Guy

From time to time over the summer we have seen a rogue cat or two in the yard. So shy and skittish we would usually just get a glimpse before they went off into the brush. Until three days ago. I heard meowing in the front yard and thought it was Calista wanting in, although that was strange since it was the time she likes to go out- not come in. I opened the door to see the rogue little black and white kitty meowing at me. He walked right up to me and wrapped around my legs. I scooped up his skinny little body and brought him in as it was raining.
I took him upstairs and set him in front of the food bowl. He ate the whole thing without pause. The whole time I was petting him and trying to get a good look at him. He was scruffy! Matted hair with a huge clump on his back. He had brownish dry hair weaving between his black and white hair. His eyes were dull and his fur lackluster. He was strong and hard as a rock albeit very very skinny.
He was also as sweet as could be. After he ate the dry food I scooped out a half a can of wet food for him, and gave the other half to Blizzie who was now glowering at me and the visitor. He alternated between purring and getting pets and gulping the food.
After he ate and got some water I spent some time patting him. He hopped right up on my lap and rubbed and purred as I patted him. He would get antsy and move next to me to spin onto his back so I could rub his belly. I did this for about a half an hour then he hopped back down to see if he could have more food. I let him have another bowl then we went back to the patting routine.
Art came up later with a bowl of cream and informed me that three cats was a lot of cats. I had to agree. We had three cats once and it was a LOT of cats. For some reason it is at least twice as many as two even though that is not mathematically possible. We discussed trying to have him live in the greenhouse since he seemed semi-feral and we could use a barn cat.
He slept upstairs with us, waking up Art at five am for more food then I shuttled him out to the greenhouse the next morning. He did not like it. I let the chickens out and they just rushed at him like they wanted to eat him. He hid behind me for a bit then he went right up into the rafters. I had to go to work so I put up a ladder with some treats and told him I would be back asap. At the store and at my Town job I started asking if anyone wanted a kitty since three cats is just too many cats for us. I got two leads and was thrilled.
I came home after a couple of hours and he was gone. I looked everywhere. Just. Gone. I was so sad. I texted Art to let him know. Of course at this point I was feeling guilty that I stuck him out in such a scary place and now he's going to be stuck outside when Hurricane Irene blows through this weekend. :-(
Later that evening we heard meows from the yard. I opened the front door and the kitty breezed right upstairs and stuffed his head in the food bowl like he had been doing it every day of his life. He paused to let me rub him and pat him. I was taking Blizz and Zdeno to the groomer the next day so I decided to take this guy, too.
Oh, by the way, Art named him. Guy. Short and sweet.
We took him to the groomer today and he was very well behaved. He is still a little ratty but it's probably because he's malnourished and has clearly lead a rough life. The groomer guessed that he's about five to seven years old. He has not been neutered yet. Luckily, he had no fleas or mites or other parasites.We brought Guy, Blizz, and Z home and fed them all dinner. Z got a cute Bruin bow for being so sweet to Toni and for giving her kisses while he was getting his bath. Blizzie was simply informed that she was no lady and needs to work on her manners. :-\
We will all hunker down over the weekend while Irene blows through and will reassess on Monday. I imagine the vet is next. We just paid off Zdeno's surgery and now we get another vet bill for Guy. It will be worth it. I hope we find him a good home, but worst case scenario he has already found one :-)

Remembrance

Sweet Polar. We adopted him within a few months of moving into our first home in NH. He was the runt of the litter but he was so sweet. He loved to go for walks and catch frogs in the pond. He loved the snow! The colder it was outside the less likely he would be to come in. He died suddenly on this day last summer from liver failure. He will always have a place in our hearts.
(1998-2010)
Two years ago tomorrow we lost our sweet Zoicite. She came home with us to the first house we bought in Denver after we were married. She was a sweet kitten from the start. I don't think I appreciated enough just how snuggly she was, how much she loved to be on our laps, be stretched, and most of all be loved! (1996-2009)

Family

Last summer our nephew Kevin married Jamie. They are a sweet couple and the wedding was so much fun. The sunset was absolutely amazing and since they got married on July 4 we were able to see fireworks from different towns up and down the water. My Mom-in-law even got up for a dance with Dad-in-law.
Abbie came with her boyfriend Zeb. He is from Colorado and we had fun getting to know him!
The day after the wedding we went to Halibut point with Art's folks. It is one of the first places I visited in New England. They looked so sweet overlooking the water I just had to get a shot :-)
Our Thanksgiving ritual of going to Plum Island was a success as usual. The weather was pretty darn nice and we, of course, listened to Alice's Restaurant all the way there.
Keeping warm by the fire. Zeb even fashioned a pot holder over the fire so we could keep the soup warm. So ingenious and fun!
Introducing Maggie! Sue, Sam, and Charlie adopted Maggie just about a month before we got Z. She is exactly one month younger and the two of them adore each other and have such fun playing together!
They played together so well and they slept for a whole day afterward! No one wanted to nap lest they miss something!
The goal- global domination. The result- lots of fun!
Lindsay's pup Bailey also joined in the fun. She is a bit older so she is in charge. They had a great time together. They played in this room all night!
Our annual Christmas picture. We had Sue take it when everyone came over for a pre-x-mas dinner. Usually it is just me wrangling everyone into one shot.
Went to Colorado for Christmas. We got to spend time with the kids and also got to know Julie better. We went to the Bronco game one afternoon and Julie introduced us to a fabulous Mexican eatery in Denver called La Loma. Delish!
Julie has a son Harry who is half way between my brother's two boys. Now they have five kids between the two of them. Wow! It can be loud and is usually chaotic but they are all a lot of fun and seem to get along well.
Mom turned 80 this past June. She had a fun party at Stratham Park and lots of family and friends came. It was a rainy day so we all cozied under the pavilion and caught up. I met a few new family members and some old friends of theirs. Great day and Mom seemed to have a wonderful time!
We moved the party back to Mom and Dad's house after the extended family cleared and the day wore on and got cooler. Such a great family! I love how often we were able to see each other this year!
For Father's Day we caught up for the traditional lobster dinner. Sam and I had hamburgers ;-) I try them every year but still don't like them. I do like the occasional mussel though, if there is enough wine, butter, and garlic on top!
We rented a house on the beach with Art's oldest sister this summer. It was a fabulous time! We were only fifteen minutes away from Art's folks house so they were able to visit often. It had a little back yard so Zdeno was able to come and enjoy the ocean. He had Maggie and Bailey come to visit a couple times which was great. We also got to meet Kevin and Jamie's new (older pup) Lester. He is a retriever pyrenees mix. He is a love with people but sadly did not really get on well with the other dogs.
The dogs, and us people, really enjoyed walks on the beach. It was early in the year so the water was still cold but we had some pretty hot days that made it feel refreshing. I even had a girlfriend that was able to come and spend the day on the beach with her three kids. Great time!
I definitely would like to do this type of vacation again. Super relaxing. We were close enough to home that we could go back if needed (Art, Karyn, and Ralph all had to work at least one day), we were close so family and friends could visit. The best was that we got to bring Zdeno and he even had visitors!

Fall in New England

Where does the time go? As I watch the leaves falling outside my window I realize that another year is coming to a close. It goes by faster each year!

Most of our time and money went into the business this year but we did replace a rotting and leaky slider with windows at home. This has been a hard year. We were distracted early by renovating and moving our business but our sales have continued to slide down as a result of the warm weather and soft economy.Outside our new shop

Inside

We did a little traveling this year but not much.


We lost our beloved Polar this summer not even a year after losing our feline friend Zoicite last fall. One day in late July he stopped eating dry food. It was such a bloody hot summer we didn't think anything of it. Within a week he was only eating one meal a day, then the next week only a bite or two. He spent a week in the vet hospital on fluids and for testing. He had liver failure. We took him home, made him comfortable as possible, and loved him and lavished attention on him until he passed away in his sleep a little over a week later. Heart-breaking. Still fighting back tears...

We did have some new additions to the family as well. We got new chicks from My Pet Chicken this spring, and Cuddles hatched three eggs this year! Our first hatch was a frizzle leghorn mix named Flower. He ended up being a rooster so his name was upgraded to Flower Power. Her second was a Buff/Leghorn mix and was given away to someone who wanted to use him for breeding. The third is a cochin frizzle mix. Baby Spice, who is two months old is most likely a hen... I'll get back to you on this though. Cuddles does not have the best track record for laying hens instead of roosters!
New silkies. They are adorable and sweet! Tiffani, Milli, and Iffi
Baby Spice hatched with her sister Pumpkin. Pumpkin died within a couple days :-(

We are also working with a dog rescue to try to adopt a new pup. More on that later hopefully! My brother has started dating Julie, a wonderful energetic vibrant person and we have enjoyed her and Harrison's addition to our family. Art's parents are doing better this year. We had a mini-scare with Bud when he had a blocked carotid artery and needed surgery, but he is on the mend.

Feline Fine

How can you tell that I have been home for a while? Our family grows! LOL! We added nine new beaks last week, and this week we have two new members of our little family.
Now that Blizzie is (mostly) out of her kitten/scratchy phase we started talking about replacing the faded and scratched couches in the living room. I would really like a sectional. It would help define that part of the room and separate it from the back part. So we went around to the different furniture stores and found what we both agreed upon.
Meanwhile at home we are adjusting to life without Zoi. Blizz has never quite warmed up to snuggling with Art. She'll play with him, but if he tries to pat her nice she just bites or runs away... After having such a good buddy snuggler in Zo I was pretty sure he was going to want another cat. I gave him some time to think about it, because you cannot get a new couch if you are going to get a kitten. Not practial at all. If you are going to get a kitten now is the time since we are home and not traveling every other week.
So, he agreed to go look at some kitties. All the shelters are full and there were a lot of kitties to choose from. Our first stop had a pretty gray boy with thumbs that was pretty sweet, and I liked the white and tabby kitten. A few rooms later as soon as we walked in a little gray tabby walked up to Art, wrapped in and out of his legs then started purring. He stood up to look around and she stood on her back legs (front legs on Art's shins) to get his attention. Just like Zoi used to do. He melted immediately. He continued looking but never took his hand off this little tabby. I was enamored with a long black haired cat with thumbs. She was sweet.
It was the first place we went to so he wanted to keep looking. We left and worked out way out to the Seacoast stopping at shelters along the way. Some of those places are so weird. The ASPCA has got to be run by some hippie liberal freaks. Those nutters wouldn't even let us open a cage to pat a kitten to see if we would like him without filling out the entire adoption application and giving them a copy of our license. Needless to say we left. Way to try to find those kittens a home!
After all of our looking he still had the tabby in his mind. Someone was patting her as we left so he was worried that she might get adopted. I tried to call the shelter to see if we could put a "hold" on the kitten but not so. We did download and fill out the app but had to go back at noon on Friday to see if we could get her.
We were there promptly at noon. Probably a little earlier actually ;) They were delayed in opening, of course! When the doors opened he shot right back to the room where she was. I could hear the relief in his voice when he announced that she was still there. Someone else came in the room (and he wasn't going to let her go again!) so I went out to get the ball rolling. Lisa came to help us. When we got back to the room Art was playing with a cute little gray kitten. She was so sweet. The little tabby had a bit of an edge on her today. Didn't want to be held as much and was a little hissy. But Lisa found her paperwork and told us what they knew about her. She was surrendered because the family had a kid. She came in with ear mites and while almost a year old was not fixed. She was also surrendered with her sister. A sister that the previous owner requested she not be separated from. The gray kitten is nuzzling with me at this point. Art is checking out a black cat he sparred (playfully) with yesterday. Black Thumbs is gone. Adopted. Good for her! Back to the sister. Lisa went off to find out who that was and the search began. Oh, wait a minute. Here she is. Right in front of us. A little gray kitten!
Kismet. I said immediately that you can't separate them! Art just kind of nodded his head.
So now we have two adorable snuggly new kitties.
The tabby is Calista, and the gray one is Thalia. Tally and Cally. They are temporarily set up upstairs in the TV room. We are introducing them to Blizz slowly. Zoi was such a snot to her so we aren't sure how she will be. Hopefully much better. So far so good! Polar is oblivious. He doesn't care. He just hopes they will play with him too!

A Chicks' Life

I got my first set of baby chicks last year. Eight little beaks with seven chickens and one Roo. I got my first egg on my birthday last year. All through the cold winter the girls gave me four to six eggs a day. I spoiled them feeding them warm oatmeal with apples, and a special mash made with cracked corn and whole oats. My philosophy was (and is) I feed them well, they feed me well.
By spring Elliot Roo was quite a handful and by summer I was at my wits end. He was so big and could be so aggressive. He would attack our poor gardener every time he bent down to pick a weed or plant a seed. He would strip the poor girl's backs he was so fiesty. He would lunge at me randomly and I did not turn my back for a moment! Although if you caught him he would happily snuggle down to be patted, and he loved it when you hand-fed him anything!
I made a fence outside for the girls so they could free range on bugs, grass, and weeds. Elliot got to me (and the girls) one too many times so I put him outside the fence for a couple of days to give us all a break. I would let him back in at night when he was calmer. After the third day he had had enough. He left. The next day I went looking for him. I could hear him but did not find him. The day after I looked again and thought I saw him at a neighbors. I had to go to an appointment but vowed to come back with Art later to get him since he was still hanging around. I really thought he would eventually just come back to the coop... The next day he was gone. I assume that someone took him. He was a big beautiful Roo for those who can handle him in all his glory!
We lost our first chicken to illness. Poor Ginny got sick inexplicably and died while we were out of town. We lost her sister Hallie to a fox. This prompted us to put a gun out in the greenhouse in case he came back. I also hung a predator "eye" outside. The fox has not returned.
We got our baby silkies by a fluke. I went to Tractor Supply to get chick feed and they were having a chicken swap. I bought two beautiful blue/black silkies that were about a month old. They were so snuggly and adorable. But so shy. They clung to each other and even when I brought them out to munch on grass they would never be more than six inches from each other.
Two of my birds went broody this summer. Ironically, they did it just after Elliot left. Not sure if they were trying to replace him or what but both Dorrie and Abbie were out of commission for a month! Corrie was hoarding eggs but would not always sit on them and once they were taken she would forget about them for a week or so. Still, she was brooding off and on for about two months. All told I think we 'lost' two dozen eggs to brooding behavior. Maybe next year we'll have some baby chicks in the coop.
The other day I was absolutely horrified when I went outside and saw that my dog had gotten one of the baby silkies. HORRIFIED! I think the dog is getting nuts in his old age. He killed a squirrel the other day and brought it into the house, too. He has never ever ever done anything like that before! Scary. So the dog is on restriction. I won't let him off his run outside, all guests are warned to give him space, and he can't be inside alone with Blizzie. I was bit by a dog when I was small and I have zero tolerance in that department. I love Polar but it would be unforgivable if he bit a person! I cried and cried. Between losing Zoi and losing Jezzie all within a week I was a mess.
We did get a new little feathered friend. We adopted a little Cochin Bantam born in June. He was a little sweetheart. He has made friends with Isabel who has been very sad and lost without her sis Jesabel. He does have spunk. Jumps right in there and tries to make a place for himself. Of course, he runs right behind me when they peck at him. Too funny! Izzie and he are in the little coop away from the big girls who are pretty aggressive toward them. Hopefully, when the Roo grows up a bit it will be a smooth transition.His name? Well, I told Art a long time ago that he could name the next Roo. We are going alphabetically and the next letter was K so he could pick any K name he wanted. Yeah, he picked 'Killer.' It sounds more like Killah since he says it with a Boston accent but all the same... I call him 'Baby K' because Baby "Killer" is way inappropriate.
I hope we are done with loss and on to happier times in the hen house!