Frank and Zappa's Garden

At the beginning of March, we actually had a brief interlude of warmer weather and no appreciable snow fall. I started tracking the level of snow in our yard based on the drift under our bedroom window and how much I could see of the TARDIS.

March 8

For the last half of February, the top of this snow drift was level with our bedroom window. I was impressed, but at the same time it was nice to see it shrinking a bit.

Sometimes I do stop to look at something other than the piles of snow.

March 14

It’s shrinking!

We have a deck under all that snow!

March 16

Well, it was nice while it lasted…

March 19

The reason I bother to keep shoveling the deck.

March 20

Zappa is thinking hard about climbing over that mountain of snow.

They both did climb the drift eventually, and from the bedroom window I can see the trail of paw prints going down the other side. I don’t think they went far though, they were back at the door  pretty quickly. Not much to see, other than more snow I guess.

It was a snowy, snowy month. Saint John got six feet of snow, which is apparently a record. Yay?

Another weekend, another snow shoveling session…

Poor TARDIS, buried in the snow.

At least we are getting some warm, sunny weather. It feels good!

I love this shot…Feeling the sun and sniffing the air..I hope he is catching a whiff of spring.

The light is bravely shining through the snow…If I could get through the snow, and knock on the door, do you think The Doctor would take us away to someplace tropical?

We plan our weekends around the snow storms now; when do we grocery shop so that we don’t have to go out in the stormy weather?

I broke down and shoveled a path on the deck this afternoon. The cats are a bit stir-crazy from being  cooped up in the house, and I felt like I could use a little fresh air myself.

It actually was a pretty nice day; warm, no wind or precipitation (for a change). Up until now, any time I have opened the door, the cats have run in the opposite direction. Once I started shoveling, they seemed to think they should check it out.

That was about as far as they got, then they went in and left me to do the shoveling. Lazy little rascals. 🙂

I cleared a path to the bottom of the steps, and that is about as far as they will get because I don’t feel the need to dig my way through that snow drift. At least they can get out and scratch their deck post now.

Zappa, watching the proceedings from a perch on the kitchen counter, was not convinced.

Frank went out and gave it a try though.

I think we both felt a little better!

Every few months we have a weekend deploy, which means I have to work on Sunday morning. I have the option to work at home, which is what I always choose, but there are those who go to the office. Since the forecast was calling for a Sunday storm, the deploy was moved to Saturday.

I stayed at home with my laptop, and my coffee pot, as usual. When I went for my second cup, I noticed a woodpecker munching away on sunflower seeds out front.

I haven’t see a lot of birds around this winter; a few chickadees at the patio feeders, and that’s about it. I’m not sure if I’ve just been missing them, or if they haven’t been around. I was  happy to see this guy though. He was all fluffed up like  a little puffball, and that red cap made him stand out in what is very much a black and white back drop at the moment.

Once work was done with, we had some lunch and decided we should head out for groceries, since it sounded like today would not be a good shopping day.

I got up once during the night, and looked out the window, and nothing was happening. But that’s been the way of it this winter; zero to storm!

By the time I got up this morning, it was well underway. It was drifted across the driveway, and the snow on the deck was as high as my shoulders already. I took some garbage down to the garage, and found we even have drifts inside.

Tomorrow we dig our way out of the garage, but for today we are enjoying another lazy storm day.

We may have had a late start, but it has turned out to be a snowy winter, most of it coming down within a one week period.

We got 130 cm of snow in 10 days. Three of those snow falls (Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday again) rated blizzard warnings and kept us at home. I don’t mind all that much; I like being at home, and can work from home when necessary, so I have not felt all that inconvenienced. But it is a lot of snow!

Winter scenes all around. Taken February 1.

Including city Bambi

The city of Saint John actually declared a state of emergency for a while. The streets have been getting narrower, entire lanes disappearing in some places; parking lots and driveways are shrinking.

Driving to work after the last storm, I remarked to Cory that I’m glad I am no longer living in my old apartment on Sydney Street, where the tiny parking lot was accessed by a narrow alley way; I suspect my car would stay buried until spring at this point!

Frank and Zappa have mixed feelings about the whole thing. Sure, there is the lounging and snoozing that is obligatory for any self-respecting feline…

But they are getting a bit stir crazy. They don’t like being  cooped up, but they don’t want to subject their dainty paws to snow either. I’m actually surprised they are still holding out.

Why won't these humans open the door!?!? Taken February 1.

Never mind.

I give up. Taken February 5.

I did, however, have to take some measures to stop them from hunting in the kitchen. After several occasions of  finding cat food packets with holes clawed in them, leaking all over the floor, I had to start storing their food in a plastic bin.

There is supposed to be cat food here!

This is not how this was supposed to go.

We’ve actually had a whole week now without snow. Except we are supposed to get another 30 cm tonight.

I don't think we need any more, do you? Taken February 3.

The snow that we had in November did indeed melt. I think we had one or two dustings of snow, but nothing that lasted. It was actually quite warm for most of December.

Cory started his vacation on the 15, which meant I was going off to work every day wishing I was on vacation already. I was off as of the 19th though, and enjoyed some busy days puttering around. We did a little shopping, and found some treats for ourselves…

Because we needed that beer glass

Adding to my tequila collection

And I was in the mood to bake some treats as well…

Cookie Jar Ginger Snaps

Snickerdoodles

Mars Bar Squares

Even the deer had some treats…

See? No snow!

We went home to the valley, and I finally managed to get photos of the pheasants that visit Jim & Lynne’s yard.

No snow there either! In fact, it was quite warm and spring-like. I think I heard that it got up to 18 degrees on the 25th?

It did turn colder after we got back to SJ, though it stayed clear.

The cats were not too impressed by the colder temperatures, especially since we were having windy days. They were a little stir crazy, cooped up in the house though, so I took Zappa out in the yard with me on the 30th. He quickly decided he’d had enough and I don’t think he was too impressed to find that the cat door was not open.

Vacation is winding down. Cory was back to work on the 29th, though I happily do not go back until Jan 5th. It’s been nice having some time at home, getting a few things done. Monday is going to hurt a little bit. 🙂

Things have been in a pretty sad state this year, because half of our fence was laying on the ground. The deer see this as all-you-can-eat buffet. I didn’t really feel like doing much, aside from planting a bunch of containers.

Before heading back to work after vacation, I planted transferred all the pepper plants that Dad gave me into containers. I planted the rose bush cuttings too, but I guess I didn’t get it quite right because they didn’t survive. Hopefully there will be more cuttings that I can try with next year!

On Tuesday of our first week back to work, Cory decided to call the fencing company to find out how much longer we would have to wait (I have been a little cranky about this). They told him they would look up the contract and call him back…And a very short time later, they called back and said “We’ll be there tomorrow.”

Hands up if you think they forgot about us…

Anyway, by Friday afternoon Phase 1 of the new cat fence was installed. We still need to get the extra bits for cat proofing, but at least now the deer can’t eat my garden.

We’ve enclosed a slightly bigger area; that yellow bird feeder used to be outside the fence, as did that pine tree in the back corner.

The deck is now inside the fence, which was what I had wanted when we installed our first fence, and the gate is much easier to deal with.

Love being able to go out the patio door and into the yard without opening a gate!

Most of my containers were on the deck…

And a few down at the bottom, where I got away with having some last year…

But I moved a bunch once the fence was up. I have space to get in behind the garden beds that were along the fence before, which is also nice.

I still have a lot of garden clean up to do, obviously. I’ve been picking away at a little bit when I have time. My garlic needs to be dug up right now, but I haven’t had a chance to do that yet – hopefully this weekend.

You can see the line in the grass where the old fence used to be. It will fill in before too long though, I am sure.

We told the fencing guys what we wanted, and they did a pretty good job of keeping the fence as close to the ground as possible. There is one corner where there is a pretty big gap though. It took the cats about a week to find it, but find it they did.

So for now we are still keeping them in at night, and I am living with the 3:30 – 4:00 am complaints, but at least the end is in sight.

I still miss my maple tree. I haven’t spent as much time sitting out in the yard this year – I’ve been finding that the evenings get chilly pretty quickly.

We have a chair in need of repair as well!

We’ve been enjoying fresh herbs. Tomatoes are looking good so far, and I have three cucumber plants that are looking productive as well. The Habanero plants look pretty good, the Jalapenos have not caught up yet, so not sure if they will. Still, things are not looking too bad considering the late start.

It’s been a long, hard week at work – sometimes things just go that way, despite your best efforts – and I was not in a very good mood by the end of it all. That led to a restless evening, and I decided it was time to get back to these photos.

They made me smile, and I hope they will do the same for you!

…It’s family BBQ night!

Stef relaxes with some guitar practice

Hi Nathan!

Time to sit back and enjoy some entertainment

Piano Man! And very well done, too.

Sisters, cousins, mother, daughter...

...and more!

They thought they could hide...

But Mom had control of the camera, and she found them all!

Lazy Sunday morning after…

Chasing chickens...

They're positive the grass is greener on the outside...

Walking in the woods

And down the country road, where we found a friend

It was a wonderful visit! I hope we will do it again soon!