Category: Walks.

So many ticks.

July 30, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

k (2)

Nothing much has happened here. Yesterday morning started out much like the previous one, cold and sunny, so the morning mist was just starting to build up when some clouds came and destroyed it all. They prevented the heat from the sun to evaporate the cold morning dew so no morning mist.

DSC_0037 (7) — The Chamomile still flowers.

This morning had no clouds but it was too warm (over 10C (50F) ) so no mist today either. I really didn’t want to take a walk because of the constant war between me and Alma but I had noticed yesterday that the new harness actually does make a difference. I can attach the leash on the front and since it’s fairly low every time she pulls the leash she turns around because the leash moves towards her front leg and disturbs her balance. So far she hasn’t figured out a countermove but I can see that she’s trying 🙂 🙂 🙂

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It was warm enough for flies to fly around but not especially many did. I’m not sure if the fly season now is over, which I hope, or if they were busy elsewhere. It could be that they all are in my garden though because there’s no lack of them here 🙂 🙂 🙂 There’s absolutely no lack of ticks though. After we came home I combed Nova and took two from her. None was caught from Albin or Alma but then suddenly I saw plenty walking around on Almas head and also one on Albins. I don’t know where the one on Albin hid because he has plenty of white on him so it’s hard for a tick to hide. All in all I picked seven more from those two.

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I had hoped the pet store would be open today but during summer he tends to have Saturdays closed. He sells a anti tick spray that is made only with scents ticks hate and it works pretty well. Albin is allergic to it but I can use it on the other two. It is after all so much easier to have to go through only one dog with extremely short fur 🙂 🙂 I can also spray it on my trousers. Pretty expensive though but it is well worth it. I’ll go there first thing on Monday morning instead. They even get them here in the garden and that’s because a deer seems to be visiting us when it knows we’re all asleep. I do like deers but I wish they could wait to visit us until the tick season is over 🙂 🙂

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I think it is time for a cup of tea and after that perhaps a nap. We’ve been up since before the sun rose and since I still am on vacation a nap sounds pretty nice 🙂 I do have some ice cream in the freezer and I think that would go nicely with a nice tea 🙂 Today I’ll only do one thing, every now and again I’ll go out to the vegetable patch to check the cabbage for butterfly eggs and caterpillars. It is amazing how fast even the tiniest caterpillar can eat those leafs!

DSC_0058 (1) — The new harness, it is called “Military harness”. I have no idea if they used something like this in the army anywhere but it sort of looks like it. The leash can be attached at her back but also in the front which the next photo almost shows 🙂

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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 🙂 🙂 🙂

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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)

Terrible morning.

July 26, 2022 · 4 Comments ·

a (7)

So we went out for our morning walk and while Alma was quite calm yesterday she today had decided not to be. It went fairly well to be honest but as we were passing the beekeepers home I was more concentrated on keeping her quiet since she has a tendency to start shouting when we pass that place.

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So suddenly Albin jumped to the side of me and went for Salmiak who happened to be in the grass beside the gravel road. This time it looked as if Albin actually managed to get to Salmiak. I managed to lift away Albin and Salmiak ran away. So I went home with the dogs while scolding Albin and then went back to the beekeepers cottage starting to look for Salmiak. I also phoned the beekeeper to tell what had happened. So we all walked around to look after Salmiak and it took some time before I could find him. He was of course not happy seeing me but he looked ok but went and hid elsewhere.

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They did find Salmiak after a while but he didn’t have any bite marks and they have kept an eye on him all day and if Albin had managed to injure him he would have shown signs of that by now. Also I checked Albins mouth to see if there was any cat fur in there but couldn’t find anything. So either Albin never bit but instead just pressed poor Salmiak to the ground or Albin just missed. Anyway I’m so happy that Salmiak wasn’t injured!

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Besides this rather awful start of the day the rest has been pretty calm thankfully. Windy and rather cool day with little or no sunshine. I must admit that I’m enjoying these cooler days because one never knows if we’ll get another heat wave before summer ends. It doesn’t look like it now but one never knows 🙂 Almas new harness has now reached the Netherlands so with a bit of luck it might reach us before Friday 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0014 (8) — A Marigold with a Berry fart resting on it 🙂 Berry farts are relatives to Stink bugs.

a (4) — The Venus flytrap will soon flower 🙂

a (5) — Something has been eating my carnivorous plants! It might be the deer that Alma scared away from just outside the lilac hedge.

It is time for us all to have something to eat. Tomorrow morning Albin will have a short leash so he can’t jump anywhere, I’ll still try and keep Alma calm and Nova can walk without leash, she never does anything stupid so I don’t have to worry about what she wight do 🙂

DSC_0001 (8) — Finally the rose on Teodors grave is in bloom.

By the way, I think we had well over an inch of rain yesterday 🙂

Have a great day!

I thought they had some in stock :-)

July 24, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

We’ve had a rather nice day here. According to the weather sites it should have started sunny and pretty early on slowly turn towards cloudy, so I wasn’t the least surprised when it started cloudy but then slowly turned towards sunny 🙂 🙂 🙂 We had a few hours of sunshine and the temperature rose to around 20C (68F) quite perfect really 🙂

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I didn’t need to water anything today because yesterday night we had some rain falling and since it was as cool as it was the ground still was pretty wet. I do however need to check anything cabbage because now is the time that both the Cabbage butterfly and Cabbage moth lays their eggs on anything that is cabbage or in that family. I just scrape off the eggs laid on the undersides of the leafs and I also spray water mixed with soap so that any egg that I might miss will be covered and therefore will suffocate because the soap won’t let any oxygen through.

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We walked sown to the creek and a bit up stream but stayed away from the high grass and bushes because this is a tick year. Albin rarely have any but both Nova and Alma are tick magnets, so the first thing I do when we come home is to comb through their fur with a very dense comb almost like a louse comb. None today but there’s always one or two that I miss so I’ll do it again later today. Nova is back to normal again after the ear infection but I must admit that I was worried there for a while.

DSC_0013 (9) — They’ve now removed almost all branches and twigs after the deforestation.

DSC_0012 (10) — There’s still some logs left but the big pile will become pellets and briquettes fore fire heaters.

We’ll have a couple of days with below 20C (68F) temperatures and tomorrow we’ll also get lots of rain, if they are guessing it right but one never knows about that. They have risen the amount of rain for every update but right now they’re guessing we will get an inch of it. I don’t mind at all but I do hope it starts out gentle so that the ground gets moist first and therefore can let the rest of the rain actually sink down into the ground and not just run away in to creeks and ponds/ lakes (or in my case the bog/ swamp behind the garage).

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I ordered a new harness for Alma, she’s becoming too big for the one she has and I did it the 17/7. Normally it will take five days or so to get it delivered but this one takes its time. I can check the status of the order and it turns out that the one I buy it from buys it from Canada. They however order if from China. So I have now been following it as an order from Sweden to Canada, then the order went to Shanghai where it finally was packed. Now it looks like it’s shipped to Canada and after that to Sweden and hopefully me 🙂 🙂 🙂 It says something about it arriving in seven days 🙂 🙂 🙂 To be honest I thought that the seller at least had a couple of each size in stock but oh how wrong I was 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0042 (7) — I’ve found even more grapes to be 🙂

DSC_0022 (5) — This is a kind of Lime tree where the fruits doesn’t give wedges but instead it looks like some green kind of caviar 🙂 I almost killed it last winter so I’m just happy that it has survived 🙂

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Have a great day!

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The beginning of our three day heat wave.

July 19, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

DSC_0002 (7) — We were supposed to have sunshine from the moment the sun rose but it tok quite some time before the clouds thinned out. It was so dark actually that I needed the camera to be set on ISO 1000 (One only need to use ISO 100 on a sunny day so it’s a big difference).

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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I really don’t like to change phone.

July 17, 2022 · Leave a comment ·

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Another rather nice day, at least after a while. The morning was quite chilly but we had sunshine and the flies were still hiding in the vegetation trying to stay warm. We went out on a short walk because Nova didn’t seem to want to go at all. She isn’t as alert that she once was 🙂 She really didn’t want to eat much either so I was a bit worried.

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Turns out that if she can eat my food she can eat rather a lot 🙂 🙂 🙂 It does look like the ear drops finally have made her feel better though because she, after eating a lot of my food, also ate most of her own food as well. She didn’t even have any problems gulp down lots of dog biscuits either and they are pretty hard 🙂 🙂 🙂 Also she is, to be honest, not a big fan of Alma so she’s either walking a big distance behind or in front of us when she can 🙂 🙂 🙂

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So I’ve finally started to use my new phone. I really don’t understand why I need to go through zillions of questions and decide zillions of things how to manage my phone every time I need to change phone? They already know everything about me, it should be enough to just log in to Google and after that I shouldn’t have to do anything more. There was something called quick switch I could have used if I had downloaded that on my old phone (don’t think I could get away from all those questions and settings anyway) and even though it said that I could get that on my old phone even if I started to use my old one it still didn’t work. At least all my contacts followed the phone this time. I am very grateful that I can call my work friend, who’s much younger than I am, any time I need to ask how to deal with new technology 🙂 🙂 🙂

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I’ve now baked a bread in the slow cooker. I looked at the recipes ina cook book that followed with the first one I had and it’s more or less regular bread but there’s one thing I didn’t understand. They never say that the bread should rise before putting the dough in the cooker. Shouldn’t it taste horribly much of yeast if one do it like that? I just did like I always do and let it rise once outside the cooker and the second time I just started the cooker when it was supposed to rise the second time. Worked perfectly! However no matter how much towel one puts beneath the lid the top of the bread will not become brown but that’s no problem since the rest of the surface towards the cooker will be. Just turn the bread upp side down and one will have a nice brown surface 🙂 I had a bit too much basil in my bread though, I like basil but this time I learned my limit for it 🙂 🙂 🙂

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The sun is still shining and it’s 21C (69,8F) outside. Clouds and some rain will arrive later today or just after midnight and by looking at how the flies are behaving even here in my garden I’m guessing we might get thunder as well. Tomorrow will be just as warm or cool depending on how hot it is where You live but after that we’ll have a three day heat wave. I’m glad it won’t last for longer but then again our meteorologists aren’t know to be the best in the world so it might just stay for much longer 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’ll go down to my friend with the garden center again tomorrow and I do hope that my brain will make me stop at the big store to buy that hose I’ve said so many times that I’ll buy 🙂 🙂 🙂 I don’t have much to put on sandwiches either, today I went outside and picked some dandelion leafs as lettuce (and i also thinned out some small iceberg lettuce to have together with some ham and cheese and tomato slices. All I have left for tomorrows breakfast (if I want sandwiches ) are a couple of boiled eggs and the last piece of cheese.

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It is time to go downstairs and make a cup of tea and to have a couple of bon bons I think 🙂

Have a great day!

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There’s a heat wave on the continent, some places here had 8C (46,4F) as warmest today :-) :-)

July 15, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

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So I wrote a post here early this morning when suddenly the web site froze and refused to save any drafts. The odd thing was that I could continue to write without any problems. I also couldn’t post what I had written but clicked to save it so I just could update the site and then just paste it here again. For a reason I can’t understand I then couldn’t find the saved post again even though I did look at the right place. So I gave up and now I’m writing it all down again 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Sort of annoying but at the same time perhaps a good thing nothing worked as it should. Nova has been under the weather all day with a slight fever and an infection in her ear, again. SI’m pretty sure the infection make it hurt when she eats because she refused to eat in the morning. Still she would take some blue cheese, no need to chew a well ripe mold cheese 🙂 🙂 🙂 She also followed us on our morning walk so I wasn’t too worried. I started with her ear drops and already in the afternoon she ate a pancake 🙂 Ok she tried to lick it up while lying down 🙂 🙂 🙂 which really didn’t work but if I picked the pancake pieces up and gave them to her she happily gulped them down 🙂

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When she got her afternoon food she still was pretty picky and still tried to lick up the pieces, it sort of worked but I decided that I would pick the pieces up and give them to her. Turns out that she only wanted the orange colored pieces 🙂 🙂 🙂 She just looked at me with disgust when I tried to give her any other color pieces 🙂 🙂 🙂 I do hope she will be much better by tomorrow morning because she is a bit of a drama queen to be honest. Then again at the age of sixteen she’s allowed to be 🙂

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Besides that nothing much has happened today. I bought several different houseleeks this week because I have a rather big pot, low and wide, that needed something in it. Houseleeks are succulents so they don’t need much soil, to be honest wet soil during winter can make them rot, so I used the sand I have beneath the grass in my garden (I still have a lot around after digging my grey water root zone). I had bought eight and they just barely fit in the pot. I’ve watered a lot just so that all the sand will fill up the empty spaces between them because it’s almost impossible to do that while planting and having very dry sand 🙂

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The pot will stay outdoors all winter but I’ll make sure to place it so that no rain or snow will make it too wet for them. I used to have hardy cacti in my garden years ago but too many problems with thorns and dogs to make it worth while 🙂 🙂 🙂 Houseleeks also get pretty flowers but I doubt that I’ll see any this year. It is time for another cup of tea, some bon bons and to watch the athletic world championships. We’ve had a rather chilly day here today, it didn’t even reach 20C (68F). There’s a horrible heat wave down in Europe (even Britain is hit by it) but it doesn’t reach us, at least not yet. Some placed here in the middle of Sweden didn’t even get more than 8C (46,4F) and that is really unusual even up here in the north.

DSC_0046 (2) — Some sprouts fell off when I was putting down the potatoes in the ground so I planted them in two buckets. I wonder how many potatoes I’ll get from them 🙂

DSC_0052 (2) — I planted several different Houseleeks in a big clay pot this morning. Only sand and stone in the pot and I do hope they’ll thrive 🙂

Have a great day!

Lots of napping today :-)

July 9, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

a (1)

I really haven’t done much today besides napping for a couple of hours and going through the dogs checking for ticks. The rainy weather really brought out those nasty critters again. We have very few slugs and snails though so that’s at least something.

a (4) — I’m not sure if it is wheat, rye or wheat-rye they are growing in this field. Back in the days it was easy to see the difference between the different kinds but now days they’re so mixed up with each other that one really need to know what it is to be able to see it 🙂 🙂

a (6)

It stayed towards the chilly side until noon today. It was mostly cloudy but as soon as the sun showed between the clouds it warmed up pretty quickly. We went out on our morning walk just after five am and unfortunately that was enough warm for the forest flies to start annoying us all. There were even some horse flies and I can now tell You that we’ll have a few less next years since I killed any of them that landed on me 🙂 Still they managed to give me a couple now quite itching bites.

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Yesterday I ordered a few rolls of films to my bigger cameras, it’s hard to get any now days and I’m not sure if it is because of the war in Ukraine or if it was during the virus they stopped producing those films. Today however I ordered a tin box with bon bons from Quality Street. I don’t have many memories of my father but I do remember that every time he came home (he was a sailor) he always brought a box with Quality Street bon bons. They are really hard to get around here so this box actually comes from Denmark. Hopefully it’ll arrive in the middle of next week 🙂

a (15)

We’ll have much the same weather tomorrow they say, a bit on the chilly side in the morning but it will never really be warm at all, it won’t reach 20C (68F). I’m ok with that since they’re guessing it will be slightly warmer the coming week, no rain though and we really would need some more to be honest. Then again with no rain I’ll be able to finally mow the lawn and with no rain the grass will grow much slower as well 🙂 🙂

a (22)

It is time to get something to eat and then doze off in front of the tv, like always 🙂 🙂 The swedish ladies will play against the ladies from the Netherlands later tonight in the European football (soccer) Championship. I might watch that, otherwise I’ll just check videos on Youtube or Facebook all evening 🙂

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Have a great day!

DSC_0011 (5) — I bought two of the rose that would be planted where Teodor is buried. This is the one still standing in a pot (the one on Teodors grave is a bit behind still). If I learned right this orange flower will now slowly fade to almost white. So it’ll have both of his colors.

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Vacation.

July 8, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

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I think this must have been one of the longest days so far this year 🙂 🙂 I had things to do all the time but it still felt like time stopped early in the morning. I was in the painting department as I have been all week and it is nasty hot there now so it didn’t help to see what beautiful weather we had outside.

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Yesterday when I drove to work I noticed something like looked like a big dark stone by the side of the road just beside a big tree. I thought to myself that I’ve never seen a big stone there before so I slowed down considerable and suddenly three sows and twelve piglets came running across the road. The piglets had slowly started to change colors towards brown but I could still see the stripes and dots on their sides.

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Today I drove really slowly there but no pigs. I found them beside the clearway a couple of hundred meters away instead. I drive to work an hour and a half earlier on Fridays so today I saw lots of animals close to the road, like deers, hares and some bigger birds. I never drive as fast as I’m allowed when I drive on the forest road and mornings like these show me how right that is 🙂

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I’ll do nothing at all for the rest of the day. I really should vacuum the entire cottage, mow the lawn and perhaps bake a bread in my new slow cooker but I refuse. I have four weeks to do that so why start today 🙂 🙂 🙂 I’ve already planned to have naps every day and even drink tea after 4 pm even though it might keep me awake all night. Those are the things one can do or skip to do when having vacation 🙂

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Have a great day!

She talks a lot.

July 7, 2022 · 4 Comments ·

I’ve tried to find out what kind of wild rose this huge one is. The closest I’ve come is Rosa setigera, Climbing prairie rose but the buds doesn’t look the same so I’ll continue looking.

It was drizzling when I woke up this morning and a bit cool as well. Soo nice to just step outside when I let the dogs out. I had my bedroom window open and was thinking that I should let it stay open it would stay cool in my bedroom. I’m so glad I closed it because it started to rain rather bad when I drove to work and after that it fell like it was a thunderstorm passing by 🙂 🙂

DSC_0002 (2) — It’s Geranium season 🙂 The photos today were taken both today and yesterday.

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The rain stopped around noon and by the time I arrived here at home most clouds were gone and the sun was shining. Still pleasantly cool though with a rather strong north western wind blowing. So I wasn’t annoyed on myself when I forgot to bring the mosquito hat. I did regret that when we were on our way home again because we reached an area where the wind couldn’t reach us but the flies could 🙂 🙂 Only annoying forest flies thankfully and I do hope this is one of those few years when we have very few horse flies.

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A timber lorry was loading up some of the timber that they cut down not too long ago and I thought it would be hell to pass it with Alma and Albin. To my really big surprise both were quiet and Alma even tried to stay as far away from it as she could. No growling, no screaming, not even some whining happened? They always get really excited every time it pass outside the cottage so I really didn’t expect that it would be that easy 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Sometimes, quite often actually, I wonder if Alma might have some Husky in her ancestry. The howling when she isn’t allowed to meet other dogs (because of Albin hating other dogs), the constant urge to run around in the garden with Albin (whether he likes it or not 🙂 🙂 🙂 ) and the constant talking which sounds very much like the way huskies do. This morning she had a long conversation with Albin, she wanted to play he wanted to nap until I went to work 🙂 🙂 🙂 I must admit that it would have been nice if she could lower her voice a bit but who can blame her, she was upset 🙂 🙂 🙂

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I’ll drive to Gudhem on my way home after work tomorrow, the slow cooker will arrive just before I leave from work. It arrives at the right time since my vacation starts tomorrow 🙂 I’ll have plenty of time to successfully try and bake a bread in it these four coming weeks 🙂 This is the first vacation in I don’t know how many years that I don’t have to go back to clean a paint box when everyone else is at home 🙂 I have no idea who will do that job now though because they haven’t asked me to teach anyone how to do it 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

DSC_0036 (1) — Insects have eaten the leafs but the last bud still stand.

We had thunder but I didn’t notice it :-)

July 3, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

a (2)

I knew that we would get both clouds and rain and most possibly thunder later today so we went out on our walk as soon as we had woken up because the sun was shining and it was cool and nice outside. Just enough warm for the forest flies to fly around but cool enough to keep the horse flies calm.

a (7)

It was almost cloud free when we started our rather short walk but the sky was completely covered by clouds by the time we came home again, perhaps 30 minutes later. It didn’t take long after that when the first rain arrived. They had guessed that it would arrive after noon some time so I wasn’t surprised at all that it arrived rather early in the morning 🙂 🙂 🙂 I really didn’t mind though but decided to do the last of the laundry before any thunder might arrive. It did but I didn’t notice it at all. I just noticed that the app on my phone had warned for lightnings long after it had passed 🙂 🙂 🙂

a (11)

They’re now guessing we’ll get more rain tomorrow and on Tuesday as well but after that it’ll slowly dry up and sunshine will return. I do hope the coming week will be cooler since I’ll be working in the hot powder paint department again. All other painters are on vacation so I’m the only one who can do it. We do however have other people who can paint with normal paint so what ever needs to be painted there will be painted by someone else. I think I’ll appreciate my comming vacation so much more after a week in that hot place 🙂 🙂 🙂

a (17)

I haven’t found that add about bread baking machines again but while looking I remembered that it would be much better if I actually bought a new slow cooker since the ceramic pot in the old one broke. I do like the food we now can buy at work but the price is really insanely high compared to what it costs to make the food at home. So when I’ve finished here I’ll check for slow cookers instead. I managed to convince my work friend that it is one of the best inventions ever so he bought one and now he makes all his dinners in it 🙂 When I get it I’ll try to bake a bread in it too, I’ll still do all the work but I must try it 🙂

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I planted two melon vines earlier today and watered them of course but it is time to water some more because I’m pretty sure the dry ground around them has stolen most of that water. After that I’ll fall asleep in front of the tv as usual 🙂

Have a great day!

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Almost cold in the morning :-)

July 2, 2022July 2, 2022 · 2 Comments ·

a (1)

it was hotter than in hell here in the cottage yesterday evening, well outside as well to be honest. The fan was working hard to help us make slightly less cooler than melting 🙂 I did manage to fall asleep and wasn’t the least annoyed when I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of heavy raining.

a (3) — I saw something moving towards us on the road I wanted to take but it did look a bit hefty to be a deer of any kind.

a (4) — Turns out that a semi big calf had jumped out of the pasture.

a (5) — It wasn’t happy to see us so it walked back down the road again 🙂

Just hearing the rain made it feel cooler. Apparently we also had thunder passing by but I didn’t hear anything of that though. I wouldn’t hear if the world exploded when I’m sleeping 🙂 🙂 It continued to rain well in to the morning. I must admit that it did feel a bit chilly when the dogs and I went out for our walk but I enjoyed every second of it. It was unfortunately warm enough for the flies to fly around but it was almost only the annoying forest flies and very few if any horse flies.

They’re guessing that we’ll get lots of rain and thunder on Monday and the temperature will stay around 20C (68F) for the rest of the week and after this heat wave I’m really looking forward to that 🙂 My neighbor mowed the lawn outside our gardens today, I napped 🙂 🙂 I have been rather active today though. I’ve done most of the laundry and I’ve finally planted all the carnivorous plants in the big pot I bought.

a (15)

I took a look through Instagram and I do like the few commercial adds I find there. I don’t know why but some of the adds show things only a big time farmer would by 🙂 🙂 I did however see one add from a business that seems to sell anything and today they sold a baking machine. I sort of would like to have that one. It wasn’t that expensive and had good reviews but do I really need a baking machine? Well perhaps maybe 🙂 🙂 I do bake a lot of bread in periods and this one had a timer so that I would wake up to freshly baked bread in the morning. To be honest I thought all those baking machines had such a timer. So I might buy it if that add shows up again.

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I’ve also shaved off all hair on my head and it feels so nice 🙂 I did look fro my mosquito hat before I started because I would hate to feel tiny flies walking all over my head while walking in the forest, not to forget that horse fly bites must be nasty if they bite on the skull 🙂 🙂 🙂 I wonder if horseflies would be interested in visiting carnivorous plants? 🙂 🙂 🙂

a (33)

It is time for something to eat and after that fall asleep in front of the tv. I have the window beside me open and I can hear that it is drizzling outside. I can also hear the rather annoying magpies in my garden. I wonder if they would react if I hung up a stuffed magpie toy upside-down in my garden? I know that if someone kill a magpie and then hang it in the garden the magpies will stay away. I like them too much to have any killed though so perhaps a stuffed one would work 🙂 🙂 🙂

DSC_0017 (1) — Grapevines really grow like weeds 🙂

a (27) — I hope lots of flies visit these plants 🙂

Have a great day!