WILDLIFE WEDNESDAY OPOSSUM

 Another night, another creature on the porch.

Bur this time it was a opossum cleaning up the cat food bowl.  They come by regularly and we know it's good to have them around the homestead.

Some interesting opossum facts above.

And not gonna lie, we think they are kinda cute!

HOT DAY TO MOW PLUS A FUNNY MOMENT

I wish I had the before picture.  It was a jungle for sure.  I broke the work into both days.  On Saturday, I spent a couple hours doing the edging/trimming.  Went around the orchard area raised beds, then the well shed, the house, the driveway, the barn and the shed. 

Phew, it was hot.

How hot?

Really hot.

But I got that done.

Then Sunday, I mowed.  Here is one angle, looks so much better.  With no rain in the forecast for the next 7 days, hopefully I will have a week off from yardwork. 

Here's another angle.  Again, just short and hopefully it will be able to stay like that for at least a couple of weeks.  I could use the break, ha.  We shall see.

Here at the stats.  About average.

And here's a funny:

2nd Man:  "Whatever happened to that box lid that blew away when we were loading trash in the truck?"

1st Man:  "Hmm, I don't know I haven't seen it."

Several weeks later:

1st Man:  "Oh wait...

"...here it is!"

Oops! 🤣🤣

GOOD FOOD AND KITTY CAT SUNDAY

Another HOT week has flown by.  Is it really already almost AUGUST?!?

We used the last package of our meatloaf from the freezer.  Time to make more!  We had one of our favorite meals, meatloaf, mashed potatoes with healthier butter and non-fat dry milk in the potatoes, and then sautéed green beans with onions and tomatoes.  So good!

We gave Babygirl some toys and she's having fun with them.  Of course, I have to check the yard for them before I mow, ha.

Speaking of, I have to mow today. I did the edging over the course of a couple of hours yesterday and today will be mowing.  Easiest to break it up into parts.  It's just so hot right now.  Everyone stay cool!

WE HAVE SOME HERBS

Several of you mentioned herbs and yes, we already have some.  They are next to impossible to find in the Summer but we got lucky a few weeks back and found a few.  We snatched them up.

I bought five:  dill, thyme, oregano and two basil plants.  I got to use our utility sink in the garage for watering once I had potted them.  It worked great!

We put them on the ledge in the screened in porch and they are happy.  It's been a few weeks now and we regularly go onto the porch and clip herbs.  Especially the basil.  That stuff is so prolific!  2nd Man has used oregano in our sauces and fresh thyme on our chicken.

Since our porch is screened in but still gets nice light, we might see if we can grow them, at least in small amounts like this, during the Fall and Winter (moving them IN the house during a freeze of course).

I'm going to move them to a cart that we have that we posted about in one of our trash to treasure posts a few years back.  It's still in the barn storage from the old house, it's just SO hot right now to get in there and get stuff out.  But slowly we are.

Anyway, we have them and we can truly say, nothing beats having fresh herbs on hand.

GOOD FOOD AND KITTY CAT SUNDAY

It was a HOT weekend.  SO hot.  I was going to do yard work but I chickened out, ha.  I will do a little each evening when I get home from work.  

I didn't get a chance to post this yesterday so here it is a day late.

On the 4th, we had our semi-annual tradition of BBQ rib dinner (Daytona weekend is the other time).  I made pickled red onions, a low fat coleslaw with no sugar.  We love it, as it compliments the sweetness of the bbq sauce.  2nd Man made some homemade bread and I made the ribs.

Here is Babygirl.

In a series of two pictures.

She was ready for food and when she is...

...she lets us know for sure!

She will be spayed soon.  Since we know she has to stay in for a bit to recover, we are trying to get her used to being in the screened in porch. She freaks out in the house and we don't want her to be stressed and trying to recover at the same time) so we've been letting her come in the screened in porch and get used to it. We have a bed for her and a littler box.  She eats there from time to time so we think she'll be OK.  

Hope your week is off to a good start!

WHY DID THE CHICKENS CROSS THE ROAD

Saw this the other night coming home from work.  I had to slow down for chickens crossing the road.

Now they weren't lost, there were others on the property they were heading to. Free range chickens!

And the answer to that age old question, at least in this case, was:

"...to get to the other side". 🤣

WILDLIFE WEDNESDAY ARMADILLO

There is probably no other animal that is synonymous with Texas than the armadillo.

This little guy or gal was rooting around in the grass the other night.  I had to get a picture.  They can dig in flower beds and the yard in their hunt for grubs and other things to eat.  They can carry some diseases so it's never recommended to touch them or interact with them but generally speaking, they shy away from contact with people anyway.

 

It's interesting to see one for sure.

BUCKET GARDEN UPDATE

Thought we'd give a garden update.  Well, our "garden" for what it is, ha.  

Everything is growing well.  It rained this weekend (imagine that) so I didn't get to do much.  At least I didn't have to water them.

But hey, all four have blossoms!

This is the celebrity tomato.  Blooms coming out.

Here is the heatmaster tomato which also has quite a few blooms on it.

This is the jalapeño, looks like it will be providing us some peppers for sure.

And lastly, here is the green bell pepper, also has a few budding out.

All of this make us laugh when we see this meme:

So true, but hey, at least it's a start to get back into gardening.  We're already planning location and design of a garden for next year.

IT IS SO HOT

Was driving home the other afternoon and went down this road toward the house and I saw this up ahead.

What is that?  Then I stopped and quickly got out to take a picture.

 

It had just rained but it was so hot, the rainwater on the road was steaming up off the hot asphalt.  I would like to have seen it when it was raining.

Gonna be a long, hot Summer for sure.

WILDLIFE WENDNESDAY SKUNK

 When we get an alert on a Ring doorbell cam, more often than not, we get a message that says there is something there that is not (it's always the cat that is identified incorrectly).

Still, we always look just to make sure.

Recently, we got an already that said "a skunk is walking on the porch".  Sure it is, let's take a look:

Oops!  Yep, sure enough, a skunk was walking on the porch!  2nd Man reminded me "don't open the door and scare it!".  Definitely not going to do that.  It sniffed around and then left.  We sniffed around afterward and no scent so we were good there.

Haven't seen it since (this was a couple of weeks ago).  Just another creature we share the property with!