚

If You don’t think about the rain that fell or the storm strength winds all day this has been a really nice day πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ We have actually had a lot of sunshine as well so the laundry dried up really fast πŸ™‚ I had some extra laundry today because Malkolm the little monster decided it would be nicer to stay in bed and pee than to go out to the rainy world πŸ™‚ I really have no good place where thick fleece blankets can dry so I was at that moment and only then quite happy about the strong wind and sunshine πŸ™‚

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I was a bit hesitant about having a walk today. We did eventually go out and walked to the bog, I really didn’t want to get caught in any eventual shower passing by, then again walking in the forest when the winds were as strong as they were today wasn’t a good idea either. The trees swayed a bit too much and at one place big branches fell off a pine just after we had passed it.

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After our walk not only did I do the laundry I also baked a bread and tried to make a pizza base. I left some of the dough from the bread, added some more flour (today I added rice flour since it doesn’t taste much in it self) and spread it really thin on the baking sheet. It was ok but rose unevenly and it was over all a bit too thick. I have at least now tried it and will try something else next time.

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After that we all had a long nap. Alma and Nova in one of the sofas and Malkolm and I in the recliner. One really sleep well in a recliner πŸ™‚ Then I realized that I had forgotten to wash my working t-shirts so I had to do that as well. This time I just put them in a bucket and washed them by hand, they are easy drying, sort of feels like wearing some kind of plastic but always feel dry no matter how much one sweats πŸ™‚ Just as I hung them outside to dry in the wind and sunshine a hail storm passed by followed by some rain, something the weather sites said didn’t happen (they also show what kind of weather we’ve been having) πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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After the willows the Grape elder is always first to flower.

To be honest I would love to have another long nap, I’m just as tired as I was before. It’s pollen time so I guess that’s why. Runny nose,eyes that feels old and always tired, life is wonderful sometimes πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

There’s at least no snow here now.

The Crane couple that nests not far from the cottage walked around in the cow pasture when we went out on our morning walk. They are used to me and my dogs going out there every day so they didn’t really care about us.

I can’t pretend that we had a wonderful weather here today but the temperature rose above 10C (50F), there was no wind in the early morning when we had our morning walk but it did rain. First mostly drizzle but the closer we got to home the more it rained. It stopped shortly after we were in the cottage again πŸ™‚

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The ground is saturated with water now, there’s only sand in the ground so when the water stays like this there isn’t any more space for more water.

We went out to the bog even though Nova wanted to go down to the creek. I wasn’t sure about the rain and if it would become worse so I preferred to not walk too far from home. She was a bit grumpy at first but since now both her and Malkolm stops to sniff on the ground every second meter she sort of looked satisfied after a while. Alma went insane like always so I really can’t say what she thought about it πŸ™‚

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The wild hogs are slowly but steadily destroying the roads here now.

All the birds seemed to love this weather though, they’ve been singing all day but I think that 99% of the House sparrow and Field sparrow population around here stayed beneath the roof on my patio πŸ™‚ The Cranes in the pasture definitely liked the rain, I guess it brought out all the frogs so they could have a big breakfast πŸ™‚

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Two days ago, after work, I was going to have something to eat in front of the tv, just as I was about to sit down a puppy suddenly stood between my feet so I lost my balance. It all went really slowly so I just leaned towards the table and to my big surprise I continued slowly towards the floor. One of the table legs broke so both the table and I continued down to the floor in a very slow speed πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ So yesterday I ordered a new table that will arrive most likely on Wednesday or Thursday.

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I’ve placed the broken table leg so that I still can use it as long as none of the dogs run in to the table πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ I really should have bought another table at the same time I bought my sofas but even though the old table was pretty ugly it still worked and I thought I just as well could use it until it finally gave up πŸ™‚

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Have a great day!

Winter decided we shouldn’t think spring was here :-)

So this week has in many ways been rather terrible when it comes to the weather. On Tuesday we had around 40 cm (16 inches) of snow falling. I really didn’t like it at all, especially since it also went pretty cold. Easter was warm and friendly, it was fun to have a puppy in the house, You already know that a new puppy is living here again and during Easter we could stay outdoors all day. Then winter came back and I really couldn’t leave a puppy in the dog house/yard with that ammount of snow plus cold weather because a puppy wouldn’t understand that he would have to stay in the nice dog house all day long.

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He would be playing with Alma and even though she would most likely have stayed in the garage it still wouldn’t be especially warm there. I really didn’t want to come home to a puppy with pneumonia. So thankfully they understood at work so I have been at home this week hating the weather because we really couldn’t take any walks while it snowed and was so cold. To make it even more fun it snowed again on Thursday, this time just a little but it was already impossible for a puppy to go anywhere. Well we were out but I had to carry him almost all the time.

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Today however it’s warmer, tomorrow will be even warmer than today and on Sunday they’re guessing it’ll really warm and that we’ll have warm weather the entire next week. So back to work on Monday it is πŸ™‚ So the new guy is nine weeks old on Monday and his ancestry is Border collie (50%) , English Cockerspaniel and Golden retriever (25% each). He didn’t look like any of his parents to be honest and was the most long haired of them all. My guess is that he most likely will look something like a wrong colored Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever πŸ™‚ At first I guessed that he might look like a smaller wrong colored Golden though.

If You wonder why I don’t have any photos of Nova it’s because she tends to prefer staying indoors sleeping πŸ™‚

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Thankfully my neighbor works in a super market so I have been able to get what I need when it comes to food πŸ™‚ I have a few tins in the cool cellar just in case something would happen so I mostly use them now because their dates are closing in. A couple are too old but can one eat them? they’ve been stored cool all the time so would it be ok to eat them? Two tins with ham are spoiled otherwise and that would be a shame. Well I just remembered that I’m on the internet right now and I micro biologist said no problem to eat but the taste might have become less tasty. Just put the tin in boiling water for a couple of minutes or more and it’s quite edible. Well I’ll do that with one of the ham tins and if it smells ok I’ll take a tiny bit and hope to survive πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

Β  Β  Male Chaffinch.

Alma has finally understood that it is ok to tell Malkolm when he goes to far, like chewing on her hamstring with his sharp teeth or chewing on her tail while she’s walking away πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ Nova does what she can to avoid him when he’s too much (which is almost all of the time πŸ™‚ ) I’ll have to make her a raised bed so that he can’t terrorize her while I’m at work, she’s after all almost 18 now. He’s not a cuddly dog at all, he is very much Nova in that way. He usually sleeps on the floor on my slippers beside the bed. he has once or twice wanted to be in the bed but only for a few minutes. He’s very much Alma when it comes to energy though.

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He did however sleep for hours after our walk this morning, despite him not walking much at all. So much new things to see, hear and smell so that was what tired him out. Many people believe that they need to run around and spend energy all day to be tired in the evening but it is actually using the brain that tires them out. So Alma wouldn’t have become a calm dog if I could have been running with her every day, she would just have become a dog with even more energy but with the same problems and I’m pretty sure that would have killed me πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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It is time to have something to eat and when I leave the computer Malkolm will wake up so I better pick him up and take him outside so he doesn’t pee in the cottage πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

Then he decided that he didn’t want to sit on the tree stump
but didn’t realize how deep the snow was πŸ™‚
So I had him in a backpack when we went out and had it hanging on my front side so I could have an eye on him and make sure he wouldn’t try to jump out πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

Back to day shift again.

This hasn’t been the best of weeks for five people at work. The economy is bad over here and we don’t have as much to do as we used to so on Monday we were told that the evening shift would stop but that we all would start working day shift instead.

We were told that we would get info about it already the same evening. That didn’t happen but we were told we most likely would get the info on Tuesday or more likely on Wednesday but that didn’t happen either so of course we understood that it must be more serious than that. So yesterday we finally got the info and they have to let five people go. I’ve been working there for so long so there was never any risk that I would have to leave. The rules here is that last one in is first one out when people have to leave. They can do some exceptions when it comes to competence and since I’ve been working there for almost 17 years now I do have lots of competence.Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β  Β 
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I feel so sorry for those who has to leave because this is happening all over the country right now. There is however a light at the end of the tunnel because the inflation is going down and they haven’t risen the the loan interest and will most likely lower it in late spring and when people see at least the interest rate going down they will feel hopeful for the future and start to spend money again, so perhaps they will return to work before summer starts (well it starts quite late here to be honest but it will start even if it doesn’t feel like that right now).


We’ve had lots of snow falling lately, light fluffy snow that is impossible to get a grip in while walking πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ and we’ll get a bit more than three inches next Monday if they’re guessing it right. The fun thing is that it will start to melt away again already on Tuesday πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ Nights will be chilly though so once again we’ll have slippery icy roads that makes it exiting to drive to and from work again. I’ll stop working at five pm Mondays to Thursdays and four pm on Fridays, crappy hours to be honest but way better than the ones I have so I’m not complaining.

Today I woke up to nasty cold but sunny weather and we went out for a walk as soon as we woke up. I couldn’t feel any wind blowing, unusual since we seem to have a constant storm blowing here otherwise. Nova is usually the first one to want to take a walk but today she preferred to stay in my bed, I can fully understand her because she is after all 17.5 years old now. I did worry for a while that something was wrong with her because she slept really heavy and didn’t eat especially much. The afternoon meal however was gulped down so I guess it is the changing of when we sleep and eat once again that disturbed her. Now they’ve been used to eat after noon and around three am and suddenly we’re going back to normal hours again.

The swamp behind my garage is now a little lake instead.
More and more birds have realized that they can get an entire peanut if they go in to the feeder πŸ™‚

So even if I finally get to go up early in the mornings like I’ve always had it still is difficult to change back but perhaps I finally will get a good nights sleep again, haven’t had that since my christmas vacation. Today however have been a day of tiredness. I baked a bread and while waiting for it to be ready I fell asleep in my recliner, with Albin sleeping on my stomach πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ I had set the timer but didn’t understand what it meant when I woke up πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ Took around five minutes until I remembered that I had the bread in the oven πŸ™‚ Turns out that it was a perfect time for the bread to stay in the oven, I must remember that till next time πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

Almost like the old lake is back :-)

They were up early waiting for more peanuts πŸ™‚

Our painter at work managed to crack a lot of his ribs last weekend so guess who had to take his place while he is at home recovering? I truly hate that job and especially the heat that’s constant there because of the huge oven on one side of the painting box and the huge washing machine on the other side. The washing machine also adds humidity to it all making it even more nasty. Plus I wear the white overall that doesn’t breathe at all so it’s like walking in ones personal sauna all the time. I truly hate it!

I’m glad I didn’t have to drive anywhere today, usually one slides to the right and down again though and not to the left and down in to the cow pasture πŸ™‚

Still I’m the only one that can do it and after fifteen years painting with powder paint I know what I’m doing. Side effects to the heat and personal sauna is leg cramps and lots of peeing since I drink loads of water all the time and I’m tired every second I’m awake. Working only four days a week doesn’t make it better at all since I’m napping away the Friday and still is really tired on Saturday. I think weekends would be better if we had more daylight, as it is now it still gets dark so early that I really can’t do anything outdoors, instead I mostly half sleep in front of the tv, yippee.

Today I woke up to a really nice and sunny morning, they said we wouldn’t get any sunshine today so I shouldn’t have been surprised when I saw that the sun was slowly rising behind the mountain πŸ™‚ -) πŸ™‚ I had to fill the bird feeders before we went out on our morning walk, the birds were sitting close to the feeders just waiting for me to wake up πŸ™‚ After that we went out to the peninsula by the bog. No wind and sunshine made the walk really nice, I could even feel heat from the sun and I think that was the first time this year that happened.

I think these paw marks comes from Salmiak, very few other cats walk down this road normally.

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Not much snow left after this weeks rain but there was still some frozen snow on the ground in the forest. When everything else is quiet it sounds like small explosions when walking on frozen snow πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ so there wasn’t any chance what so ever to be able to see any wild animals today. I could have stayed all day (well at least for as long the sun still wasn’t covered by clouds) out on that peninsula. Back in the days with all the old dogs we quite often did stay out there for hours but today suddenly all the dogs wanted to go home so I guess a wolf might have been close to us or perhaps lots of wild hogs, the dogs don’t like them especially much either to be honest πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

So much water in the bog now that it almost looks like the old shallow lake they once dried out here.

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We’ve had our pancake Saturday, some of the laundry is done and we’ve also napped in front of the tv. All that is left to do today is to hope for that big lottery winning πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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Have a great day!

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Thursday morning. On our way out to the island in the bog.

The weather this week has been really nice, lots of sunshine and no wind. I couldn’t enjoy it especially much though because the cold I had during the christmas vacation didn’t want to leave me. It has been an odd one. Sometimes I’ve felt rather fine just to minutes later freeze like a dog or boil like a kettle. Runny nose and lots of sneezings but thankfully less coughing. Also the throat couldn’t decide whether it should hurt or not so that has come and gone as well πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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I have been on walks with the dogs though. Alma is in heat and she’s more annoying than usual, none of us can stand her for more than a few minutes at a time πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ She has been really annoying on our walks as well So at the moment she’s not the most popular girl here πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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Our fox is very much alive thankfully, I managed to take photos of it in the cow pasture on the other side of the gravel road. The fun thing is that I didn’t see it while I took some photos on the frost covered trees in the pasture πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚Β  I had the wrong telephoto lens on to be honest but then again if I had had the bigger one I might not have caught the fox at all.

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Today the weather sites first guessed that we would have fog in the morning, then they changed that to snow. So I wasn’t surprised that we had misty rain when I woke up, that changed to drizzle when we went out for our walk. Naturally it then turned to heavy rain for a short while to finally become snow. We did actually get fog too but well after noon. So I guess it would be hard to complain about those weather sites since we actually had both snow and fog plus the bonus rain πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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We walked down to the creek yesterday.
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From now on it’ll get nasty cold again and I’m not happy about it. Alma removes all covers I hang in the opening at the dog house, so all warmth in there goes away. Really annoying! So now I’ve ordered three Dog-Igloos. One really big for her and two smaller for Alma and Albin. So when Alma has removed and obliterated the cover once again they still can be warm and cozy when they go inside their Igloos. Alma will of course try to get in to the smaller ones as well since why wouldn’t she so I can only hope that Albin wants to stay in the bigger one so she can stay there at the same time as well. They are so big that she can’t drag them outside but I guess she will try to do that anyway πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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Today we walked out to the peninsula by the bog.
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All puppies and younger dogs tend to destroy anything that isn’t solid concrete, so especially things made from cloth will be teared in to zillions of pieces but I do hope she for once can stay away from destroying these Igloos, they were quite expensive. Then again, why would she.

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Have a great day!

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It fell down to -20C (-4F) last night but now they’re saying, on tv, that it’ll turn towards warmer again. The weather sites doesn’t show it that well though but how often are they right in their guessings πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ I do hope they’re right because I’m really tired of having a real winter again πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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We went out to the bog when we finally came out on our morning walk, I wanted it to get less cold but the snow was still enough cold to give Albin problems with his paws. Snow cramp isn’t funny. None of them seemed to hesitate going out there so I guess no wolves have been close for a while. I did however see lots of tracks after moose and the dogs really don’t like them either, not enough to stop them from going out on a walk there though πŸ™‚

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The only animal we heard was an over active raven, it was totally alone and I guess it had found something to eat and was calling after its friends. If there were any smaller birds they must have been amongst the trees on the island.Β  I guess if one is used to all the sounds there are in a city it could feel scary to walk around in an almost completely silent world like it is out there πŸ™‚

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I had hoped the cold would give up by now but instead it seems like it has gotten new strength. I’m sitting here very well dressed and still feels that it is way too cold πŸ™‚ Sneezing a lot but also coughing more than before. I still feel that it is going the right way, after all I’ve had it for quite some time now.

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Time to make something to eat and then stay up till really late just to get the right hours in to my brain for when I start working again πŸ™‚

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Have a great day!

Finally less cold!

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If You don’t already like apple products that company really doesn’t help You to start loving them, on the contrary because after trying to get an Apple account for half an hour I truly hated anything Apple related πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„ I’ve had one before but couldn’t remember what I wrote in the security questions so I had to make a new one. It is amazing how unwilling Apple was to cooperate with me. If they ask me for what my address was where I grew up it really should tell me just the street name and no numbers. Also I got codes from Apple that I should write and the numbers weren’t accepted!!!

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I finally made it and went out to find an app with voice recording, just to realize that it wouldn’t work unless the Ipad was connected to the internet!!?? Why on earth do I need to be connected to the internet?? So instead I’ll use the voice memo that already excists n the Ipad. After all I can talk for hours, stop the recording but continue to record again when I have some time left. Doesn’t seem to have a loop though but I’ll just continue to read books for hours πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„ another problem I had was that I couldn’t find any place to change the volume so I had to go online to find that out πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„

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Just around 0C (32F) here today. The snow is slowly, slowly melting but new one fell so not much difference in the snow thickness on the ground. We went out to the bog again and while being there I noticed some canine paw prints in the snow, made a couple of hours or so before we came out. Way too big and wrong shape for being a fox, also slightly smaller than Almas paw prints so I knew it wasn’t a wolf. Then again no prints from humans shoes so I couldn’t figure out what it was. On the way home I heard a hunting dog barking from a long distance, my guess is that it had made a visit to us before it went back to where it should be.

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Besides fighting with my Ipad I haven’t done much today. We’ve had our pancake day but that’s it. It’s already pitch black outside, the sun set at 3:16 pm today and it doesn’t take many minutes before it is dark here. I’m so glad that there’s only a few days left before it goes towards more hours with daylight. One odd thing has happened here today though, the christmas lights in the christmas tree were shining when we came home after our walk, they are battery driven and the dogs can’t start them but I haven’t either πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„ I never lock the door so someone must either been here and lit those lights or there’s something wrong with both light chains because both were shining πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„ If someone was here why didn’t they also start cleaning my cottage because god knows that it needs cleaning πŸ˜„πŸ˜„πŸ˜„

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The bees are sleeping and this year they have almost all the honey they produced because people don’t buy expensive Swedish honey when there’s cheaper foreign ones in the stores.

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The Amaryllis I bought was a filled one and I don’t like it πŸ™‚

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It is time to start recording the first of the Harry Potter books for the dogs πŸ˜„

Have a great day!

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We actually had sunshine for a couple of hours here today!! but since the hunters were out in the forest all the time it shone we couldn’t enjoy it on our walk. Isn’t it typical that the one day the sun shines they’ve decided since long that they should be out hunting πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ I really can’t complain about them because I they haven’t been out there especially much this autumn, bit it is still annoying πŸ™‚

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Nova is quite angry at me today. Isn’t it strange how a dogs hearing can change so much as it does sometimes? yesterday for instance I very quietly opened a box with toffee and she could hear that even though she was sleeping upstairs in my bedroom. Today however she couldn’t hear me calling her when she was two meters ahead of us when I wanted to take a detour on our way out to the bog πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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I leashed her as soonΒ  as we caught up with her and she’s been really angry since then ,even though we’ve had pancakes for dinner after our walk πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ I will continue to have her leashed for a while because if she’s a bit too far away from the rest of us and a wolf is nearby it might be the last thing she’ll do. I guess that a lonely old dog is way to tempting for a wolf to just let got.

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Besides that very little has happened. I’ve made dinner for work in the slow cooker but I haven’t tasted it yet πŸ™‚ I’ve also done the laundry so now after this I’ll bake some bread. I have a cold that doesn’t want to break out so I hope it will go away by tomorrow because I feel tired all the time. Either that or break out so I can get rid of it that way πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

I was surprised today!

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The rest of this weekend has been much less eventful and I’m so grateful for that πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ However I keep finding a lot of wasp queens here indoors and I have no idea how they get in here. Normally I try to just catch and release them but lately they have been a bit angry so I’ve had no other choice than to kill them. I don’t like that but I just can’t have angry wasps flying around in my home.

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We went out to the bog this morning and everything was just fine. Nova leash free as always a bit ahead of us and the rest of us following her. We went out on the peninsula and stayed there for a few minutes and turned back homewards again. Then suddenly Nova, 17 years old, started to run on the path. Albin did look a bit worried frowning and Alma did suddenly behave as if she had been to obedience school. So I guess we might have had a wolf rather close to us. I never see them though even if I now days quite often look back to see if anything is following us. I guess wolves just are too smart to follow us on the roads or paths.

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My orchid is finally opening up its flowers. They don’t smell anything but that’s quite common with orchids we have in our homes. I think it’ll get at least four more flower stalks before it’s season is over. The flowers look a bit more yellowish in the photos than they do in the real but I guess that’s because I used a flash when I took the photos.

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I also found something in my garden that made me really surprised! I found four fruits beneath my Black walnut!!! I haven’t even seen it in bloom. At first I thought it was odd that I found four figs beneath the canopy since my fig tree stands closer to the kitchen door but then I picked them up and realized that it was walnuts πŸ™‚ I know I should have waited to open up any of the fruits but I just wanted to see how big the nut would be, so I opened the smallest one. I figured that since it is so small I’d rather plant it in a pot and place it outside, if it germinates there’s always someone who would want a walnut tree and if not the forest is quite big and most people would see it as an ash tree instead πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

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I’ve started to bring in more of what is going to spend winter in my cool cellar, like these apricot trees.
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They do look like figs, don’t they?
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The smallest that I opened up.
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Nova taken with the Minolta 8000i.

I didn’t win the lottery so tomorrow it’s back to work again, it is at least a short work week this time. It’s dark outside now but tomorrow morning I’ll check if there are any more walnuts in the tree. To be honest I’m happy about the four I got since I didn’t think I would get any at all but as we say here: much wants more πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

Have a great day!

Strong winds.

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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.

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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 πŸ™‚ 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.Β  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.

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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.

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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 πŸ™‚

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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 πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ 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.

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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 anΒ΄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 πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ 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.

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Have a great day!