A weekend

A wee visit to Mom’s place to do a bit of set-up in the back yard and to visit with her and Kyle. They have both been very busy already, so there wasn’t a lot to do; but we did hang out all the chimes and bird feeders, and set up the patio furniture. Iain expanded the patio area a bit.

Relaxing after a bit of work. Iain got some digging done, while I did the easy stuff.

 We don’t get to see them as often as we should. Life is TOO BUSY, for them and for us!


We are so thankful that these two have each other to rely on!

Sunday afternoon we made a quick trip to the lake, thinking we should set up the gazebo, as the blackflies are on their way and it will be the only place to sit outside in any kind of comfort. Sadly, the roof has ripped in several places (which we discovered as we tried to hang it). It is six years old, and has been outside all summer each year, so I guess this is understandable.

So, we did a quick fix with the ever-useful duct tape. Not sure how long this will hold (in fact, with all the rain we received Monday and Tuesday, I won’t be surprised if it is off), but it’s the best we can do until a new one arrives, probably in June.

Yuck. I don't want to have to look at this for very long.

The flowers are blooming at the cottage!

Daffy-dills!

On the way home we spotted some Mennonites who live in the Renfrew area. At first I thought it was just someone with a team of horses out for a tour, so I took a picture through the windshield. It was only as they approached that I realized they were all dressed in black. I put my camera away quickly, as I’m sure they don’t like being treated as photographable oddities (although, if you look considerably different from the average person, and you are doing it on purpose, you should probably accept that you are going to be an object of curiosity). I was really going for a picture of the horses, anyway.

A nice team!

Can spring finally be here?

It’s starting to feel a bit warmer, it’s raining more often than it snows – yes, I think it’s here!

Every morning, Jezebel comes to the door to watch Iain leaving for work. I don’t know if she just wants to escape outside now that it’s spring, or if she is missing having his lap to curl up on every day (as she did for the last year when he was out of work).

Our adorable girl.

This was a sight for sore eyes last weekend. So good to get back to the lake. It’s where we really want to be, all of the time. We’re fond of saying that if we had high-speed internet there, we’d probably just live there.

The snow is going!

The main road is bare, but the sideroads by the lake are still snow-packed.

At least now you don't fall through the crust every second step.

We saw what looked like racoon tracks. We aren’t really woodsmen, however, so we might be wrong.

Raccoon? Skunk?

The ice is just beginning to recede near the shore where the water is flowing.

It never really freezes solid here - too much water action.

Most of the lake is quite solid as yet, though slushy on top.

I'm hoping it will look at bit different next time we are there.

Moose and deer tracks on the road across the field.

We don't often see moose around the lake.

And we saw a gull! I believe this is the earliest I have seen one on the lake, as yet.

So wish I'd had my telephoto lens handy!

Still waiting for spring

One more wintry weekend at the cottage.

They may sound like a squeaky hinge, but Blue Jays are beautiful!

This was a lazy weekend: puzzles, books, games, and good food!

The required puzzle being done.

The weather was rather dull, unfortunately. The bright winter sunshine through the windows is always hoped for. Still, the days and nights weren’t terribly cold. No snowmobiling this time: Jo wasn't feeling very well. We took a short walk down the road, and that was pretty much all the exercise we got. We also had a nice visit with the Remus family, up for the weekend. Little Kenadee couldn't be cuter.

The view: cloudy.

We put seed into the feeder and were rewarded by visits from Blue Jays like the one above, plus Chickadees, a Red-Breasted Nuthatch, and several Red Squirrels.


I'm glad Iain built this feeder; it attracts lots of birds and animals.

There is still lots of snow.

A chickadee having a snack.

Of course, the squirrels fought over the feeder, as they always do.

This guy was enjoying the peanuts.

We DID get to try out our new (to us) barbeque (courtesy of Brian, who gave it to us when he moved). Thank you Brian!! First steaks of the year, and they were SO GOOD yummmmmm. I'm looking forward to more barbeques, as it worked perfectly.

Hopefully our next visit will be warmer, and we’ll be able to see the grass a bit!

Enjoying February

This is, admittedly, not my favourite month, but one must make do with what one has. In my case, this means I stay inside most of the time. We made a trip to the cottage last month, and that’s mostly what I did, but it was fun anyway!

Dodie hard at work.

No cottage trip is complete without the pre-requisite jigsaw puzzle. This was a rather hard one, and I wasn’t sorry to see the end of it.

It was a bird-count weekend but we saw so few birds it wasn’t worth submitting.

Despite our best efforts - as you can see, by the amount of seed and peanuts here - we saw few birds.

Friday was a very dull day indeed, weather-wise. Perhaps that kept the birds away.

A Chickadee!

I never tire of our view. In this case, I was happy to see the sun setting slightly further to the north. Spring is coming: very, very slowly.

Sunset.

The moon setting very early on the Sunday morning. Beautiful.

Moonset.

Having a cracked window brings about one good thing: a lovely frost pattern!

It kind of looks like big bug...

Iain took a walk in the snow before we got ready to go home.

The snow was quite deep. With the cold weather, I doubt it will have melted at all before we are back again.

An Hiatus

It's almost a month since I last blogged, and I have no excuse except that my life has been quiet...too quiet.  Just kidding, I don't mind it being quiet. It's nice, really.

The first two weeks of my absence were spent waiting for Iain to start his new job. And the last two weeks have been spent getting used to our new circumstances.

First off, getting used to a 5:00 a.m. alarm wasn't bad. One of the results of aging, for me as for many people, is an inability to sleep for eight hours most nights; so we have adapted to it pretty quickly. By the end of the work-week, though, I'm falling asleep on the couch during the evening.

Secondly, Iain has had to adapt to a longer commute. He's on the road for a good three hour tour, every day. It would be worse if he weren't getting away early, though.

There are a lot of good things about this extra morning time, not the least of which is that I cannot continue to avoid exercise as I have for the last year. Someday very soon, I'll be starting to work out again (yay me) (go Deb go).

Other than that, well, days have been short and cold, cats are snuggly and well (Jezebel had dental work done, but she's recovering), and every morning I look out at the snow and wish I could just stay inside. A typical winter.

Maybe next week I'll have something more interesting to report on. Patience....patience.

Cold, but beautiful.

It’s January, and as the current mild spell draws to a close (colder temperatures are on the way next week, according to the weather network), I’m thinking about those very cold days we spent at the lake, at the start of this new year.

Even the daytime high was pretty, well, LOW. I stayed inside most of the time. Fortunately, we had a warm cottage, comfy chairs, jigsaw puzzles, good company, and lots (and I mean LOTS) of food and drink.

Iain got a set of whites for Christmas from his clever brother Kyle! And he put them to use when he made us some chocolate souffles.

This was the first time I remember seeing a Tree Sparrow; there were several at the feeder.

There were several Red Breasted Nuthatches, but no White ones.

We did have a visit from a couple of Flying Squirrels, at night of course.

Of course, we had lots of Bluejays.

The only day I went out for any length of time was Saturday, when I wandered down the lake and turned to shoot this distant picture of some of my cottage-mates playing on the ice.

I had to take quite a few shots before I finally got one that came close to catching the gorgeous colour of the sunset on Friday. It still doesn’t quite do justice to the beauty of that evening.

Merry Christmas from Our House to Yours!

Everyone is undergoing the necessary evil of Christmas pictures, just for your enjoyment.  All the best from me and Iain, and all of the kitties on Deb Island!

Snaps

Jezebel

Onyx

Stitches

Not the best day for a bake sale

I knew it was going to snow a bit, but we were surprised by just how much snow we got! It did put a bit of a damper on our sale, though we still did very well and sold a lot of goodies. I apologise for the poor quality of these photos; I had to use my phone camera, which is less than mediocre.

By the time these photos were taken, we’d already had a lot of people through, and things were beginning to lull.

Dodie had a few Christmas decor items available, and they did get picked up.

The firemen across the way were showing off their new platform truck. You can see the amount of snow that had fallen before noon.

People came in by dribs and drabs, and we sold a lot more goodies before we closed up.
I fell in love with this ornament Lisette brought to decorate the table. Shiny shiny shiny!

These were available from Avon in 2003. I would like to pick one up someday.
 

Thanksgiving

It’s nice to have family around at Thanksgiving, and though everyone we wanted to have there couldn’t make it, we enjoyed what we had!

This is the “penultimate” cottage weekend for us, this year as most. One last weekend to relax and enjoy the beauty of the place.

Sheila and Kyle joined us for a walk.

Iain can't pass up a chance to undo some beaver work.

It was so beautiful and calm!


One of my favourite spots on the lake. Love this view, from Hefts' property.

There aren’t a lot of birds around now, so the woods are quiet and still.


Dandelions: the first to come and the last to leave.

We checked out the vinyard, where we’d been told the grapes were plentiful and not being taken by the birds for a change (few birds + a plentiful year = more grapes for us!).

This was Len’s vinyard, and he would have been so happy to have a harvest like this.

It took me about 30 seconds to find all these.

On Sunday, we prepared for dinner. Just about all set up here, waiting for people to arrive.


Sheila doing some setup.

It was a great meal, by the way. Many thanks to Dodie and Myles for an excellent turkey!

The ongoing war with the beavers.

Since Iain was free a lot this summer, he made a real effort to keep the creek open near the farmhouse. Lloyd did eliminate one of them (quite probably the adult male), but younger ones were still patching up the flow every night, though they weren’t doing as good a job.

You can see here that the water is not moving very well. The young beavers use a lot of small sticks and don't add stones and solid mud the way an adult would.

The amount of flooding, especially on Dodie’s property, made this worthwhile, but cold and messy work it is!

Iain uses a pitchfork to clean out a lot of the stuff. All the fallen leaves don't help - they get right into the dam and jam it more.

The water flows better when he’s done. Of course, it doesn’t last – the beavers do it again at night – but it keeps the lake level more like it should be.

Flowing well - for now...

The years of damming have taken their toll, though; the creek at this spot is much higher than its natural state of long ago. I miss the summer days in years past, when we had a bit of a beach along the shore, and when “gull rock” as we called it (guess why) was a good six inches out of the water, and the birds would perch there. Nowadays it hardly breaches the surface at all, even when the lake is at its lowest. It’s my thought that this is why we have so much algae and the nice sandy bottom we once had is now rather yucky: the lake doesn’t breathe the way it used to do, as the water can’t run away as well.

Iain took a little walk downstream (well, it wasn’t easy, as he had to push through a lot of bushes), and he thinks the beavers may be making dams further down in response to his “dam-busting”. They won’t be easy to get to, so this may become a problem.

The view upstream; what a lovely spot this is!