Odds and Sods

I've been oot and aboot enjoying our weather, since the rainfest which happened last week.  I am procrastinating on the garden and containers, so things are still not the way I want them to be.  It's hard to point the blame at anyone when the problem is me.  I've been enjoying hand piecing quilt blocks (I have a total of 4 completed blocks and one work in progress) under the umbrella on our deck.  When I get frustrated I dig the pitchfork out of the shed and root around in the gardens for a while, then return to the deck.

We poured boiling water on a small anthill on the patio, and it worked spectacularly.  It didn't appear to be a big deal at the time, but the next morning the ants had brought out hundreds of dead, and they abandoned the site.  So last night I got inspired and boiled the kettle and my two biggest pots full of water, and poured them over portions of the biggest anthill by the rose garden.  So far there doesn't seem to be the same result, possibly because the original kill site was between the patio and the house foundation so there was a lot of concrete to trap the boiling water.  The big colony is just a patch of weedy dirt in the middle of the lawn, and there is ample room for the ants to just move over.  We've tried putting ant bait on wax paper for them to take back to the queen, and that seems to have reduced the numbers somewhat.  The problem with the bait is that we have to pick a time when it isn't windy, or rainy, and we know that our grandpuppy won't be visiting.  We're not always that organized.

Huck and Tuggy are having a blast.  They're spending most afternoons in their crate on our deck, enjoying the fine weather too.  Last night they discovered at least one fly in the house and spent the evening chasing it from window to window.  Someone must have eventually caught and eaten it, because I haven't seen or heard it since yesterday.  Every time I came into a room I found one cat or the other clinging to the windowsill with all four paws, following the fly  with their eyes.  I guess I should explain that because we have an older house the windows are actually flush with the wall, there is no actual sill.  This means the window has to be open for the cats to sit there, and even then there isn't a lot of room to spare.  Tuggy in particular overlaps the sill in an alarming fashion.

I have not abandoned this blog.  I know I haven't posted regularly and I may not manage every day during the summer, because I tend to have a short attention span in good weather.  There are so many things to do, and I enjoy being outside when the weather is decent.  Please check in from time to time, and I'll do the same.  If there's a stretch of rotten weather, I'll probably be here a little more often. 

I hope you have a great summer.  Get outside, dig in the dirt, read a good book.  Go to the beach, barbeque instead of heating up your kitchen.   There will be lots of time to blog and play on the computer when the weather is bad.    Or maybe the computer fairy will bring me a laptop (but don't hold your breath).