Toad

There is something about this fella that makes me think he knows more than he's sayin'. Doesn't he look thoughtful?

daffy nuptials

Something you can count on is that nothing stays the same. The cute little fluffy ducklings of the spring are now full grown ducks, laying eggs and "doing things", as Simon puts it. These "things" are what led him to think that the ducks should really get married. And because we are just that weird, we decided to do it.
Here are some snapshots of the big day:

 Bill and Dipper, the grooms, waiting expectantly for Lucky and Constance.

Here come the brides!

The ceremony was short and sweet, perfect for a duck's attention span.

Simon took care of the flowers.

(It wasn't easy this time of year, I think my mums suffered a bit.)

I made the ducks a wedding cake.

They didn't get to cut it themselves, but they did get to have some!

I'm not sure cake is something they like. Crazy ducks!

And finally, the event wouldn't be complete without a honeymoon.

And that's it! May they enjoy long, happy lives of marital bliss.
Raise a glass with me, "To the quacky couples"!



rabbit trick

My son's bunny disappeared on Monday. This bunny, Hester (named after Hester Gray from the Anne of Green Gables series) is a cute little fluff-ball who lives with our eight chickens. She was there on Sunday evening when the kids put the chickens away for the night, but when they went out to feed them Monday morning, she was gone! The chicken coop has interior walls with straw behind them for insulation (this is Canada) that the bunny has been gnawing on all winter, so I thought maybe she had managed to get inside the walls. I ripped the interior walls out all around where she had been chewing, frantically searching for her, but to no avail. She was gone. How she could have escaped was a mystery to all of us. Every night this week, as the weather gets colder, we've been wondering where she is and how she is managing. How long could a pet bunny survive on her own around here? There was nothing we could do and I felt just awful about it.
On Saturday afternoon we thought we'd better get to fixing the walls in the chicken coop. The old interior walls were just hardboard and they needed replacing, so my wild frenzy of wall destruction wasn't anything we didn't need to do anyway. It could have been done more neatly though. I started by cleaning the floor. As I cleared away straw and, umm, other stuff, (remember, chicken coop) from along the back wall I heard something. A scuffle and a squeak. Jiminy Jillikers! Could the bunny be in the back wall?! She hadn't chewed a hole there; how was that possible?! I called the whole family in there to help rip the wall off. After all, if it wasn't the bunny I might need help with whatever it was. (Giant weasel, rabid squirrel, killer moth...who knows?) and if it was her, well, I didn't expect her to be in very good shape and I didn't want to be traumatized alone. (I know, really wussy. Better to traumatize my children than deal with a half-dead rabbit on my own. I'm not proud of myself, but there it is.) As my son tore away the wall, out popped the spunkiest little gray ball of fluff you could ever want to see! Negatively affected by being trapped in a wall for five days? Not this plucky gal! She's good to go. Water? Yes please! A little something to nibble on? Why, yes, I think so. Other than that, all's well.
So, how did she get there? The best we can work out is that she managed to get up into the loft, where there are no interior walls, and fall down the back between the interior and exterior walls. So we've taken measures to see that it can't happen again.
Life with animals; always an adventure!

This is Hester when she was just a wee little bunny.

my cakes

So I've been working on my cake decorationg skills. Here's a little slideshow I put together of what I've done so far:

Now I just need to work on my photography skills! 

the scariest thing I've ever seen

It was terrifying. I've been dealing with a cold or flu or something; generally feeling cruddy. I woke up in the middle of the night last night, shuffled down the hall to the bathroom and turned on the light. Then I saw it... the most horrifying face. Swollen and puffy, splotchy and squinty... it was, of course, my own reflection in the mirror. Did I mention that I'm getting close to forty?
Mental note; do not turn on the light in the middle of the night any more, especially not while ill.

message in a bottle

As I was getting the recycling ready to put out (By the way, is it wrong that I miss the old days when garbage was garbage and we didn't have wash, separate or generally think about it? We just put it out and it went away.) I noticed this bottle:

Let's take a closer look at that:

"New easy grip bottle"?! Seriously?! Is that really necessary? Were people really having so much trouble with the old design? If folks were dropping their bottles all the time, perhaps it should have been seen as an indicator that the rum to coke ratio was a bit off. This seems like an overreaction to me.

If I could save time in a bottle...

This makes me feel really stupid, but I don't understand the concept of "spare time". What is it? How does one come by it? Is it found in the couch cushions and kept in a jar beside the "spare change"? Last time I checked, everyone had the same 24 hours in a day. What am I doing wrong that I don't seem to have extra pieces of it kicking around? By the time I take care of all the basics the day is pretty much used up. I do spend time doing things just for fun, but I don't do them during any "spare" time, I steal time for that kind of stuff! It gets stolen from time I should be spending doing other stuff, like cleaning a toilet or returning a phone call.
Actually, it's funny how many word that we apply to time can also be applied to money; we spend it, save it, waste it and most of all, run out of it.