Jurassic Bone Marrow

Yet another red neck folk art creation of my dad's whimsy. It use to be a perfectly normal porous rock decorating our humble little fish pond. But one to two years ago maybe more, can't remember exactly, my dad decided to make it in to this using some cement that was laying around. Something that looks to me like a giant soup bone. I don't know why he needed to do that but on a whim I guess the need was there. It could have been possibly his love of things drum stick or any bone cooked with meat still on it. I know he always has to be the first to grab those. Its the cave man in him I guess. 
It is pretty cool to look at even though I still have mixed feelings about it. I could plant or someone else could plant some nice pinkish flowers in the hole to represent fresh marrow in a bone? Who knows? So far my dad only has planted some random tulips in the hole thinking they would come back every year (but they didn't) but I think much smaller flowers would do much better anyways. 

 

Big Poofy Garlic Flowers

Here we have some more of those last years summer pics for your eye's enjoyment. 
Not normally considered pleasant smelling whether the flowers or the flavouring bulbs, but some nice big poofy garlic flowers over looking the junk in our little back yard. But then beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all. Normally these flowers are even more showier if you plant them in a non domestic way. Meaning if you just bury them in some obscure wild patch of your yard, they will grow some lovely purple-ish colour on the poofy blossoms. Down side they will be a little more puny. Must be the wild stuff in the soil. I would imagine that eating the bulbs later on would naturally be healthier for you then being domesticated. Maybe I'm wrong. None the less these are pretty cool looking. 

 

Dad's Chair Monstrosity

Presenting my dad's unholy union between a former 1988's van chair and a discarded broken probably peed on former office chair, now in this wonderful red neck concoction.  OK its kind of neat, it sort of looks like the captains chair from StarTrekNG but if you ask me looks a bit dangerous.  Oh yeah he put it together last year. And he keeps it in my studio only because he feels the need to share his stuff in there since the old Commodore 64 is in there for his old chess enjoyment. 😑

Fiery red leaves

Thought I mix it up a bit by sharing last season's fall leaves on the trees in our back yard. Then maybe I'll get back to showing spring and summer stuff or maybe something really weird and unusual. You just never know. 😉
Anyways here are some lovely new pics of the burning bush that's located in front of my bed room window. There's also a bush in the back with I think something like a Chinese maple of is that still a Japanese maple? We do have yet another tree closest to the pond that's an official Japanese maple but this one I'm unsure. Maybe next time I'll photo that official one in the fall as well. Its leaves are quite "stringy" looking if you ask me and its one of my pet doves favorite materials to use in there nests besides curly and twisty sticks together with some forked ones in them. Over all I really thought the leaves were so beautiful I decided to collect a few for future projects. Most preserved quite well as dried supply's. 😊

 

Summer Happy sunflowers

Ok so its still winter but here's a little bit of summer to wet your summer whistle. 😜 Besides I already saw Easter cream eggs already being sold during the Christmas holidays and just last month and only a few weeks into January I first heard what I thought were the sound of robins while on my way to pick up some KFC. Not a big KFC fan but the people in this household really seem to love the stuff. But the walk to the franchise is a body of a treat for me. I love a good walk. So yeah anyways the sound of what I thought at first, thought was my imagination and was really the sound of a whirlybird. Those whirling mushroom things on top of roofs that made the strange chirping/squeaking sounds. On my way back my eyes confirmed that I was not hearing things, it was indeed a very early robin. Although there were probably a pair I saw in a tree, I only saw the one. OK but how are they going to get enough food? There really are no worms at the surface this time of year. Only a scattering of small dried fruit still on some trees and bushes and not really the good kind. If someone knows tell us all? 😮
Oh and don't worry, spring is just around the corner. 

These are some lovely pics of last summer's sunflowers. Very successfully grown. But at the beginning a bit slow going with the squirrels stealing the seeds and seedlings and other mishaps. 
In in case you are interested,  I made a little green house for each seedling out of a half cut water bottle with vents cut onto the what is actually the bottom of the plastic bottle and placed them on top of each space. It gave them much needed protection till they can get a start. Then after removing the protection, I surrounded the sprout with small sharp sticks to discourage squirrels digging the plants up. You can also use plastic forks for this as well. Remember to have the pointy bits up.   After that its just a matter of watering them everyday on hot days. Later they provided a great meal to all the birds in our neighborhood. Such as gold finches. Sadly I never got a chance to take pics of them since they're really flighty type birds. Maybe when I have a go-pro cam or critter cam. Oh well.

None the less enjoy.  😊

Sadly that year. I saw no honey bees. Oh and they're still approving "round up" to be used in our municipality. Stupid bone heads!

Cheesed off

OK like most Canadians I'm quite disappointed at Old El Paso for deciding to discontinue the powdered nacho cheese mix.  I really didn't eat it as intended though but I absolutely loved it as a topping for my popcorn.  What to do?, what to do? Well you make your own and its not really that difficult. If you have a Balk barn in your area or some kind of bulk store you may be in luck. 
Look for the powdered cheese normally used for pasta to make macaroni and cheese. but there's another way of using that stuff. Make your own powdered nacho cheese mix. First get your self some powered cheese mix that is if the bulk store has the stuff. About a cup or if you prefer two. Then purchase a few packets of taco seasonings. Whatever your favorite is. It could be Old El Paso or what ever you prefer it really doesn't matter. I purchased the Metro brand. Then get an ordinary jar. Glass or plastic or even some other container, what ever so long as it holds your stuff and keeps it dry. Then mix a packet of the taco seasonings with your one cup of powdered cheese and wala! you have your very own nacho cheese mix. Tastes may very so you may wanna use more of the taco seasoning mix or less its up to you. Problem solved and enjoy! 

A house all decked out

A lovely pic of a decorated front lawn in all kinds of Christmas related characters. This guy sure has some excellent airbrushing skills. Not to mention a great eye to produce these wooden cut outs. Could have looked much nicer in Christmas snow but even without, its a really great set up.
Oh and bonus for once I took this shot most recent as in not from 2 years ago. 😜
Their house is very pretty too. 😊

 The conductor guy from The polar express. 🔺

  Scrooge 🔺

 Baby Jesus and family with the Polar express train in the background.  🔺

Winnie the Pooh and friends.  🔺

Home Fries vrs the winter day

Boy for the last days of Dec let alone 2018 it was pretty warm today. You could mistake it for early spring especially seeing some guy walking down the street in shorts. But you know that these kinds of days are usually too good to be true. Tomorrow we are back in reality of this miserable type of weather below 0 celsius. Surprise. 

But there are always home fries. Nice and comforting thing to look at let alone to savor in your mouth. Yum!  Better then looking out the window at the bleak landscape that winter causes. 

BTW I actually made these my self. No store bought crap here. Just some yummy homemade goodness straight out of the oven. These never last long. 😋

Last day of a chickadee

Sadly it was the last day on earth for this chickadee. That's why it was so easy to take a pic of this little guy two summers ago with just a regular old digital camera. The poor guy was so sick he wouldn't even move much when I approached him. Even if I touched him too. Although he did kind of sickly give me a protest chirp. But by the end of the day the poor little guy fell asleep and never woke up again. But before that I placed him high on a near by bush so at least he could have some peace. Cause well my cat would have had him as a snack and well you just don't know what kind of diseases the bird had. In the end I buried the little bird in a pot full of leeks and garlic. I think it grew pretty well the next year. 

Possum picknick

A little late in posting this but better late then never.
Now two late summers ago. Actually it was the same year we had that flood, we had a little visitor at night. I had gone outside to take care of a few things and probably to savoir some of the grapes we have growing all around the yard. My favorite are the grapes growing on the vines hanging on our little shed closest to my birds outdoor aviary/cages. Those are simply the best tasting grapes in my opinion to all the grapes my parents planted around the property. Apparently the animals think so too. Like this possum who I caught with a camera making a pig of him self. You can just see him and his grape filled muzzle going to town on all this fruity green goodness.  

Tail end. 😉😊

Its feeding time for Meetso

" I came out of my jungle. Now feed me. "

It was a hot summer day when I took this last year, and was still pretty warm when Meetso's internal dinner bell rang. That was usually at the end of the day when I met him in his usual all day hiding spot where he can get away from the heat and keep an eye out for any unsuspecting tasty critters that went by. It is the small area of bushes near the fenced in garden. Its a mini garden but you get lots out of it. The bars make the bushes look like a small habitat for a tiger in a zoo or at least that's the impression I get from the image I took above.

At this point the sun was getting low so the backgrounds of the images look more dark then I would like them. But the colours on my kitty still look alright. Meetso sits on the edge of a wood plank for awhile on the garden, half asleep and thinks about his next move. 

Can't get enough of his lovely fur covered back and his wonderful white spot. 
Oh and if your wondering about his tail, well for some reason he gave it a hair cut. He literally plucked some of the hair on his tail to make it look like that. Not really sure why but it might just be easier to clean in the summer since he does shed copious amounts during that time. 
He also plucked his tail again this year too. 
It gives his tail the lion tail look. 

" Huh? I thought we were getting food?  "

At this point I think Meetso was getting a little tired of all the picture taking but he's just so darn cute. 

 " So um food?  "

Just another shot of his cute face. 

" Sigh.......The things I do for food.  "

Yeah eventually my cute fluffy big boy got his numnums. But not before I took just one more pic. 😉😀

A little bit of green

OK so St Patrick's day is long over but, like everything including spring everything seems to be a bit late this year. But better late then never. 
I found this pretty cool little four leaf shamrock while removing some of the little invasive plants in our pots. It was about 2 year or is it three years ago now. I saved it by pressing it between some books and then later laminating it. I fixed the colour in Photoshop cause it was brownish after scanning it in and examining it.  I'm only keep it for coolness and nothing to do with luck. I have a related article which I'm going to post in the other blog soon. Just not today. 😋😎

 

With a cherry on top.

Happy New year every one. Hopefully it won't be worse then last year but then who am I kidding. 
Anyways here are some nice summer pics from last season of June. Some yummy sour cherries that were all nice n ripe. Oh yeah they really are yummy even with their sour qualities. Oh and they make really great jam and pie. Who knew you can get so much from a really small cherry tree. Of course eventually I'll share with the birds when the tree gets a bit bigger. 😉
Use to drive the neighbours nuts when I climbed theirs. There were sour cherries trees on both sides of our property and those were pretty tall.  But they were always pretty prone to wood eating insects for some reason. Oh well. Maybe now they're more stronger because of breeding. But then who knows. 😊

 

The house thats for the bird that has everything.

Well I had or rather I still have this cheapo purse. I only had it for a couple of years I guess before it got all torn up and ratty. It was really nice when I got it. Most unusual and different from all the other purses I had in the past and I just couldn't resist purchasing it despite in my head I knew its a cheapo. Plus I felt sorry for the foreign girl working in that little shop that I know probably wasn't going to last for much longer and she would probably loose her job. Well I was right. The shop soon after closed and she probably had to go back to her own country cause she just couldn't make a decent living in our humble little mall. It really is a little mall which consists of just the main grocery store and a few enclosed shops. Definitely not a plaza. 
Anyways instead of just throwing the purse away I decided to make it into a bird house out of it. Something I kind of wanted to do anyways in the future and took advantage of when I got an old ratty purse to do so. 
So here it is. I hung it close to a bird feeder underneath a shed roof but so far no takers this year. Oh well maybe next year when I move it to a different more secluded spot. 

 

Just dilly

Last year when I took these pics, like the cat nip, the dill that grew, really was bountiful. Sadly this year the dill that grew back although looked like it was going to really be bountiful again, was not. The swallow tail butterfly cattapillers made sure of that. Usually they go crazy all over the parsley and the tomato plants but for some reason it was the dill's turn to get pummeled. Oh well there's always next year. 

What's a little catnip

Well its October and I'm still pulling up those annoying ivies. Thankfully I can see the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. But the last to pull out is the more difficult. On top of that I think that ivy was the thing that was making me itch all summer. Still have to yank out all those butter cups. 😖

Anyways here are some nice pics of some colossal sized pretty much a bush of cat nip weed I snapped last year. When it came time to get rid of the old growth, I threw it in to the bushes and I think that's what drove Meetso to go over the top. Sadly when I tried to repeat the growth, Meetso as with all cats just couldn't resist raiding the nip. So the only thing that survived this year was the one still hanging in a pot. Oh well. Got to figure something out. 😏