Yes, it's me. I bet you were wondering what's up, and why I went quiet.
I had to look back to see when I last wrote on here. *facepalm* It's been a while. Oy. A break turned into almost five full months of silence.
I haven't done a whole lot of social media, either. The royal "they" messed with something and things just aren't as fun as they used to be.
I'm at home almost all the time now, and there is nothing terribly exciting about work-for-pay, and what has turned into pretty mundane times when I'm not working. Especially now that it's winter time. How many times do you want to hear about Furby? I could probably post daily tidbits about her. She's so spoiled. I made her listen to Christmas music today. I don't think she was too happy. It wasn't the fat quarter shop.
For the last few weeks I've had some ideas percolating for the blog. The ideas are still being pondered and sorted out.
In the meantime, the winter solstice is here, and I figured this was a good time to break the silence and let you all know I'm alive. Ha!
For the first day of winter it snowed. We've had a few snow showers already, but nothing has stuck. This will stick. I think my area has four inches of fresh snow.
In addition to winter solstice, Christmas is just around the corner! I've got almost everything taken care of. Now I'm just waiting for the big day.
After that, a little bit of down time and quiet before I start gearing up for seed starting and garden season. Woo hoo!
This type of blog post is for when I have a lot of little things I want to share, or when I feel the need to catch up.
So, grab your coffee/beverage of your choice and join me.
If we were having coffee ... I'd talk about how fast this month has gone. I realized a few weeks ago that I haven't written anything, anywhere, for a while. Oops. Though, to be fair, I haven't spent much time on social media or the internet. Plans. I had so many plans and aspirations. Then time goes by much faster than anticipated and before I know it, a month has gone by.
Things are still a bit busy for me. Not as busy as a few months ago, thankfully. I'm enjoying this little bit of a lull before things pick up again.
If we were having coffee ... I'd give you an update on the chicken flock. We have the roosters separated from the girls. The roosters are finally realizing they are boys and were harassing the girls too much. The hens seem happy they aren't being constantly chased around. The roosters are now busy harassing each other and pulling each others tails. They will be heading off to the freezer sometime next month.
Let me tell you about the roo who has turned into the dominate roo. We call him Mangle because he has something going on with his feet that I didn't spot until after it was too late. Apparently he's grown up on the mean streets of the farm yard and has learned how to take care of himself. The other boys are scared of him. It really is something how he handles himself. I still remember helping him out from a corner he got himself stuck in back when he was a young chick. Now he's ruling the roost. He's pretty tame around people, so that's nice.
If we were having coffee ... I'd tell you about the rabbits. We rehomed Loki and Thor. They were sweet rabbits, Thor in particular, but it was getting to be a bit much. After we had 14 baby buns born in one day I decided we had to do something to prevent the pregnancies. I had Feffer and Thor together, and Shadow and Loki together. Shadow was being mean to Loki. (The big bully) When the opportunity to rehome some of them came up, I grabbed it.
Feffer is now by himself, and Shadow and the baby bun are together. Still don't know if the baby bun is a boy or girl. My son is thinking it's a girl. I've been calling her "LB."
If we were having coffee ... I'd share that Furby is still in the house with us. She's learned a new trick. When she's outside and ready to come back into the house, she finds her way to the deck and calls until someone hears her and goes out to get her. Spoiled much? Those grand ideas of integrating her back into the flock -- I don't think it's going to happen.
Yesterday she was running around with a hen and I thought for sure that was going to be it. Nope. Furby went off on her own and then meandered a bit until she heard my voice, and came running.
This photo is from a while ago. She was really feeling it that morning and was bawking up a storm. So I pulled her over by me while I was working.
If we were having coffee ... I'd blather about the weather and the garden. We are in the midst of a drought and high heat. At the beginning of the garden season I was prepared and expecting cold weather and potential frosts. Instead, we got extreme heat and my cool weather crops didn't fare well. The weather keeps switching from extreme heat to cooler temperatures.
I've been doing a great job keeping up with weeds. I get out there almost every day and I take care of them and enjoy the flowers and the butterflies. What I need to do is get out there and take care of some things like I've been wanting to do since early spring, but have either been to lazy or too busy to go out and mess with.
On July 15 I took some video clips of the garden. I want so very much to have videos of the garden throughout the summer. This go-round I decided to chat about the plants. Before I knew it, a couple weeks went by and the videos were still sitting on my phone. Until the other night. I've got the clips together and then it took me a bit to remember how to compress the video and get it to a decent file size so it wouldn't take all day to load to youtube. It's been a learning curve all over again. Please bear with while I figure this all out again.
If we were having coffee ... Crafting. Crafting! I've been doing some crafting.
Tour de Fleece happened. I did some spinning at the beginning and finished up my first two pounds of grey Corriedale fiber.
I have no idea on yardage. I spun four bobbins worth.
I had a ply party one evening.
Then. Nada. I decided to be dedicated to a cross stitch project and get it wrapped up.
I ordered the "Happily Ever After" Stitch-along kit back in 2016, for Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery's 2017 mystery stitch-along. I got overwhelmed by the border and header and put it away almost right away. I pulled it out later and did the first square, got overwhelmed and put it away again until last year. I looked at it and told myself "I'm going to work on it this year." Then didn't touch it until a few months back.
Well ... I'm done! It's so pretty!
I completed it on Saturday, July 24, at 10:35 p.m. Years in the making. I didn't dream that I would take years to finish this sampler.
Then what did I do? I grabbed the cross stitch kit my SIL gave me for my birthday last year. This one is a bit harder for me. The colors are so close that I was struggling a bit. And, you guessed it, I put it down.
I guess I'll be dedicated to this one for a while. I'm breaking it down into sections and focusing on one flower bit at a time. Which is good. Even with the cheaters, the line keepers and whatnot, I'm still goofing up a bit. Fortunately I see the mess-ups right away. And as I was proofing this blog post I realized the project itself is upside down in the photo. See, so easy to get mixed up on this one. I've got a feeling there are going to be a lot of unintentional customizations on this one. I'm worried about running out of floss, since it's a kit and it feels like I don't have a lot of leeway.
Sock knitting happened. When my son was playing chauffeur to my Miss Daisy, he kept commenting that I needed, *needed* to bring knitting with me.
I knit socks. I found the sock yarn at a shop over in Ashland. I looked at the colorway and thought "Oh, those are nice summer-y colors."
Really? Wool socks in summer?
Well, yes. In my area they are sometimes necessary.
Project: Vanilla socks
Started: June 2021 (I think) Finished: July 2021 (I think) Needle size: U.S. 1, 2.5mm Yarn: Patons Kroy Socks yarn (Cherry Pop Stripes)
This is most of the excitement that has been happening on the homestead. There are some days where I still feel like I'm struggling to catch up on the to-do list. What I need to do is take some time off of work and make myself tackle some of those things on my mental to-do list.
Well, let's hope it's not another month before I update again. 😁 (One of the very few times I'll use an emoji on here)
At the beginning of the month we got some scorching weather. My poor garden.
During March and April I had been planning for and anticipating cold weather. Possible frosts, too. My last average frost date is June 1. I'm in zone 3b.
Instead, we got temperatures in the high 90's Fahrenheit. Our area is not used to that kind of heat so early in the season.
Some things had been planted already. Those plants did all right. Some of my cool weather transplants did not fare well. Some things simply withered away in the heat. Other things, like my broccoli and lettuce, bolted.
The weather then settled down a little bit, temperature-wise. Then there was no rain. The forecast kept promising rain, but I was out there every day, trying to keep everything watered and the transplant shock to a minimum.
A few things I direct sowed popped out of the ground within three days. Practically unheard of, to me. My carrot seeds didn't sprout, I think. The ground was drying out so fast and I completely forgot the trick of laying boards or something down, to keep the moisture in until the seeds sproud. Do I have time to reseed? Maybe.
This past weekend and the last few mornings I've been waking up to temperatures in the 40s Fahrenheit. C'mon, man! At least we got rain on Sunday. Sunday we lit a fire in the wood stove. A fire. At the end of June. Even though we were bundled up in layers, we were still cold. So we lit a fire and kept it going for the day.
Last year I wanted to do videos, documenting the garden throughout the gardening season. Things went awry, because life likes to throw curveballs, and that didn't happen. A bummer, too, because it wound up being a beautiful and wild garden. Tomato plants taller than my husband. Broccoli stalks as thick as small trees, with beautiful heads of florets. Cucumber vines that stretched from one side of the garden to the other.
I also did a mixture of some flowers in there, too. I wanted to attract the pollinators to my garden, and help things along. I had butterflies and humming birds checking things out.
This year, I don't think it's going to be quite the same. That's all right with me. Whatever does happen and anything that comes out of the garden will be a success.
I'm already harvesting lettuce. I picked off a few little broccoli heads, too.
So, speaking of garden videos, I've made two so far. Real quick videos that I stood in the center of the garden and turned in a circle. Early in the morning, and early in the evening you can hear the birds and there's not a lot of neighborhood noise. It's calming, and I would rather share those sounds than me talking about the plants.
Here's the video, taken June 14, 2021.
Here's the video I took this morning, June 23, 2021.
I shot the video, then thought about going around and sharing what the plants were. My phone was out of memory. I have to delete some old audio books, videos and memes off my camera roll. Maybe I'll attempt it again next week.
I feel the need to apologize for disappearing off the blog for so long.
For a while, this is what my life was like.
This painting is by Andrea Kowch, A Michigan native, Andrea Kowch cites the Midwestern landscape as the prime inspiration for her work.
Life got really busy for me. Like, really busy. It got to the point where I felt like I was on a merry-go-round of all the things I needed to take care of.
Suffice to say, things had to give. Writing and my hobbies went by the wayside.
I had reached burn out and had some crappy symptoms of it. Thankfully, last week I had very much needed time off from my job and was able to decompress. I'm feeling much better now.
Things have also calmed down and there's no longer the constant merry-go-round feeling. I'm also trying to take better care of myself and take time for the crafting every day. Even if it's just 15 minutes of something, or knitting while my son is driving us to town.
I'm feeling feeling like I can resume writing. I don't know how frequently it will be, though. I have ideas percolating in my brain, but I don't know if/when I will follow through with them.
A quick run-down on things:
Furby is doing well. I think we are having a "Call of the Wild" moment. Since the weather turned nice I've been letting her go outside. She can see a little bit, so I'm not too worried about her wandering off or getting lost.
Well, in the morning, after she's had breakfast, she usually starts bawking and calling until I bring her outside. She spends a lot of time out there and she's pretty content by the time I bring her back in. If I bring her in too soon, she lets me know. She's also hanging out with the young birds a bit. I think her instinct to be with a flock is pulling her to the coop. I let her hang out with them and she looks confused, for the most part. I think all the hustle and bustle makes her nervous, still.
I put the garden in the second week of June. Well, most of it. I have/had grand plans of some things and they haven't come together just yet. The extreme heat we had did *not* help things. Our area went from near-freezing overnight temps to almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit, in just a few days. Very unusual for my area this early in the season.
Earlier this week I took a quick spin around video of the garden bed. It was so peaceful out there. I felt the desire to capture the moment.
I'm sorry to have to write that I haven't seen Porkie since April. We are thinking that Porkie was a girl and went off to have a baby. Or, Porkie just wintered here and has now moved on.
In any case, I know Porkie was very much loved by the people I'm connected to on social media. I feel privileged to have been a part of Porkie's life for a short bit, and help him/her make it through the winter. If you ever need a Porkie fix I have videos on my Youtube channel.
So ... that is what I've been up too. I'm still alive. During this crazy time, I know sometimes people worry when someone abruptly disappears. Or, maybe no one noticed I had stopped writing because I am still sort of active on Instagram, but not so much on other social media.
It wound up being a gorgeous day. Lots of sun shining, warm temps and warm breezes helping the snow to melt.
Now we are just waiting for the frost to go out and the snow melt to go away.
In the meantime ...
It's official. Little baby lettuce and baby spinach.
This time around I'm following the advice of the YouTubers and keeping the tray up close to the light.
Things were fine last year when I didn't have everything up close to the lights. I'd like to see what happens when I do follow this advice, though.
The day ended pretty grey. Weather is supposed to be not as nice. Either snow or rain, depending on what area you are in. We shall see.
Yesterday someone asked me how Porkie is doing. Porkie is well. The warmer temps agree with Porkie. We are seeing him twice a day, most days. He's getting his oats and a sprinkling of rabbit feed now. He seems pretty content. When he sees us he does his little grunt sound, which I assume is him showing he's happy.
This weekend was beautiful, weather-wise. The sun was out for most of the weekend. A little bit of wind on Sunday. The wind helped to get the snow melting.
I opened up the greenhouse this weekend. It's amusing to say that since I can't put anything out there yet. I had to take a hammer to some ice and break it up so I could open the flap door and go in.
I did spend a few minutes in there each day, thinking about how excited I was to get it last April.
I bought all those fabric pots last year, and hardly used any. I have plans for them this year. And all those water jugs that I had water in, to try and use as a passive solar heater. I don't think they did a bit of good. It's too cold up here.
I looked around for damage of any kind. It looks like someone tried to nibble their way in, before the snow got deep.
Depending on which thermometer you looked at, it was either close to 100 degrees Fahrenheit,
or somewhere around 80.
I made a quick walk around the house.
The angel is getting uncovered.
The one big "puddle" has returned. It will be here until the frost goes out.
And a gorgeous view of the garden area.
Speaking of the garden - what's this?
If my eyes aren't deceiving me, I do believe I have some itty bitty baby plants. I spotted them this afternoon.
I tried to get a close up shot. Hard to focus that close.
They may be as close to instant gratification for seed starting as it gets. Wow!
Speaking of seeds, I remembered to take a photo of my outside project.
Nothing fancy. Just a few small starter pots in a small planter.
I'm wondering if I should stick this over into the greenhouse, but then I'm worried the seeds will get too hot, sprout early, then die over night.
Sometime last year I came across a YouTuber who was making videos showing off these solar water fountains she was making. My husband said he told me about solar fountains. I vaguely remember him telling me about them. My memory really stinks sometimes.
Anyhow, I was watching more of her videos, and decided to order myself a solar fountain pump. I gave it a try this weekend and it really does work! I had tried it with a bucket and the hose. Nothing fancy. Sunday we went to Men@ards and picked up a inexpensive bird bath.
I gave it a try this morning, with a spout cap. It's lovely, and the sound of the water was so soothing to hear. It' will be a while before I can set up my water fountain. This will be a nice substitute until I can get my big fountain set up. Then I can set this up, and maybe another one or two, over in the garden area.
Fun, right?
One other thing I did this afternoon, before dinner, was to make an upside down pineapple cake. I use a recipe from Sally's Baking Addiction. Yum!
I was so excited for this weekend to start. You know why?
Because I get to finally start some seeds! Woo hoo!
This year I'm trying my hand at making seed starting mix. I purchased a few (or four) bricks of coconut coir and a few bags of vermiculite.
I am wondering if I should have mixed some perlite in.
Okay, so I might have started some earlier than what I listed on my calendar.
Last year was SUCH a great learning year for me. It was my first successful year starting seeds. This year I took the time to find out my average last frost date and determine when I should start the various seeds. I've also be watching a whole lot of youtube videos. MIGardener and The Rusted Garden are two good channels to watch.
I got to break out the seed storage system that I've been seeing all over on YouTube and decided to jump on the bandwagon.
I've seen people have all sorts of organization systems for their seeds. I decided to go alphabetical.
Sooooo ... On Saturday, March 6 I planted:
Black Seeded Simpson
Buttercrunch
Iceberg A
Igloo
Gourmet Blend
Looseleaf Blend
Spinach - Salad Sensation Hybrid
Spinach - Bloomsdale Longstanding
So far I've filled one 1020 tray full of 72 plugs. Today I set my indoor seed starting space up.
I had the light on only for taking the photo.
I also decided to try an experiment with starting some chive and poppy seeds outside in a makeshift winter sowing greenhouse-ish thing. I forgot to take a photo of it and now it's night time. In the past I haven't been as serious as I should have been about trying to start poppy seeds. I feel determined to give it a really strong effort this year. I remember a house in my old neighborhood had poppies on the south side. Every spring it was a gorgeous sea of poppies. Years ago my MIL purchased a poppy plant at a rummage sale and it flourished at her house. I may try a few different methods. Wish me luck!
The last couple of weeks have blended together for me. The severe cold that has hit the country hasn't helped either. Has it been two weeks? Three? Four? I don't know.
When we were first told sub-zero temps were going to hit the area, I got working and did what I could for the rabbits. Since the chickens have their coop, they didn't need as much extra stuff done for them. Simply make sure they have enough food, water and no windows are wide open.
There was one night that we felt we needed to give them supplemental heat. That night turned out to be the coldest night. We had a low temp of -30 degrees Fahrenheit. When I got up in the morning, it was -29.
The chickens weren't happy with this weather, of course, but they are a hardy breed, and are best suited for this weather.
We were sure to give them extra tidbits and scraps.
This photo is from a week ago, or so. It was around 10 degrees Fahrenheit and I thought they'd appreciate some fresh air. They did.
Unfortunately, so did a predator. We lost a chicken, maybe two. I'm pretty sure it's a fox. I spotted paw prints. So, no more open coop until I can get the fence closed.
The rabbits, however, I needed to be a bit more creative with.
For Shadow and Feffer, I was wrapping their space with sheets and tarps, along with a piece of wallboard. After watching all the homesteading youtube channels, I am perfectly fine with something not being pretty, as long as it does what it needs to do. Besides, this isn't permanent.
Then I made sure they had plenty of hay for bedding and insulation. They LOVED the hay. They also hollowed out themselves a little nest in the dog carrier we have for them. From what I've observed, it's Shadow who is mostly in there. Poor little Feffer. He loves his Shadow, so he lets her have what she wants.
They are both just fine.
Feffer wanted to check out the camera.
Shadow was more interested in the carrots I brought out for them. She had grabbed her share and ran to the back of the space. I am amazed at how they managed to flatten all the hay I tossed out there.
Thor and Loki got a sheet draped around their run. I was using safety pins to hold the sheet into place. I also made sure they had extra hay in their hutch.
Every time I went out they seemed really happy to see me. I know they were hoping I was bringing them treats, too.
And, of course, we can't forget about Porkie. Do you know if any other wild animal that gets his path shoveled for them? He does. I have no idea if he appreciates it.
During the worst of the weather my husband set up a wind break so wind wasn't blowing straight into the space of the wood pile.
Speaking of Porkie, here is a rare daylight shot of him.
I've had a lot of people contact me, asking how he's doing. He's doing all right. He made it through the severe cold. When we'd see him, he had frost on his face. I made sure he had access to warm water, so his insides would warm up a bit. As always, he had his oats. He's been showing interest in chicken feed, so we make sure he has some of that when we offer him food.
Miss Furby, our house hen, knows how good she has it.
Furby is so spoiled. She's been spending a lot of time next to me when I'm working. Currently she's asleep, with her beak tucked into her wing. The temp is up outside so I don't have the wood stove going full blast. I'm guessing she was feeling a "chill."
How have we been faring during this cold snap? We finally cracked into one of the holz hausen wood houses and we were pleasantly surprised with how dry the wood is. When it's as cold as it has been, the wood stove is very hungry and the bones of the house don't seem to warm up. I'm very grateful we aren't heating with propane, or we'd been hurting. A few weeks ago the market price for propane was $2.399. I can only imagine what it is now.
Other than filling the wood rack, there's been a lot of tv and youtube watching. I pulled out the spinning wheel and have been working on my sweater project.
I also (finally) made myself a little bag to hang on my spinning wheel. It holds my oil and my spinning card measure-r thingy.
So very pleased with how it turned out. I've wanted one for so long. I can't believe I waited this long to make it. I've been doing other crafting, too. I'll save all that for another post, so this one isn't so long.
This type of blog post is for when I have a lot of little things I want to share, or when I feel the need to catch up.
So, grab your coffee/beverage of your choice and join me. I'm currently drinking a hot chocolate with cinnamon.
If we were having coffee ... I'd marvel at how fast January has moved. I've been in my head a lot this past month. I thought after the holidays were over I'd be able to take a break, catch a breath. No. I feel busy, busy, busy. I'm not exactly sure what it is making me feel this way.
Anywho, I blinked at here we are, at the end of the month.
The month has been fairly mild, weather-wise, and I really appreciate that. Just a handful of very cold days. I started writing this post on Friday evening, Jan. 29, I'm not sure when I'm going to finish it. So, as of this paragraph I think I can safely say we are supposed to get snow this weekend. There hasn't been much snow this year, compared to last year. Oh my gosh, I don't even want to think about last year. It was daily snow movings and plowings. So. Much. Snow. Ugh.
If we were having coffee ... I'd mention our wood splitting project. We have knocked the pile down pretty good. I believe my husband said we have 30-some logs left. We aren't going as quickly as we did at the beginning. In fact, we still need to think of a place to put the last bit. It's not easy to scope out a spot now that snow is on the ground.
Here I am in front of the wood stacks. I'm in awe of how much wood we've moved in the time since we got the load.
I don't have any current photos of what is left to cut and split. Saturday my husband cut up 17 logs, or so, and we have about that many left needing to be cut.
If we were having coffee ... I'd talk reading, or the mostly lack thereof. I'm sort of mad at myself. I said "Self, you are going to start up with books again." Very little reading has happened in the last year. And even less listening to audiobooks. Last week I picked out an audio book for my hubby and I (I think. I'm not actually sure who picked it out.) Defiance by C.J. Redwine
Dystopian book about a girl who's super brave, tough, can take care of herself, yadda, yadda. More to it than that, of course. The main character, Rachel, really bugs me with her "I'm so smart and clever and capable." Yet she gets herself in to bad situations. It's a type that just bugs me to bits. Not very clever, but thinks they are super smart.
I'm at the tail end of the audiobook. It finally got to where her behavior didn't bother me. Then I discovered the library doesn't have the rest of the trilogy in audiobooks. I hate when that happens!
If we were having coffee ... I'd talk crafting. Another thing that has not had much attention. My head is just not in the game, lately. It wasn't until the end of the month that I started feeling the urge to do anything.
At the end of last year I participated in the "Cozy Things" quilt along hosted by Pat Sloan. I have the quilt top done and sandwiched. Thursday I started cross hatching it. I don't know what took me so long to get going on it. I'm not ready to share a photo of it yet.
I've been slowly working on my Halloween cross stitch.
I was so happy when I finished the house. Then I printed out the next part of the clue and was surprised that I wasn't done with the house. I forgot there was a first floor. I'm slowly chipping away at this project.
I have a sock on the needles. I started it so I'd have something to work on in the car. I haven't been going to many places, much less be a passenger.
I'm currently working on the heel. The leg is a 1 x 1 ribbing.
I did dust off my rigid heddle loom, and made myself some towels out of peaches and cream dishcloth cotton.
This one was a mix of colorways. I think they look fun!
I made of the green ones two different sizes, by mistake. I'm still learning tricks to measure the fabric as I go along.
If we were having coffee ... I'd share that I've been daydreaming about springtime, gardening and seed starting. I've been hitting the homestead and gardening youtube videos pretty hard. For as many videos I watched last year, I'm still learning things. With so many people getting into gardening this past year, I think that's driving the Youtube content to expand a little bit. I've organized my seeds, saw what I had from last year, and I already purchased the seeds I want for this year. I've also put my first order in to Baker Creek for Ghost and and Carolina Reaper pepper seeds. I'm super stoked to give those a try. I'm debating on when I should seed start for them. Maybe try one seed each and see what happens.
I've got a calendar printed out and all my seed starting dates noted. As soon as I wrap up the quilt, I think I'll say farewell to the sewing machine for a bit and set up one of my seed starting stations. Last year I started out sharing the whole seed starting journey and I went off the tracks. Unexpected life things happening. I'm thinking about giving it a try again. I realized I enjoy looking back at the photos and videos for the plants from last year.
Which got me thinking about when I tried video podcasting and then almost right away Covid hit and I no longer had quiet time at home. I can't remember what brought it up a while ago, but my son said something about my videos and I said I don't have anywhere to do it, and he said "You can close the door to your craft room." Yes, I suppose I could. ... I'm still thinking about it. It took a lot for me to record that first video a few years ago. Speaking of podcast videos. Well, flosstube, my friend Leann started a flosstube and she's fun to listen to. She gets so much done on her projects.
Okay, I realize I just blended to subjects together.
If we were having coffee ... I'd let you know that all the animals are doing just fine. Especially Miss Furby.
She spends her days close to me, and she is so spoiled that when I'm not watching television, I leave it on for her, so she doesn't feel alone. I feel bad that I still haven't told Furby's story, like I did Porkie's but I want her to have her own entry. Did I mention Furby lays an egg almost every day? She does!
The ladiess are starting to really crank out the eggs, which is great! We are starting to fill up the incubator so we can have chicks in about a month.
Thor and Loki, and Shadow and Feffer are all doing well, too. They are enjoying this mild weather. A little too much, maybe? Ha ha ha!
Speaking of Porkie, I have some news that may bum some people out. Some one took one of my Facebook posts about Porkie and sent it to the DNR. I got a talking to and was informed about what can and can't be done. I'm hurt and upset that someone would do that, specially if it was someone on my Facebook friend list. Most likely it was someone in the "What do you see from your window" group. I keep reading the rules on feeding wildlife and know what I can and can't do. Suffice to say, I won't post about Porkie on my social media anymore, unless it's like general update, like "he's still alive." It's a bummer because so many people enjoyed seeing his updates. Many people have contacted me and said seeing Porkie updates was a bright spot in the pandemic. I wrote a post to the group, to let his fans know why there would be no more updates and as of 1 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 30, it hasn't been approved. My guess is the post will sit in limbo because someone taking groups posts outside of the group is probably against he spirit of the group and people would be more reluctant to share. I know I feel like my trust has been violated and I'll be even more wary about what I share on Facebook in general.
The law is hard, but it is the law. I will respect it.
