Category: Phone photos.

Good Yule!

December 24, 2023 · 2 Comments ·

x (6) — They had decorated a tree like this in a small village where I had to change bus to get to my new car. It reminded me of something I’ve read about, that before we started to bring in the christmas trees like spruces and pines here in Sweden, sometimes they brought in young apple trees and decorated them and if the timing was right the young apple tree started to flower just around christmas.

So I’ve done all the important stuff today, I’ve made the christmas ham and at the same time I also put the prince sausages and meatballs in the oven together with the ham 🙂 I’ve eaten some of the Quality Street bonbons, I’ve watched the Donald Ducks christmas show and also fallen asleep a few minutes in to it. I did however just doze off for a few minutes so I watched most of it anyway 🙂 🙂 The birds did get more seeds than usual and we had a rather nice walk in the morning when the temperature was as low as -12C (10,4F). No wind and sunshine made it really nice even though I couldn’t feel any warmth from the sun what so ever.

It wont look this wintery for long though, it will start raining already tonight and the temperatures are now slowly move above 0C (32F). It’s snowing at the moment, tiny flakes and I guess that if they’re guessing it right we’ll have very little snow tomorrow. It will rain even more tomorrow but it will unfortunately be sunny on Boxing day. I write unfortunately because the hunters will be out and they’ll hunt for hare and fox. I wished them good luck with the hares but they already know that we truly and deeply dislikes them for hunting fox here. We need them to keep the ammount of rodents down, these mild winters have really suited the rodents, so everyone in this part of the village hates when they hunt for fox.

I was going to bake gingerbreads but didn’t have any energy to do it but over here we say that christmas lasts till easter so I have plenty of time to do that 🙂 🙂 I did however defrost the freezer yesterday. It was cold enough outdoors so it was the time to do it if I ever was going to. I must admit that i didn’t realize how much ice there was in there 🙂 🙂 🙂 It took well over five hours even if I had placed a bowl with boiling water in there and even though there is a shallow sort of gutter at the bottom of the freezer that is supposed to lead the water in one direction out to bowl collecting it, it really doesn’t 🙂 🙂 so now the floor around it is nice and clean as well 🙂 🙂

This morning when I was about to put everything back in the freezer I also looked if anything in there contained gluten, so now my freezer is quite empty 🙂 🙂 🙂 Only the things I’ve made myself were gluten free. The reason I did that (because I’m pretty sure I would have forgotten normally) is because I bought a Julmust with orange flavor. I was talking with one of the owners of the grocery store I buy my food from because they were offering taste samples of bread with something on and I said I couldn’t eat it. So then they said that at least I could drink the Julmust. Turns out they were pretty wrong about that 🙂 🙂 🙂 I did wonder why my stomach suddenly gave up now when I’ve been so careful with having nothing with gluten. So I checked the internet and voila, the Julmust contains gluten.

Most other, if not all, Julmust only have the flavoring of malt and not the real thing so it was an honest mistake but I will inform them about it. There’s nothing more I’ll do today than watch the British crime drama “Vera” and perhaps a program about the smaller wild cats we have around the world. I’ve watched it before and to be honest, those small wild cat species are really much more interesting than the bigger ones, perhaps because we always almost only see programs about the big ones. Tomorrow starts the time of leftovers, sandwiches with ham, sausages and meatballs. I’ll make them a bit more fun by adding blue cheese as well 🙂

Taken through my kitchen window, these birds truly loves peanuts 🙂

I wish You all a Good Yule!

Snowstorm and new car.

December 22, 2023 · 4 Comments ·

The snowstorm Pia passed by yesterday evening and all night long. I had borrowed my neighbors car and if there’s one thing one doesn’t want to do is to wreck their car because one was driving careless 🙂 🙂 🙂 So even though I went home half an hour earlier I still came home a few minutes later than I normally would have done 🙂 🙂

A15659_001A — As You can see this photo wasn’t taken today but was taken last spring (with my Agfa Flexilette) but it shows the only big building, besides the castle, that still stands in what once was a thriving village.

20231222_111056 — This is just beside the previous building.

The car dealer and I had agreed to meet around 1pm and I was going to get there by bus. The bus would leave my bus station at 12:05 and on a sunny and nice day in spring or summer it takes around 45 minutes to walk there,so since the world now once again is filled with that white crap (and the fact that it rained a lot before the snow fell and it went cold) I decided to start early, I’m so glad I have studded boots because the snow didn’t stick well to the ice covered road. Today it took almost exactly one hour.

20231222_113302 — This is the creek where it flows out in to the lake.

I think I would have thought the world was beautiful if I hadn’t had to walk in this mess 🙂 🙂 I only brought my phone so only a few photos today. The wind was still blowing pretty hard and it was bitterly cold. Well walking and wearing really good winter clothes did help but standing and waiting for the bus still made me pretty cold inside.

20231222_113436 — The road leading to the castle. Big oaks grown on each side of it.

I managed to get there in time and went to the grocery store on my way home. They usually like when I tell them about my car problems 🙂 🙂 So we had a good laugh before I finally drove home again. I haven’t had much sleep to be honest but I think the short nap I had in my recliner will help me to stay awake until at least 9 pm 🙂 🙂

20231222_114423 — There once was a big yellow house standing behind those Birches. I guess it was the rectory but now days priests usually don’t live beside the churches they work in.

Only one previous owner and it has a new cam belt, that was the thing that made me want to have it without even seeing it in a photo 🙂 🙂 It has six gears, something I need to get used to. The only things I really made sure to know about before I drove home was to know how to open the fuel filler flap, something I didn’t understand with the borrowed car, I had to phone them to know how 🙂 how to handle the different lights and how to control the heat in the car, it took me over a day before I understood it in the borrowed car 🙂 🙂 🙂 Cruise control and how to manage to radio can be learned later 🙂 🙂 🙂

20231222_125854 — This is at the bus stop in a village called Ljung. I like how they decorated the tree like that. Back in the days before they brought in spruces at christmas they often brought in a young crab apple tree, dressed it and if they were lucky it had green leafs and perhaps even small flowers when christmas arrived.

Winter vacation started today so no more work until January 8 🙂

Have a great day!

20231222_150507 — My new car and a very happy Alma 🙂

I still prefer rain to snow.

November 4, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

Long working Friday means slow Saturday. I really can’t understand the genius at work who thought it would be a good idea to make the last working day in the week also the longest (start earlier in the day and stop one hour later in the night). Ok it’s only every second week that happens but to be honest that idea is really stupid 🙂 🙂 🙂 A good thing is that we don’t work the Friday before the christmas vacation starts 🙂

It was so foggy when I drove home last night that I sometimes had no idea where I was. Not even when I was only a few hundred meters (much the same in yards) away from the village 🙂 🙂 I was of course driving really slow and since there were so many Roe deer on and beside the road I most likely would have anyway. I had hoped that there would be lots of fog left when I woke up today but by the time I got up the fog was already on its way to dissolve. I was going to fetch a package at the grocery store in Gudhem so I did that as soon as the dogs had had their breakfast, so I also missed the sunshine we had those few minutes I was away to get that package 🙂

Still it was still quite bright when we were out walking and since there was no wind what so ever it really was quite nice. No bigger animals out in the fields so I was pretty sure no bigger predators were in our part of the forest, deer and other bigger animals tends to go out to the fields when predators are around, so they can see them earlier and therefore flee in time. We did hear some walk away when we passed them on our walk though, running in a dense part of the forest isn’t something one does quiet 🙂

Hunters will be out in the forest tomorrow if the weather isn’t too bad and when looking at the different weather sites it looks like the little rain we’ll get will come in the afternoon. They usually never stay for long though so I guess we’ll have our first walk for the day rather early anyway. It’ll stay fairly warm the coming week and that means it’ll also rain some every day and it doesn’t look like we’ll have a day without rain for at least a week. I must admit that I’m really tired of the rain now, even my sandy soil is now constantly wet and muddy (which is really hard for sand to become 🙂 🙂 🙂 ). I guess however that I wouldn’t like snow and cold weather any more so let the rain come 🙂

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Have a great day!

The wind is the same but now it’s raining.

May 1, 2023May 1, 2023 · Leave a comment ·

So if yesterdays weather looked nice from indoors todays wetaher doesn’t and isn’t either 🙂 There was at least no wind in the earky morning when we went out for our walk but it did rain consistently for the entire hour we were outside. To be honest, none of the dogs wanted to take a walk but I forced them because I wanted them to get rid of some energy. Albin and Alma can destroy an entire house when they’re going full force playing 🙂 🙂 🙂

The rain did stop and naturally during the time I did the laundry. Almost as soon as I’ve finished it the rain came back 🙂 🙂 During that time I also saw the sun for almost ten whole seconds 🙂 🙂 I wouldn’t mind that much if the wind just could stop blowing, especially since it is just as cold as it was yesterday. The birds doesn’t seem to mind the weather as much though, they sing a bit less I guess but then again lots of them are on the ground eating what ever they can find and it looks like they find a lot.

I did my taxes today and even before I made the car deduction for driving to and from work because I really can’t use public transportation (it would take 150 minutes one way and it takes 30 minutes with a car) I would get a few dollars back 🙂 Can’t remember when that happened the last time With the deduction I’ll get a few more back but since our inflation is insane here that money won’t last for long 🙂 🙂 🙂 Well it’s better than to have to pay back 🙂 🙂 🙂

A15398_002 — Four from the Agfa Ambiflex. A bit too wintery but they make today look nice and cosy in comparison 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Around five? years ago I sowed some Gardenia seeds, I’ve tried before but have always failed. This time however I got five little plants and I still have five living even though one really look more dead than alive 🙂 🙂 🙂 Today I found flower buds on the two of them that I looked at!! I also noticed that they were attacked by something, can’t really say what I only saw the larvae or what it was. So now I’ve sprayed them with soapy water. Soapy water suffocates everything insect-wise and I do hope I didn’t destroy the coming flowers by doing so.

A15265_020A — Four from the Agfa Ambi Silette. These photos on the other hand make today look like a nasty november day 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Tomorrow’s a working day again so back to work it is. I actually almost won back all the money I spent on the lottery, not quite but very close 🙂 🙂 🙂 not enough to stop working but I’ll at least not have to pay more than less of a $ US next week 🙂 🙂 🙂

A15266_004 — Why not ad a wintery photo from the Flexaret VI too.

Have a great day!

The last of the nice days, for now.

April 22, 2023 · 4 Comments ·

a (1)

Another rather wonderful day, the last one for a while they say. It does however look as that they now are guessing that it won’t be that cold as they first guessed so I guess they were right the first time they guessed 🙂 Even nights will be fairly nice the coming days so that means I don’t have to cover the potted plants I brought up from the cool cellar. They have been though and that saved them from as low temperatures as -6C (21,2F) several nights. The meat eating plants I bought last spring have also survived and are now moved outside. Anything that eat flies are friends of mine 🙂

a (4) — There was still frost on the ground when we were out on our morning walk.

a (6)

A week ago I started to cut down a part of the garden that mostly consisted of thorny wild roses and thorny sloe bushes. They spread way too fast and it was impossible to pass without getting caught by all those thorns. It was a paradise for birds and other small animals because no predator could ever reach them in there. Still they had to go but the birds and all other small animals can still enjoy the protection of the thorns because I placed all those thorny branches in a big pile beneath the apple tree. They’ll stay there until next year when I’ll put it all through my compost grinder. It really doesn’t work well with fresh branches so it’ll have to wait a year.

20230416_140402 — Two thirds of what I was cutting down left here.

20230416_140338 — The first pile of thorny branches.

20230422_121329 — Two more piles that were moved to the first one.

20230422_121341 — This is the result. One rose is left and I do hope I saved the right one, the one that doesn’t spread via the roots 🙂 To the right, beside the blue large pot, You can see sand cherry trees. They are actually quite long but tends to follow the ground instead up growing up towards the sky. Gives delicious berries 🙂

Now I’ll have to continue to mow that area no matter what weather we’re having so that no new shoots can grow up again. Either that or cover the area with a hug and rather costly tarpaulin. I used my the little hand chain saw I bought last year and even though it works well the batteries don’t last for long but takes hours to recharge. Now I’ll need to sharpen the chain because sloe is really hard and wears down the chain pretty quick. I have one more place I need to cut down, new bushes grew up in the middle of one of my gooseberry bushes so now there’s very little gooseberry bush but lots of other things instead 🙂 I also mowed the lawn for the first time today and I think I was first in the neighborhood. I’m not that keen to do it as often as the neighbors though 🙂 🙂

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Alma has now adopted my neighbors and is over there just as much as she is here. They thankfully like her a lot, especially since she’s so calm with their older daughter?! She’s never calm here but as soon as she jumps over that fence she the calmest dog in the world playing nicely with a 4 year old 🙂 🙂 🙂 It’s good to know she’s welcome though, otherwise life would be so much more complicated.

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Have a great day!

Not as uneventful as I wish it had been :-)

April 14, 2023 · 6 Comments ·

WordPress have lowered the amount of gigabyte I can use for free, from 3 GB to 1Gb and that would mean I would have to start a new blog so often that I finally caved in and bought more space. Now I have 6GB per year but I’ll have to pay for it. So from now on this is the place I’ll stay at.

A15265_001A — From the Agfa Ambi Silette.

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We’ve had a cloudy week but rather nice temperatures but since it has been so cloudy I’ve taken very few photos so all photos today are older ones. I would have liked to say that the week has been totally uneventful but that would be to lie a bit 🙂 Twice this week I’ve had calls from neighbors telling me that Alma had escaped from the dog yard 🙂 🙂

A15264_005A — From the Voigtländer Bessamatic.

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I have no idea why she does it because she’s miserable when she can’t get back in again 🙂 🙂 I do hope I now have secured the fence enough to make it too difficult for her to get out again until I can fix the dogyard properly again. It is a good thing my neighbors like her a lot 🙂 🙂 but we are all a bit worried that she might get hit by a car, not many comes here to be honest but if anyone who doesn’t know about her habit of escaping comes here I really don’t want her to be hit by them. A good thing though is that she doesn’t approach strangers.

20220827_060429 — From my phone, a Samsung something.

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They are now guessing that it will be really warm towards the end of next week so now people are planning to fill up their outdoor bathtubs and all kinds of things one can do in warm weather. They really shouldn’t since it’s over a week and at best our weather forecasts are slightly worse than bad 🙂 🙂 I’ll be happy if the sun shines, if nothing else it at least makes it feel warmer 🙂

a (12)

Have a great day!

We never see wild life any longer.

November 5, 2022 · Leave a comment ·

The weather has been rather pleasant today, we went out as soon as I noticed that the sun rose but since it felt a bit chilly I decided to put on the winter jacket. Too bad that Alma decided that today was the day she would stop behaving at all 🙂 🙂 It felt like I was walking in a sauna in that jacket. It felt like I had run a marathon after just have passed the beekeepers cottage and that’s just 150 meter (much the same in yards) away from home 🙂 🙂 🙂

I needed a long nap after that walk and the sun shone when I woke up again. I went downstairs and opened the kitchen door and noticed that while the sun was shining the rain was also pouring down. There was a tine cloud just above us but I didn’t think that it was big enough to pour down that amount of water.

Nothing much else has happened here. We never see much wild life any more because of Almas shouting and me scolding her for pulling the leash 🙂 but we do here a lot of ravens and jays. I guess those are the only birds that manages to be louder than us 🙂 🙂 🙂 I did put down my carnivorous plants in my cool cellar today though, the venus fly traps and the pitcher plants. All north american but not hardy enough to stay outdoors all winter. Well so far it has been much warmer than normal so they could have stayed outdoors much longer but I tend to forget to bring them in before it is to late normally.

Tomorrow will be much the same as always. I’ll wake up early, start with the laundry. After that I’ll make dinner to have at work next week and I’ll use the slow cooker of course. I’ve been really lazy lately so I’ve just made pasta and meat sauce and will do so for the coming week as well. I might change my routine if I would win lots of money in the smaller lottery today (the one where I only 🙂 can win 150 millions 🙂 🙂 The big one didn’t have any winner yesterday so anyone winning it in the end will be filthy rich 🙂 Well to be honest 150 millions isn’t that bad either 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for something to eat and I think I’ll have warm cocoa with it.

Have a great day!

20221105_160740 — I think most of us call this one Christmas cactus now days. Back in the days however there were several different species we had, some flowered in November so they were called November cactus here and the other ones were called Christmas cactus just because they were in bloom around Christmas. Now days they are so mixed with each other that they flower any time of year really. This one used to be clear white but like always they tend to turn pink after a few years.

The first frost!

August 31, 2022 · 4 Comments ·

20220830_060424 — The first frost on the car. I had a few photos in the phone that I show today.

We had our first morning with frost yesterday. The temperature sunk to 0C (32F) for just long enough time to give me a sheet of ice over the entire car. I can’t say I liked it 🙂 🙂 🙂 Normally the first frost arrives at September 6 so it came a week early.

20220829_093136 — This rather aggressive spider refused to be pushed away from the toilets at work 🙂 🙂 The body is around four fifths of an inch.

When I’m at work my dogs are in the dog house/ yard or garage. They once dug a hole in the ground to get in to the garage so after that it’s now their indoor yard 🙂 They’ve created havoc in there so I rarely go inside to see what it looks like now days 🙂 🙂 The problem now days is that they easily get in there but Nova is old and not especially agile any more so quite often I need to open the garage door to let her out. Albin has never been agile in any way and he’s getting older as well so lately I’ve had to open the garage door for him too.

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So yesterday when I came home Alma came out from the dog house (a big part of the wood shed to be honest, it’s so big that I almost can stand straight and I would have no problems having a bed in there 🙂 ) but neither Albin or Nova came out. So I opened the garage door and out ran Albin but I couldn’t find Nova? In this garage/ wood shed, dog house they’ve saved the old outhouse (the old outdoors toilet) and remade it in to a garden shed. and it is sort of built in to the garage. I called after her but she didn’t make a sound, then something on the ground caught my eye.

DSC_0014 (7) — The photo really doesn’t show it but the leafs are now slowly changing colors.

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Turns out that the old lady had dug her way beneath the old outhouse and while doing that pushed the sand behind her blocking the way back out 🙂 🙂 🙂 I have no idea for how long she has been trapped there but it looked like she has had plenty of space anyway 🙂 🙂 🙂 So the first thing I had to do was to dig her out of that place and when i finally got her out I blocked the space with an old lawn mower 🙂 🙂 🙂 The lady might be old but she’s still pretty active 🙂 🙂 🙂

20220830_163829 — She had dug her way in beneath the old outhouse where the lawn mower now are pushed down and I could see her nose mowing from the little space between the wall and ground to the left where the rake stands.

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Have a great day!!

Lots of thunder lately.

August 19, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

The photos are taken with either my phone or my little Sony so they can be taken any morning since last week.

We’ve had lots of thunder lately and today is no exception. It has stayed calm for a while but now it’s closing in again. I don’t mind since the heat will cool down for at least a while.

Yesterday and before noon today the weather guessings showed that we could possibly get up to two inches of rain today but has since then calmed down considerable, as most we’ll now get perhaps a tenth of that.

On Wednesday I found a notice about a registered letter that I could fetch in Falköping. I had absolutely no idea what it could be so I took a couple of hours off from work to go and get it. When I get there they check and says I’ve already have fetched it? I don’t know what they are doing at the Swedish postal service because it turns out that it was the parcel I already had fetched!! So it wasn’t a letter and I haven’t gotten a paper note in my mailbox about anything I can pick up at the post office in so many years that I actually can’t remember when it happened the last time 🙂 🙂 🙂 The girl I talked to felt so sorry for me going there unnecessarily that when I bought a soft ice cream she made it so big that I had huge problems eating it 🙂 🙂 🙂

Today I went to the grocery store in Gudhem and picked up another parcel, this time by another company thankfully, it was my new coffee maker 🙂 I haven’t tried it yet, it is too late for tea or coffee if I want to have any sleep tonight so I’ll do it first thing tomorrow morning 🙂

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I can hear the thunder closing in again, the lightning map says it’s still several km, miles, before it is here but thunder can move fast sometimes.

Have a great day!

Sometimes I do wonder about our postal service!

July 28, 2022 · 6 Comments ·

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So I woke up to e clear sky just before the sun started to rise and we went out for our morning walk as soon as I had put on my clothes and the dogs their harnesses. I did take a look at the thermometer before we went out and it showed 4C (39,2F). It was wonderful to take a slightly longer walk in that temperature because not a fly or mosquito were around to bite and annoy us 🙂

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Alma had once again decided that she would be impossible but she did at least not scream loudly when we passed our neighbors and Albin didn’t even look for Salmiak. Salmiak however is totally ok and it might actually be that Albin never tried to bite him but just push him down with his nose but as I said to the beekeepers I’m not willing to try it again just to see if that’s the case 🙂 🙂 🙂 Anyway we walked down to the creek and followed it down-streams. Alma was everywhere as usual and when Albin wanted to walk out on one of those small bridges that cross the creek she naturally had to follow and since Alma is like she is she then fell down and in to the rather muddy water 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0036 (7) — Those three trees are the last ones in the WOW trees 🙂

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That didn’t calm her down especially much and we had a full blown war between us all the way home. It’s fun but as soon as we pass the gate she calmes down and becomes that wonderful dog she is here at home. She smelled of mud and rust, lots of rust in the waters here so I had to shower her. I could have and should have done it outside with the garden hose but instead decided I should do it in my tiny bathroom. I decided that she would follow in her own pace and everything was going fine until both Nova and Albin decided they too had to go in to the shower. Well I did manage to get in there but she wasn’t happy. At least until she realized it wasn’t that bad, perhaps even rather nice 🙂

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After that I had to go to the store. I decided I should go to the one in the village where I work, mostly because I needed duct tape. They are the only ones I know that sell a kind where one can split it in half and get two thinner strips. All other ones are difficult to do that with. So off I went. At the same time I got two text messages that told me I was going to have two packages delivered to my home but I didn’t need to be at home at the delivery. Just before I left the store I also got a text message that Almas new harness had arrived and that I could pick it up in Gudhem. I could have waited but thought I really want to try it as soon as possible.

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When I came home again my neighbor told me that a guy had been here to deliver my packages but went to them instead. My neighbor told him to leave the packages with him or just put them in my garden around 20 meters beside. No problem the delivery guy said, tossed the packages in the car again and drove off??!! I then got a message that the packages had been delivered but I didn’t have them and my neighbor hadn’t either. So I called our postal service and was pretty angry, asked something about if the driver possible had some mental challenges or other problems (I’m not proud of that) (I did say to the girl in the phone that I wasn’t mad at her but she was the one who unfortunately had to take my anger). She fully understood and after perhaps ten minutes waiting she then asked how my neighbors house looked like. The delivery guy had told her he had placed the packages close to the post boxes (around a 100 meters, much the same in yards)Turns out that he had placed my packages at the farm up the slope!

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I know I have a high hedge but my cottage is very visible when driving down the slope so I have no idea why he though my neighbor next door meant the farm up the hill??One package weighs 20Kg (44,1 pound) and the other package was very big but not heavy at all, so I had to go back home and take my car to get it back home 🙂 🙂 🙂 On the other side, I did get my neighbors mail in my mailbox instead 🙂 🙂 🙂 Well everything was solved and now I don’t have any more packages so everything is as it should but if I can chose who will deliver my packages in the future it will never be our postal service again!

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Have a great day!

e (5) — If Albin doesn’t want to play Alma is fully capable to entertain herself with an apple 🙂 🙂

e (10)

The beginning of our three day heat wave.

July 19, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

It has been hot here today, Scandinavian hot that is, 28C (82,4F) and it isn’t nice at all. No problem at the beginning of it though because we had a strong and cool wind blowing but when the wind died out so did our energy 🙂 Alma tried to be full of energy for as long as she could but even she had to give up in the end 🙂 🙂 🙂 Tomorrow we’ll most likely reach 34C (93,2F) so I’m not looking forward to that at all. It’ll only last for three days, on Friday it’ll get much cooler and we’ll have loads of rain if they are guessing it right.

DSC_0005 (7) — They are now gathering all twigs and branches in big piles, they’ll make pellets from it all so that we can buy that and use in our heating systems.

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Like on me Novas joints don’t like the hot weather at all, she has problems walking up the stairs now, while she in the cool and early morning had no problems at all. She has been a bit spoiled now when she has been feeling bad because of her ear so I’ve added something she likes (well both the others likes it too), Tuna 🙂 Now she refuses to eat at all unless I put in tuna or something else she really likes 🙂 🙂 🙂 So this morning when there wasn’t anything extra in the food she just sniffed at it and walked away, she ate almost twice as much as she usually do when I had added tuna to the food this afternoon. Hot temperatures really didn’t affect her appetite for something she likes 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Fewer and fewer birds sing during the days now, they are doing what they can to secure the future for the younglings they have now rather than prepare for another batch of them, instead katydids have started playing, and loud as well especially in the evening. I do like to fall asleep to the sound of playing katydids. Especially hot days like this one can pretend that they are rather quiet cikadas 🙂 🙂 🙂 We don’t have cikadas here so it’s easy to let the imagination fly free 🙂 🙂

DSC_0026 (7) — This one used to belong to the Corydalis family but they split that family up. No idea what it is called now though. I think it is annual and really grows as much as the weed it is. It is a favorite of mine in my garden.

DSC_0033 (6) — The Sweet William grows here and there in my garden.

22 new species are added to the list of invasive and forbidden species here in the EU. From the previous forbidden species we already had around half of them growing in the wild but so I’m not sure if forbidding them actually will help anything. My guess is that since we have problem enough as it is, like the drought most likely will reduce the harvesting to around half of what they normally can harvest and the war in Ukraine will reduce that perhaps even more, the will of killing of plants and animals that shouldn’t be here might be a bit low. I was surprised that the The African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis) actually is seen as a threat here, our winters are after all still quite chilly in periods.

DSC_0037 (5) — It is hard to see any apples in my Aroma apple tree but it doesn’t look as a successful year for that tree.

DSC_0038 (5) — However it’s a totally different thing when it comes to the tree I once sowed from an Aroma apple kernel. The apples on this tree are delicious but they tend to be hit by rot and fungus easily.

Lots of garden plants are also forbidden now, even though we seems to be allowed to still have them in our gardens but they are not allowed to be sold or spread by humans. Last year they tried to have a “Kill all Lupins” day here in Sweden and I think zero people cared about it 🙂 🙂 🙂 We love our lupins and really don’t care what authorities says about them. Do You know why they are seen like a problem? It’s because they start growing in places where very few other plants will grow due to really bad soil. When they start to grow someplace they actually make the ground much better and plants that can’t compete with other plants where the ground is good will then die instead.

original_file_home — This is now the first thing I see when I start my mobile. He does look a bit grumpy, doesn’t he 🙂

I’ve baked another bread in the slow cooker and it turned out even better than the first one. I really can’t understand how people can fail baking bread in a slow cooker. Just do as always but instead of letting it rise the second time just put the dough in the cooker. The temperature is so low that it’ll have time enough to rise before it starts to being baked. For once I even took a photo of the bread. It is up side down so the top is pointing downwards and that paret is very light but the rest is just as brown and crispy as one wishes 🙂 the “folds” on the surface of it are prints from the baking paper (parchment paper).

Have a great day!

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A really nice first day.

July 11, 2022 · 4 Comments ·

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I had a tough night last night, my dogs tried to take over my bed and push me off it 🙂 🙂 🙂 To be honest I think it mostly was Alma but the two others just spread out more the more space she gained from pushing me away 🙂 🙂

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I went to my friend who ownes a garden center today (didn’t take any photos but I can’t say I know why I didn’t 🙂 🙂 ). She now has two eight months old german shepherd/ rottweiler cross dogs and it’s fun to see the difference between them and Alma who is a cross between white swiss shepherd dog (more or less a white german shepherd) and dobermann. While her two dogs looks more like rottweilers Alma looks more like a german shepherd. One of her dogs has begun to behave much like Albin when it comes to other dogs while the other one is more like Alma. Really want too meet but is also really vocal about it 🙂 🙂 Two beauties non the less 🙂

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I didn’t stay for long and wasn’t planning to buy any plants this time but I had planned to buy some soil because I’m out of it now. So naturally I didn’t come home with any soil but I do have a walnut tree here now 🙂 🙂 To be honest I didn’t buy it because she didn’t think she would be able to sell it any longer and was going to throw it away. So I could take it if I wanted and of course I wanted that 🙂 🙂 The tree wasn’t standing in a pot with soil but instead the roots were covered with something I can’t guess what it is and it had no problems staying alive as long as it got water.

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So the first thing I did was to plant it in a pot with the soil I had left and some peat and then I watered it a lot. I’ll keep it like this until next year, so it’ll spend winter in my cool cellar (if it survives for that long) and then I’ll plant it next spring. I know where because I have some plants I’m pretty sure won’t tolerate the toxins that will leak out from the walnut tree and that would be an easy way to get rid of them 🙂 🙂 🙂 All walnut species are more or less toxic towards their environment, a good way for plants to eradicate anything that would compete about the nutritions in the ground.

DSC_0007 (4) — The wheel barrow is full of flowers now.

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Today has been mostly sunny, warm and with a strong wind blowing. Quite nice to be honest. They’re guessing that tomorrow will be rather hot and after that it’ll slowly cool down until Friday when it will be rather chilly, 15C (59F) if we’re unlucky. We’ll also get plenty on rain on Friday so I won’t complain too much, I can always nap all day if the weather will behave like that 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0014 (3) — I’ve sowed poppies in my garden for many years now but I get one or two as best. This is one of the two that actually isn’t growing in the wheel barrow.

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Have a great day!

20220711_132559 — The walnut needed some support so I used this old ring net (is that the right word?). It’ll stand here on the north side of my house for quite some time before I move it anywhere.

20220711_152441 — I told my Amur grape vine that if it didn’t give me any grapes this year I would dig it up 🙂