Mid April

What a week. Work was very busy, the food bank was very busy, and the usual life things were very busy.

I didn’t go to yoga on Tuesday, the morning class on that day is a gentle class and instead I put in several hours of work in the yard to fill both yard waste bins and got half of the front yard cut back. It is easier to see backing out of the driveway, but still half to go.

The goal this rainy weekend was to fill them again to be picked up this week. That has not happened.

On Wednesday I worked my check in shift at the yoga studio then had a private session to work on a couple of things that need fine tuning.

Besides having to be at work a couple hours early on Monday the shifts all week until Friday were non stop. But there seems to be the dullest of lights at the end of the peak tunnel.

On Thursday I was really hoping for a light day at the food bank so I could get more done at home but instead it was extremely busy. They have also changed the days for handing out food so were expecting a lot of people later in the day.

After I put everything away they had me bag up food for 12 families. This was three bags apiece. One was full of cans (blue bags) then a bag of dried goods like oatmeal, beans, applesauce, pasta, nuts, milk, peanut butter, ect. And then a third bag of frozen food, protien, strawberries and tortillas. By the time I finished I had just enough time to get home and walk before work.

Friday after yoga, dropping off dry cleaning, doing laundry and my walk before work it was nice to have a slower night.

I also took about 20 of these pictures, sticking my phone into the Portulacaria trying to get a glimpse of Ethel and her kittens, with no luck. But at one point something growled at me so I figured I was close and walked away.

Today while on the phone I walked out back to lower the umbrella because the wind was picking up. I had seen Ethel go into one of the feral cat condos yesterday. She had gone in but came right back out.

But while walking past it and she was across the yard I opened up the lid to see four week old kittens.

I did not stick around or try and touch them. From what I have read you should wait about two weeks before touching.

I also don’t want her to abandon them. I was happy to see her hanging out in the rain on the top floor looking out the door, knowing her kits were dry and warm inside.

Lori thinks she has homes for all four, of course assuming we catch and tame them. So very many pieces of advice on that today as the pictures were shared.

One friend who has captured kittens that young guaranteed us the momma would follow if we moved them. She did it and put them all in her spare bathroom. I said fine I’ll bring them all to her place because we don’t have a spare bathroom. 🤣

I do know that if Ethel abandons them we will have to bottle feed as the pound euthanizes bottle babies for lack of staff and we do not have the time or energy for that!

Day Light “Savings”

I just moved all the clocks up before heading to bed.

We lose an hour this weekend and just why can’t it be out of a Monday instead of an already packed weekend.

The weekends have been very busy with yoga teacher training since January. We are in week nine, full day classes this weekend and next. Then the eleventh week is our testing.

Today we were studying nutrition and more philosophy. Also we have all put together our own sequences for the testing day when we all “teach” the other students. We practiced and fined tuned those as well.

The only day of the week I have not been going to yoga is Thursday because I am still volunteering at the food bank. This week I took in a huge donation from one of the teachers at the yoga studio. She picked bags of avocados and lemons.

There has not been much else going on. Work is the busiest time of year. We are also down another person on my shift so we are working with half the staff of last year.

The last kitten is pregnant. I didn’t catch her, but trapped her in the garage, only to find out the clinic nearest us has no appointments for the next month.

Sadly we are pretty sure Farquaad is dying or has died. He was not feeling well for the last few days and although he was drinking water he has not been eating.

We have not seen him for over a day when he was moving very very slowly. Personally I think someone around us left out rat poison for the rats and he being a good hunter caught and probably ate the rat.

I am still walking every day and made my 100 miles for February, but just. I am looking forward after teacher training for some studio time to paint, garden and project time and heading to Seattle in May.

One of THOSE days

Today was a food bank day. And boy oh boy was I busy. They were pretty much out of the homeless snacks. Single serving things that have a long shelf life and require no refrigeration and possible not even cutlery.

The city had gone to Costco and bought cases and cases of instant mac and cheese, cup of noodles, single serving fruit cups, cookies, nuts, instant oatmeal, granola bars, crackers and other single serving items.

Even though they will be long long before they expire I still have to open the cases and mark each item with the expiration date. So the boxes of oatmeal have 52 bags in them, four cases of just that item includes writing 10/24 over 200 times.

Then getting them all loaded on the homeless shelves so the caseworkers can load them up when they come for food.

I then came home and found both kittens from yesterday were back. (I am not this close to them, it is zoomed in). As I headed out to squeeze in a walk before work I saw these two and realized both are missing their right eye.

This gave me really bad feelings, like maybe someone around here was hurting them on purpose and/or dumping them here.

We have started making calls to nearby vets and clinics to find another resource for fixing the kittens. But these two are going to need more care so trying to find a shelter for them. It is breaking my heart.

End of 2023

The end of the year can be measured in hours. It started with a lot of rain and back to back house guests in January.

Six of us spent 10 days in Portugal in June and there was a years worth of art classes as well. The walking challenge continued through another year with 100 miles per month.

Mid year we started going to a new Yoga studio and I started volunteering at the food bank. Both of those endeavors are still going strong. In fact 2024 will start again with rain, also with Yoga Teacher Training that will keep us very busy for the first three months of the year.

There were also more cats! Floof had five kittens on Easter Sunday. We caught and re-homed three of them and we seriously need to catch and fix the last two within the next month so we don’t end up with more Easter kittens.

A new kitten showed up out of nowhere a few weeks ago. He has been caught, probably about six weeks old and is going to its forever home this Saturday.

I don’t know if there will be any travel this year. Im looking at a trip to Seattle to see friends and family. The Yoga studio is going on a retreat to Bali and that probably won’t happen but the pictures sure are pretty.

This little trouble maker leaves in a few days.