A Mouse in the House!

Yes, a mouse... How you ask.

The story begins last summer, when we thought we were so smart.  We installed a "cat door (see blog here)".  We thought we were so clever, because we were tired of being constantly hounded by our three cats to  "let me out".. "let me in"... etc.  Also, Tonks wouldn't go outside if she couldn't see that the door was open.

the  Cat door was a HUGE hit, to both the cats and to us.  We could sit and enjoy the evening without having to get up so often.

But in the middle of the summer, one quiet evening, I was sitting at my computer and out of the back of my mind, I could hear Paralax meowing at me, but her meow was different... it was .. prideful.. excited.... and then my MIND BURST!...   That is the "I have a gift for you".. meow.. But the really bad part was....  she was at my feet.  Sure enough...  there she was... standing tall,  presenting a nice big fat dead mouse.. in the house.. at my feet!  ugh.  Well, I got really mad at her.. and locked the cat door.  That was it, no more freedom.  Well like every parent.. she (and the other two) nagged, whined, whimpered and howled enough, that I gave in and a few days later we unlocked it and everyone was happy again.  That is, until the next "mouse event" when she arrived in the house with another one, except it wasn't all the way dead, just half dead.  Oh my God, I was over the edge on that one... and got really mad.  Locked that damn door again for a week this time, but I just couldn't stand the whining.
The rest of the summer went ok, with me giving them limited freedom... only allowing the door to be unlocked when we were near by.  We did have a bird incident later in the summer (too gross to talk about) and a couple of close calls but the rest of the summer and fall went along without any more indoor adventures.
Well,  its spring again.  They are soooo happy to be popping in and out of that cat door, that it makes me feel so happy for them.  Well, until Monday.
Monday night, terry comes home from bowling and starts messing around with the front landing.  He is banging things, moving stuff.. .and muttering under his breath.  He says... "Well, I think we have another mouse.".  But this time, its alive, its hiding under the radiator next to the front door.  Grrrr... its squeaking under there which is causing ALL kinds of excitement for the cats and ME!  Terry digs and prods with a stick, a flash light and gloves but no mouse.. although there is a lot of panicked squeaking.  Terry determines that this little scare critter is backed into a hole where the radiator pipe goes into the wall.
So.. all the cats get locked up... and we set a mouse trap with yummy, crunchy peanut butter and we place it very close to were the mouse is hiding.  End of story... almost.
When we got up the next morning, the trap is untouched... and the mouse is still in the hole.. squeaking his heart out....   We put the trap away,  because the cats are now roaming the house, and we leave for work.. figuring Mr. Mouse will meet his match.  This breaks my heart.. but there is nothing we could do.
When we arrived home after a long day... there was our little boarder... still squeaking... still in the hole.
Now what!  I got the flashlight and started poking around and I figured out that he went in the hole.. and dropped about 4 inches down between two 2 x 4s and the gyproc, trapping him in this small space. he couldn't climb up the gyproc to get out the hole.  Now my heart was really breaking... but Terry didn't really think I was right... what do I know about Mice abilities.  Well, one thing I do know, is that he was there two full days now.. with nothing to eat... and my heart was really breaking.. sooo.. late that night, when Terry wasn't looking... I dropped a nice big fat cranberry down in the hole...  poor little thing.  I really didn't want him to die in that hole... ewwww, that would be stinky.. so I needed him to keep up his strength until he found a way out.
Terry set the trap again.. but I thought it was quite a waste of time... and just like the morning before.. nothing touched in the trap (although, it could have been because he was stuffed with a cranberry belly).  Still squeaking too... (probably would like a glass of milk, now).
Off to work we went... and home again we came... he is still in the hole.. still peeping.  One thing I forgot to  mention is that the hole had a constant gate keeper... one or two of the cats sat or slept very close to the hole, most of the three days.. just in case!    For lack of a better idea, Terry decided to give the little guy one more night to try to get out of the hole.. and he locked up the cats, set the peanut butter trap.. and went to bed.  Meanwhile... I glued 3 popsicle sticks together... so they were about 10 inches long.. and popped it down the hole.. leaving it pop out... maybe this would help him  get out... and eat the peanut butter and get trapped.. a quick and painless death.
The next morning.. Terry checks the wall... and sees the stick.. (quite impressed that the mouse was able to carve those sticks out of the 2x4.. and glue them together to make them tall and extra sturdy).  With his eye rolling and snippy remarks... he said "its either gone or dead.  You would think he would go for the peanut butter after not eating for 2 days"   Oops.. I didn't mention the cranberry..  I wasn't convinced it was gone.. but I did think the stick had moved a bit.  But there was no squeaking.
After another day away at work, coming home.. and it was all quiet in the hole.. Terry figured he better try and get the carcass out of the hole... and in he goes with a saw....  actually, he had to cut a couple of holes to get right down to the spot where Mr. Mouse was.
Well, the good news was... he wasn't dead... the bad news was... he wasn't in there anymore, either.  The question is  ....where did he go.
We haven't got that question answered but we do have a new selection of mouse traps.  Ugh!

The end of the story though goes like this. Today, right after supper,  Pika.. my majestic hunter... popped into the house through the cat door.. carrying a nice big fat squirrel.  That enraged Terry and Pika was picked up (still holding the squirrel) and dragged outside where Terry shook Pika until he dropped the squirrel.. who ran across the deck, in front of Paralax and flew off the deck.
 
Needless to say.. the door has been permanently  altered.  Terry has engineered it so that it only opens one way.... there will be no more unlimited coming and going.

  

 Only "going".... 

Happy Secretary's Day

Well, I never thought I was going to get the honour of another Secretaries Day portrait.  When Pattianne retired from teaching 3 years ago, so did her tradition of having her grade primary/One or two students sneak to the office with some lame excuse, so they could study what we looked like and then go back to class and draw a FULL SIZE portrait of us.

I have had several of these portraits and each year they vary so much, its amazing that I look like all of those portraits.  Please check here and here for my last two..... that is before the one I got today!

It all began with a cheery "Good Morning" from nicely retired Pat who bounced into the office one morning this week as she does quite often.  Even though she is retired, she subs in our school fairly often as well as tutoring.    This particular day she was in a grade 1 classroom.  It was always so nice to see her... but today, she seemed more than pleased with herself, and she hadn't even started her day yet.  

It all became very clear to me when about mid morning, 4 little people from her class arrived at the office, looking like they had a mission to accomplish.  I had seen that look before... but when I asked if I could help them... they answered very quickly.... No, its ok.   

Now, Melinda, my new co-secretary what taken aback by this "dismissal" by these 4 little ones, but I told her to quickly stand up and come over.  We both stood there while they pretended to look all around the office, but I knew they were studying my brown sweater, my brown pants, my square glasses... hazel coloured eyes.. brown/blonde/gray hair.

I talked casually to Ms Cronin, talking about her white blouse, her brown pants.. and how we both have rectangular glasses.  I talked about her dark eyes... her straight dark hair and her lovely shoes.  She thought I was NUTS.... but I was helping the kids to remember what we were wearing and what we looked like!

Two days later, when Secretaries Day was officially recognized (we were actually spoiled on all 5 days of the week!)  Ms Elliott/Irving's class all arrived with this life size portraits along with comments and signatures

 This is me.  with my square glasses, large blue eyes, pink and purple shirt or short dress, with a scoop neck, filled with gems and bobbles.  I have two chokers on, one pink and one purple, to compliment my purple pants and big purple feet.  I have many fingers, multi plus grey teeth.

 This is Melinda With her beautiful blue shirt/dress... her extra long, super thin black legs and killer high heel blue shoes.  She has brown hair, millions of yellow teeth and no neck.  She is a little uneven in the shoulder department...  and I do believe one of my past pictures, I suffered the same affliction.

Each picture is surrounded by words spoken to Pat, the teacher, which she then writes down and they sign their name below.  I had several standard ones like "She is pretty", "She makes the announcements" "she has lots of bananas"(referring to the snack basket near my desk).  Melinda's had "She rings the bell" "She plays on her computer""She gives us snow pants".

 Our #1 favourite testimonial was written on Melinda's portrait though... by Aidan.  "She is in the office, she helps Mrs Peters.  They both love each other"!  You can't ask for anything better than to love your coworker who you work with every day!

Thank you Pattianne for another great Secretaries Day!

Spring has sprung.. again.

Monster Rhubarb - Late March

Its been sort of a crazy (but nice) spring here in the Valley.  We had almost summer like conditions in late March/early April.  It sort of gave us a false sense of spring.  Gardens were raked and twigs removed and lots of little spring treasures were unburied.

The garden Early April

With the nice weather, Terry spent an afternoon turning my little garden and getting all the sneaking moss and weeds out of it.  This was March and then the weather turned really cold and miserable for April.  It was nice to look out the window and see the nice clean garden, but it was way too cold to do anything out there.

Rhubarb- Strawberry type... 

 This is the Rhubarb I planted last spring, and it barely grew during the summer... I think just the shock of replanting, and then I  totally ignored it all summer.  We shall see how it fares this spring.  I am looking forward to some rhubarb from these little plants.

My compost Daffodils... weird

These rogue daffodils popped up in the thick layer of oak leaves in my compose.  I think its a little gift from Wendy's dad... and you see, the flowers are facing her house...

Same Monster Rhubarb -mid April

Monster Rhubarb - early May

 Just two weeks later, the big monster rhubarb that I keep trying to give to my sister is again too big to transplant to New Brunswick.  I am going to have to dig it up this fall... geeeeesh.  Another year of monster rhubarb harvesting.

Strawberry Rhubarb - mid April

Strawberry Rhubarb - Early May

 I think my little strawberry rhubarb will be successful this year.  I am looking forward to small bright red stalks instead of the giant, green stalks from my monster plants.  Should be interesting if my muffins I make will taste any different with the small red chunks... 

THE ENEMY!

We filled a big yard garbage bag today with these pesky little yellow dandelions.  Man, some of them grew bigger than my rhubarb.  What is their secret!

White Bleeding Heart Mid April

Bleeding Heart early May

Mystery Daffodils getting even bigger in my compost

Nut Hatch

This narrow tree trunk is in our side garden.  The tree broke off two years ago.  This hole appeared last fall and  today we saw little nuthatches birds going in and out of this with nest building materials.  I brought them two beetles and a grub I found while digging.. I hope they like them.

Ah, my babbling brook.

Hurrrrrrry.... HARD.... Every little bit!!!

Its that time of the year, again.  The annual Greenwood Ladies Closing.  I curl two nights a week and I have travelled to two bonspiels this year but for some reason I feel like I have curled three times more than I really did.  I love my team, and I love my club but I am sick of curling. 

That being said, I had a great weekend curling.  We curled one game Friday and one on Saturday.. but anyone who know anything about bonspiels knows that once you get into "C" division (by losing too many games) you begin the slippery slope of many games in a row!!!

The above picture is of our Friday Night game which started at 9:00pm (a time that I am usually in bed watching TV on a Friday night) and with all those rocks in the house... sadly we only scored 1 pin.. Let me assure you... we swept EVERY one of those bloody rocks!

The highlight of the weekend is always the Saturday night banquet and Dance.  The theme this year of our bonspiel was Las Vegas and the 24 teams who were in attendance were very inventive on their costume choices! 

Hazel, Jill, Donna, Debbie and Wendy - The Blue Women

CSI - Greenwood Style

A Shot Gun Wedding Group from Chester

Security - Greenwood Style (and they were very thorough)

"The Royal Flush" from Halifax

The "Gals" from New Glasgow...

The Big Deck - Greenwood

Ceasar Anyone... Greenwood Style

The Cigarette Girls (and Eric)

Fancy Deck from Greenwood... Check out the Headdresses

Can you guess.... 

Yarmouth... "dealers"

Halifax 4 of a kind...

Clare "Players"

Sonny and Cher - Berwick

New Team to our Spiel.. didn't even know about the costumes and went out and made some!

Gambling babes!

50/50 Winner (Thats me) $200 will work nicely in buy my new pair of Curling Shoes!

Late Saturday night trying to get all the blue off... ugh... 

International Day of Women

Kind... Funny...Creative...passionate...soulful...loving... and

funny... oh, did I already say that... well she was. Mom threatens dad on their wedding day as he pretends to drink from a bottle of booze! I love this....

My mom

Aurora Martha Boudreau Admond

Died 19 years ago today

International Day of Women

I love Saturdays & Focaccia ... but I hate Februarys

Both statements above are true.. and I have mentioned it before... February seems to be a rough month for me... why... I have a theory. I came across a blog a few years ago that sort of described February as "February Crazies" and in my world.. it was bang on.

What is the February Crazy, you ask? Well, it is a lovely period of time that occurs annually each February. Its symptoms vary but may include any or all of the following:

1.*Irritability. ~not just me... everyone around me... people all around me are edgy, stressed and down right irritating... (or maybe its just me)

2.*Strong urges to run away and join the circus. These urges may also be experienced as desires to become a hippie or ride the rails or do a stint in a nunnery. My favourite... live on a lake, with no road in or out... only the lake. Can't get to me, can't find me...

3.*Feelings of guilt. Mainly because of the first two symptoms and also because of the feeling of not measuring up to what others expect...

4.*Sudden weeping. When irritability cannot overcome feelings of guilt, sudden emotional outbursts are common. Afterwards... Symptom #2. comes into play again, then #3... and back to #4...

The other problem with February... I just can't blog. I can't.. I tried.. it doesn't work. If I did blog.. it would be a miserable, complainy blog... and who needs that...

February is over.. done.. for another year.. and next year.. I won't blog either... I will plan it though, instead of spending the whole month of February feeling guilty about it... bah.. done... happy MARCH!

But today... we make Focaccia....

I was flipping through some emails and came upon my weekly email from Cooks Illustrated with a list of recipes they were highlighting on their show. Focaccia is about the only bread I have made that I feel successful in making, and they were highlighting some fine tuning of a old fashion recipe. After watching the 9 minute video, I felt I was prepared to attempt this fun and flavourful bread... all on my own..

I had to start with what they called a "Biga".. which is a small amount of flour, yeast and warm water, and let it sit for 24 hours... almost like a "dough starter" but way easier...

I can't link to the recipe because its a members only website.. and I can't publish the recipe either... but I can sure email you the recipe... if anyone wants it...

The bread turned out so flavourful and chewy and crispy and yummy... I will make it again... next weekend. My only complaint is the recipe called for kosher salt to be sprinkled on top of the olive oil.. and while I know I am not a fan of salt.. I did it anyway.. and blak.. I didn't like that part at all and won't do it again.. ewwww.. toooo salty and bitter. Terry thought it was great, but he enjoys the flavour of salt... .

National Chocolate Cake Day

What a great way to bright a January week. Melinda showed me this little clip yesterday in one of those locally printed "read me" things you fine in restaurants, waiting rooms and gas stations. It said that Jan 27 is National Chocolate Cake Day. I was tempted right away to make "THAT" Chocolate Cake that I discovered the recipe for way back in September. I would have to bring it to work to share with 40 staff.. because I just couldn't have that in our house for the whole weekend... Lord... I would explode.

But, the community was a buzz about the weather and the possibility of a storm coming.. and also a possibility of school cancelations. My luck would be to waste a whole evening making this glorious cake.. and then have to eat it all myself. I decided not to bother... and sure enough... school cancelations, and a little snow/freezing rain to rain storm arrived, right on schedule.

Even worksites were cancelled by 10am.. and I spent the day home puttering around, catching up on laundry, dusting, de-fridging and putting away odds and sods.

Terry napped this afternoon and I puttered...

and then, I thought of it...... National Chocolate Cake Day... and remembering a very easy and extremely yummy recipe I got from my sister in law, Kelly, when I was making things for Lyndsey's baby shower. I just happened to have all the millions of ingredients in the cupboard (sarcasm here).. so I made tiny little chocolate cakes for Terry and I.

I don't even know what they are called.... but you take one package of Betty Crocker Cookie Mix (Kelly recommended the peanut butter cookie package, but I can't find it at either of our grocery stores, so I bought chocolate chunk) and one package of Reese's Minis.

You follow the directions on the package which is 1/3 cup oil, 1 egg, and 2 tablespoons of water. Mix it in a bowl with the stuff in the package, spoon into mini muffin tins... bake for 8-10 minutes. When you take them out of the oven, you pop a reese's mini into each little chocolate muffin cake..... and tada.....

Imagine.. how much we celebrated National Chocolate Cake day.. with these mini chocolate cakes of sorts....