Ravenwood Cottage

Late October...

Another glorious, rainy and dark October day here at the Cottage. Some find days like this depressing…I find them so restful. It is as if Mother Nature lies back on her harvested bounty and sighs with contentment as she prepares to enter into a time of repose and refreshment. I suppose that is how I feel as well. The garden in except for the sweet potatoes needing to be dug and cured, the fields not burgeoning with grasses to be mowed and the ever present task of pushing back creeping noxious plants toward the clearing I call home.

From my desk I can hear the pop and crackle of a newly lit fire that takes the chill off the main living rooms. The sweet smell of burning oak that stirs my collective consciousness of memories of ancient man huddled against the forces of nature for warmth around the hearth. How blessed I am for a warm dry home in which to live! The days have rolled into weeks and months and I can hardly believe it will be November soon. My garden is still producing pimento and green peppers and I have some late planted ‘Brandywine’ tomatoes struggling against the cooler than normal temperatures we have had this fall. I could have safely predicted another month of growing season but this has been the coolest October on record in our area.

My oldest cat is ill again…probably bitten by an aggressive stray male cat. She has surely used up many of her nine lives this summer. She has come back from infected glands, a neck abscess from a bite and now trying to recover from a bite on her back leg. Poor dear is such a sight as she drags herself from the basket I outfitted for her convalescence. I can hardly maneuver in my tiny bathroom as it is, but now with absorbent pads covering the floor, her basket and a dish of water I must do a ‘twister’ dance to enter there. Today she finally ate some solid food, the first in 4 days. Lucky for me she loves a dish of half & half for that is what has fought off dehydration.

Beth and I had a fun time last night at our weekly scrapbook crop night. It is a 25 mile drive one way to meet up with Marsha and Loretta, but oh so worth it! We can chatter a mile a minute or all sit quietly working on our projects and we relish this time for ourselves. Beth is cutting out triangles and squares for a lovely fall colored ‘Bear Paw’ quilt, Marsha creating a Christmas gift album for her sister with childhood photos of family and Loretta is assembling another album containing zoo photos. We are all amazed at how much she loves to visit zoos…and takes hundreds of photos of the animals. I confess I would only be able to create a double page spread on a zoo visit and then be done with that topic. We good naturedly tease her about her love of zoos.

I think it is time for a second cup of tea…and perhaps a slice of the pumpkin pie Mother made last night. Sort of my version of ‘elevensies’ that the British observe. Have a pleasant day readers.

Tomato Harvest Time...

Taking a short break…trying to gather up enough energy and enthusiasm to can some fresh picked tomatoes from the garden. When I purchased my plants this spring they were supposed to be an old favorite ‘Rutgers’ variety. Not sure what I actually received as I even have a yellow tomato plant in my garden. Most of the tomatoes have been so small it is almost like trying to process the tiny cherry tomatoes Mother wanted the first year she moved into the Cottage with me, ha ha.

It is so dry! We desperately need several days of good steady rain. I sat the sprinklers up on the garden after I picked about 3 gallons of tomatoes, I am sure there are as many more remaining to be picked. Gretchen has gone to Atlanta for a few days and the Cottage is pleasantly quite even though she is always a quite resident. We miss her while she is gone, but life with two old grannies must get tedious at times. Mother is having a lie down and I am enjoying a steaming cup of tea and almond biscotti, yum. I suppose that will be my lunch.

What an adventure I had last night on my trip to Sam’s Club and then onto the Monday night crop. I decided that I should drive the newer car; the one Chrissy gave us, as it had been just sitting for a bit. It has been parked under the shade of a pecan tree on a grassy spot. When I stopped for gas and moved my cropping tote to retrieve my purse…hundreds of ants were on the back seat! They must have been nesting under the seats and the movement stirred them up. Marsha kindly brought up her can of ant spray and I gave the trunk and car a good spray and rolled down the windows. Later when I checked back I did not see any ant activity. We surely will have to take the car for detailing now to be certain all the ‘illegal residents’ are gone.

Hard to believe it is almost the first of August, this year is speeding by. Naughty me just procrastinates doing things that have a real need to be done. A bit worrisome is the forecast of the H1N1 virus looming upon us this fall and winter. Marsha has a relative that has been diagnosed with the swine flu and is not doing well. I do hope the vaccine that the Center for Disease Control is working on will be available and prevent widespread illness.

Well, the tea is cooling and I can no longer postpone pressing on with the canning of the tomatoes. Will attempt to post a photo of my harvest in the next day or so…Oh and by the way, my corn is tasseling. Hope I can get a few good sweet ears of my first success with growing corn.

July Update...

Once again the days have turned into weeks and the weeks into months since I have updated my blog. I honestly do not know where the days go!! So far summer has been quite active for the residents here at the Cottage. Between yard work, having a garden, transporting Gretchen to university classes and the up and downs of daily life, it seems I stay busy.

The seasons’ first handyman only lasted till the weather turned warmer and now my daughter, Amy, graduate of the Master Gardener Program with the Georgia Extension Service is helping me with the yard and garden needs. She has leveled out a huge lump near the vegetable garden so I can move all my herbs to that spot. I am trying to compact my growing area into as small a space as possible, less for me to care for as I get older and slower…and lazier I guess. The heat has been rough off and on this summer but nothing as we had experienced in the past few summers. We do need rain however and I am hoping that this next week brings some.

Gretchen is only taking one class this summer quarter at school so we only have one day a week to be there early mornings. Her Mother and I have been taking her out for driving experiences and my Mother has been coaching her on the manual requirements. Hopefully she soon will be competent enough to obtain her license and begin driving around Griffin. She is also a whiz now on the lawn mower and helps transport debris to the burn pile for disposal later this fall.

Our oldest cat, Tootsie, used up a couple of her nine lives the past few weeks. She developed a large lump under her chin, which I was convinced was cancer and became very weak. I took her to the vet fully intending that she would need to be ‘put down’. The vet suggested that we try antibiotics and a steroid injection and see how she did. I have a bad taste for euthanasia so agreed to the course of treatment. This involved bringing her in the house for me to nurse. Tootsie has mostly been an outdoor cat so she would have to be bathed to come inside; I was able to bathe her without a scratch on me, this tells you how weak she was. Day by day with the administration of the Amoxicillin she got better. She ate 3 to 4 times a day and got supplements of small dishes of half & half which she lapped up gratefully. In 8- 9 days she was able to go back outside and is doing well. You just never know!

Mother has found a new hobby…playing Yoville on Facebook. When I went to a scrapbook retreat in May a new friend there, Melissa, needed a few more workers on her crew at Yoville so she could ‘buy’ a house in the game. I joined her crew expecting to never play the game again. Well, I poked around the site and learned the game. The basic premise is one works at the Widget Factory and earns coins. These coins can be used to purchase, furnishings for your apartment, clothing items or food stuffs to keep up your avatar’s energy level. Knowing how much Mother like decorating homes and such, I suggested that she might enjoy the game. Mercy!! She took to the game with a vengeance and has progressed 34 levels out of 50 in just 8 weeks. And she really enjoys buying the bits and pieces at the furniture store and decorating her apartment and has even purchased a large home which is furnished as well. Now Mother and I are hooked on going to ‘yard sales’ at Yoville to search for ‘rare items’ or a bargain for our imaginary homes. I am so glad I found something she enjoys so much!!

Work around the Cottage...

Continuing to restore my computer, but I did manage to work outside a bit today in the garden. I weeded and fertilized the blackberry vines; they are putting on new growth fast now and are beginning to bloom. Woody gave my name to a gentleman who was willing to do yard work as he had been laid off at his regular job due to the downturn in the economy, his name is Ralph.

Ralph came today and began working in the yard and around the Cottage; raking dead leaves from the yard, filling in holes from decayed tree stumps downed several years ago and the endless job of digging up privet! We are expecting rain soon so I asked Ralph to scatter the special fertilizer around the dependable pecan tree we have in our yard. We did not get a crop winter 2009, so should be due a good harvest this fall and winter. I hope he will be willing to work for awhile to help me push back encroaching Mother Nature.

Sunday was a lazy day…I was sore from the yard work. Mother and I viewed several episodes of the ‘West Wing’ on CD from Netflix; I made homemade hamburgers for supper, yum!

Got the pecan tree and blackberries fertilized just in time as we had 2 inches of good rain today. No outside work today so I puttered around in the house doing things that never seem to get caught up. We moved the hall table from the rear entryway to make a spot for a bench I had been using in our ‘tornado closet’. Mother and I decided that we might make better use of the bench by the back door to allow us to remove our shoes so we would not track in so much sand from the driveway. Mother also ordered paper shoe covers for workmen and guests to put over their shoes upon entry. I wish I had a paved area for entry or even just some gravel to cut down on the dirt and sand gathered upon our shoes. Someday…

Beth and I planned to attend the Stockbridge Crop tonight and decided to dovetail some errands and eat supper out as a treat. We first went to Pet Smart to stock up on cat food as the price has been lowered temporarily from 47 cents a can to 40 cents. When one purchases as many cans as Beth and I do, the savings mounts up. Then we looked around in Michael’s Craft Store. It is getting harder and harder to find bargains at Michael’s because of the restrictions they place on the use of their discount coupons. I did however luck up and purchase a Making Memories table top organizer that I had been wanting. I wanted a place to store recent purchased items so they would not become lost in my…uh..cluttered scrapbook room. With the 40% of coupon it was still a splurge, but one I felt I could make. We had a nice steak and baked potato supper at Longhorn’s Restaurant and then traveled on to crop with our friends for the evening.

Not such a "Good Friday' for me...

Never in the 11 years that I have had a computer have I had to use my Recovery Disc to re-boot my computer…up until now! I heard all the horror stories about scrapbookers losing all their digital files & photos; documents and such but never realized the depth of angst that would occur if such an unthinkable act happened. Luckily for me about six weeks ago I purchased an external hard drive and began faithfully backing up my desktop and files. Even with my photos and files retrievable, I lost many small software programs that I had downloaded online over the three years I have had this computer. So after spending several hours on the phone with Dell tech support, he advised me to use my Recovery Disc and begin again.

Slowly I rebuilt my data base, adjusting settings to suit me and trying to remember all the tiny details of my computer world so that they could be restored. What a nightmare! Needless to say, I have begun a document listing all the programs that had to be re-installed to get me up and running again. When I could not find the exact moon phase calendar I had previously used I purchased one online and burned it to a CD. This is something I will diligently do from now on with online downloads.

Readers, if you do not have an external hard drive and have not burned photos or software to a CD…trust me…begin to do so at once. I can not number the hours I have spent to make things comfortable again for me! In addition to my external hard drive I now have an online backup service which was recommended to me by an acquaintance. The online server is called Mozy. I had several questions about starting up their service and I was very impressed with the customer service I received! I had follow up emails several days after my concerns were addressed to be sure all was well and did I have further issues that needed attention. I can highly recommend their customer service. Check them out if you have need of such a service, they are reasonably priced as well. With so much of our lives stored on computers it is foolish not to take every precaution to safe guard the information.

Mozy

Not much new...

Busy day today; three trips into town and back. I would have never believed that I would be doing so much shuttling back and forth once retired, one really never knows what life will yield. Gretchen had classes at Griffin Tech and then later in the afternoon a Staff meeting at the Hospital. I ran a few errands while she was in her meeting. I bought a 6 pack of ‘Rutgers’ tomato plants at Ace Hardware in town; was really hoping for another flat of lettuce but they didn’t have any. I have some older seed tape with lettuce seeds and may try planting some in the garden.

A few weeks ago Mother purchased a police scanner, we are always intrigued when we listen to the one Beth and her Mother has. It is interesting to hear what is going on in the county or city as far as emergency services goes. I did an online search and found a website that gives the scanner frequencies that local law enforcement uses in Spalding County and the City of Griffin. Everything is all set now for Mother to listen to the police scanner whenever she chooses; I also printed out a sheet with all the police codes on it so she can interpret the activities she hears.

Heavy Frost this Morning...

Goodness winter seems to have returned to the Cottage the last few days. I know we usually have a cool snap around Easter time and my blackberry blossoms are near to beginning their bloom cycle, but between the torrential rains, piercing winds and bone chilling temperatures it certainly doesn’t feel like spring.

Yesterday afternoon I took my spun bond fabric and wrapped it round and round our largest peach tree that is loaded with fuzzy baby peaches about the size of your thumbnail. I will still need to thin the fruit somewhat to take stress off of the young branches, but Mother and I are so looking forward to maybe having any crop at all of our own peaches. The one remaining apple tree that lived through the drought the year we planted it is almost ready to bloom. What a lovely shade of deep pink the unfurled buds are, I shall make every effort to photograph the blossoms soon.

I also have a baby head of broccoli the size of a child’s fist and the cabbage plants are having a growth spurt as well. The sugar snap peas I planted two weeks ago are just barely poking their cotyledons up through the moist soil. I think the rain buried them deeper than I had planted them.

Have not mentioned my food storage activities in a long while; I am deep cleaning the pantry and taking inventory of what we have and keeping my eyes out for sales at the market. When Mother and I went to Wal- Mart Monday we found our favorite brand of cake mix, Duncan Hines, on sale. The mixes have risen to about $1.60 each as their regular price and were on sale for .98 cents! We stocked up buy buying a dozen mixes. I am certain we would want a cake once a month so this is a nice addition to our reserves.

I found a very useful website in my surfing and have been following their suggestions for a month or so now. I will share the link with you.  Actually it is a group of three websites joined together that discuss food storage, how to save money while building up your pantry and how to cook with the items you store, especially very basic items such as wheat. It is very frustrating that the Utah area has such helpful resources for saving money on stocking up where as in our area one is pretty much on your own. Hopefully I can begin posting more frequent additions to my efforts to build up my pantry better.

Food Storage Made Easy

Woody and Grits came yesterday to repair a small leak I discovered in the roof of the attic space in the new wing of the Cottage. I was rummaging around in the storage space looking for any odd photographs that I might have missed when I developed this passion for scrapbooking when I noticed a small puddle on the floor. It seems that the foam insulation around the ridge vents had decomposed and perhaps allowed a small leak to develop. Hopefully that repair will solve the problem but I will keep a watch out in case we need to extend the search for the cause of the leak. The upkeep on a home is like an annoying insect, constantly attacking you and draining your pockets. I love this old house...but honestly it is just more than I can care for at times.

My poor old worn out knees have felt like they are rusted stiff lately, I creak and pop when working in the garden and have had to take a mild analgesic more often than I would like to. Mother and I had a serious discussion recently about me scheduling knee replacement soon. As much as I do not want to have this procedure, she is correct in saying I need to do it while she is still active. I shudder to think how we would manage if Mother became unable to care for herself and my knees were worse than now. So I am trying to convince myself that late summer is the time for me to have this surgery. Ugh!

Guess I have rambled enough and need to get up and busy inside, tomorrow I am planning on working in the garden. Thankfully I have the mower going now and cut the grass for the first time this year Saturday. Will try to post some ‘catch-up’ journaling soon with our activities.