RIP: Raven the cat

Raven the cat

August 11, 2002 - January 29, 2010

Beloved pet of CityRat, Savannah, Pumpkin, Peanut, and Wicket.

Big brother of Caramel and Mimi.

We all miss you friend. Sleep well.

 

Playing catch up!

A lot of things going on around here...so much to keep up with. Even without a job both Savannah ad I seem to be constantly on the run. Soccer, school, dentist and doctor, then keeping up with the housework, as well as keep the baby happy and busy. Doesn't seem like much when I type it out though.

So, what have we been doing around here? The garden has been expanded, dug, and planted with peas, beans, carrots, radish, beets, potatoes, and lettuce. Tomatoes were supposed to go in but that hasn't happened yet, so i might have to buy some seedlings to cover that area. Potatoes went into a potato box i built, although only one seems to be sprouting now....wonder what happened to the rest of them. Oh well, we'll wait and see how that goes.

Sunflowers were planted at the back of the yard...again, something dug them up and ate them the first time. This time i covered them with some lattice until they sprouted...and now something has been nibbling the leaves, but at least they're growing!

Raspberry bush was planted, and doing pretty good. It's still small, so we won't get to much off of it this year, but it's flowering already.

Rhubarb root went in, and seems to be doing well. It's still small too, but those things grow almost anywhere so I'm not worried about that one.

Wildflowers in the front yard appear to be coming up, but it's hard to tell between the "weeds" and the "wildflowers".

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The Fat Cats Neighbourhood Adventure

Raven (aka the fat cat because he weighs almost 20 lbs) decided to have himself an adventure the other day. He is entirely an indoor cat so I have no idea what possessed him to want to take a jaunt outdoors but he waddled out the door none the less.

He then spent the rest of the day taunting us by walking by the open windows and meowing so that we would come look for him. Of course we never found him on these occasions but I am sure he was close by laughing at us.

He finally decided to come home just after it got dark and the temperature dropped. I am sure than main reason for his reappearance was his desire to have food served to him since he is not agile enough to catch his own dinner.

Of course, he could not just come to the door and meow to be let in. No he made CityRat come out to retrieve him from his hiding spot beneath the outdoor bar. Not the easiest place to get a fat cat out of. At least I didn't have to be the one too pull him out. I still bear the scars from the last retrieval attempt.

Plants, and gardens in the Bubbledom

So we've been busy here in the Bubbledom, digging up overgrown flower beds, widening other beds for vegetables, and basically getting the yard cleaned up so we can use it.

The beds in the front yard have been planted with packs of wildflowers, and the other random bed in the middle of the front lawn has been seeded with grass seed. I know, not very homesteader like, but we just moved into the place, and it's a rental, so we have to take things slowly here in regards to taking over the property with the way we'd rather have it. Savannah has also added some hanging pots with Geraniums up on the front steps, which make the place look a little more cheery too.

The back yard has had our composter added to it, the rain barrel moved behind the shed (although the downspout hasn't been completely moved yet, which caused a small basement flood one day), and the bed behind the shed (hey, I'm a poet, and don't know it) has been widened to at least twice what it was. We also planted a raspberry bush down near the back of the yard, and a rhubarb plant up closed to the house. In one of the planters that was left behind I've discovered that it's been planted with chives, so we now have fresh chives in a pot out back.

On the downside of the Bubbledom, the upstairs washroom floor is soggy, and we're patiently waiting for it to dry out so we can fix it up. That and we're still getting organized and unpacked from moving here last February, so we're always busy busy busy!

On a side note, the site will be going through some changes in the next little while, please bear with me as i get everything sorted out.

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Welcome to Homestead Bubbledom

We've moved a bit, south west of where we were, from the confines of the apartment over to Homestead Bubbledom. Yes, that's what I'm naming it. Although we're still renting we now have a yard for the youngins and a garden, a driveway, a basement, and even heat (yes, heat, which was lacking in our apartment...possibly more on that later). We've been at the new place for a couple weeks now, we're still unpacking and getting things setup and organized of course. The cats love the extra space, and the stairs. Maybe Raven will finally lose that gut.

So far we've got the bedrooms almost completely set up, just need a bed for Peanut to finish their room i think. Our room i think is setup, just needs some more organization....or me to put my clothes away. Wickets room is still a crazy place, and needs a door knob as the last one was shot.

So, the basement toilet blew the seal, we replaced the upstairs toilet with a new dual flush (and a proper wax seal), cleaned out the shed, replaced the crazy 3 headed homebrew showerhead in the upstairs shower, cleaned up the backyard a bit, removed the frozen uncooked hamburgers from the BBQ....not sure how long they've been sitting there, and threw out tons of garbage that had accumulated from the previous tenants who basically were slobs who did nothing.

I now have what my wife calls a 'man cave' in the basement. It has the computers, some shelving, and the fish tanks. Right now there's mostly just bits of shelving and boxes everywhere. The fish tanks are on their shelf, they still need more attention though. I'll be building a small aquaponics system there too, so keep an eye out for that.

That's about it for now....this site needs an overhaul....it's on the list.

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