A New Day

It was a terrible day here at the Three Cats Ranch yesterday. Sadie was off getting her teeth cleaned, and Smitty was pawsitively bereft in her absence. 

They've become fast furriends, even if he does like to beat up on her now and then. He was home alone for most of the morning. Mike and I arrived home at the same time, and we let him outside. He was only out about 10 minutes, caught a mouse, ate it (yum!), and then came back inside to grieve in purrivate.

As for me, the most productive thing I did yesterday (aside from grocery shopping) was to take a nap. I wondered what I'd have to tell you today, but the garden is always prime blog fodder. I was out watering the flower pots, and then took a little walk down to the vegetable garden. I was looking for any new sunflowers. While there, I noticed we actually had some wildflowers (not just weeds) in the "bee garden." Now, I should probably explain the bee garden if you don't remember.

We have a large garden plot. Here's how it looked when we were both young, virile, strong and up for so much home grown produce:

But this is our first vegetable garden in many years, and so we only planted about one-third of the space you see there. Here's a picture from when we first planted the seeds for this year's garden:

Back there where Mike is working on the fence, we let it grow wild. We also planted hundreds of wildflower seeds, but I'm afraid they couldn't compete with the natural weeds that grew up quickly. We're calling it the "bee garden" because weeds still bloom. Heck, they are wildflowers just the same as the ones we planted...they just aren't as desirable. So anyway...the bees love it, and when I'm out there, the place is humming with them. Surely it's good for the actual vegetables. 

So, anyway, back to what I was saying...I happened to look into the bee garden and I noticed we actually did get some desirable wildflowers. I think these first ones are called cornflowers or else "bachelor's buttons." We have them in this blue and also in a darker purple.

Also, these pink ones...don't know what they are.

And this little daisy-type flower. I like how it's petals are tinged with orange.

And this one...sorry for the blur.

Checking in the greenhouse, I was thrilled to find one of the tomatoes turning red. 

And lettuce! Finally! I planted this way back in April! The squirrels have been dining on it, and it's been so frustrating not to have lettuce sooner than this. 

The squirrels dug in under the wall of the greenhouse, as you know, and we've had a heck of a time keeping them out. We've trapped (or else Smitty has caught) nearly 30 of them over the season. Now, we're leaving the greenhouse door open (because it gets too hot in there in summer), and the squirrels seem to have completely lost interest in the greenhouse. I suppose the forbidden fruit is always the sweetest.

Okay, so it was time to go pick-up Sadie from her torture treatment dental appointment. To say she was freaked out would be an understatement. She turned on her lasers as a warning to stay away.

She got a clean bill of health though, and no more teeth pulled. At her last dental visit, which was around the time she came to live with us, they pulled four of her teeth. We worried she'd lose even more.

But she's been flossing daily and using a water pik, and so her dental hygiene has seen significant improvement.

Fortunately, everything is back to normal this morning. I left her wrapped in her favorite flannel quilt.

Smitty is enjoying the morning sunshine on his kitty pole.

All is well.

As for me, I'm going to be working double time today. I want to make some zucchini relish, and I need to hoe the garden. When all of that is finished, I'll get back to my quilting. Truly, I'm hoping to get it to binding stage today. Probably, I should do some housework, but that will take a backseat to sewing. Also, I'm going to remake a couple of our masks made from the old pattern. We really like the Creative Grids masks. 

The shape fits our faces a little better. When I make these next ones, I'm going to try adding a wire over the nose and see if that gives us an even better fit.

Before any of that though, I'm going to do some slow-stitching. I missed out on it yesterday, and so I'll probably give myself a double dose today.