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Morning on this final day of September. Cool 51°. Warmer than yesterday’s 46. Never saw the sun yesterday and it only made mid 60’s. Good dsy to work outside though.

The crew came and got their equipment and were off to their next job. I went to store and picked up what I needed. Between an online special and a $10 reward coupon, I was able to grab one of those big size packages of toilet paper for half off regular price. So now am stocked with paper towels and toilet paper for awhile. Stopped at Walmart to see if they had any men’s bibs, but nope. Am looking for a pair to wear when working outside in the cooler weather that’s to come. Couple other places here to check. Women’s are had to find. I like to putter around outside on cooler days if it’s nice out, but sometimes need a warmer pair of pants than just my regular ones. I like to walk through my woods and trim dead branches I can reach and maybe build a fire if the ground is damp and burn them, take my lunch and sit by the fire, or maybe cut wood patterns to do during the winter. Duck material bibs are abrasion resistant and hold up to outdoor work.

Didn’t get the bagger system in the tractor yesterday either. Decided to haul another load of dirt down to the boat access and level off a bit of the area where there’s a couple of ruts. That’s the last load for this year, as I can’t use the little cart once the baggers are on. Then raked and cleaned up from having the tree taken down. By then it was time for afternoon dog walk. Barbie, that tree was a a White Birch. They can grow to 80 feet tall. You can tell if you look at the bark, you can see some peeling off. Aspen bark is a little more greenish and stays tight on the tree. They also tend to have more than one trunk coming from a single base. Here’s a pic of birch bark for those not familiar with it

The Birch is also known as Paper Birch since its bark is thin and flexible. Native Americans made canoes from it and there have been other uses as well, including craft work. I have a bag of it in my shed with plans to roof a bird house with it.

So, guess I will get my day started. Putting the baggers on today and cleaning up leaves. Also need to replace a rail in the Assoc. Pathway fence and will blow off some leaves at one end. Hope you all have a nice day. Martha, hope thry can find out what your son’s back issue is.

Cool but muggy here in North Florida. No sun yet today and if we are lucky we won’t have it. Gets way to warm when old sol shines. We have been mostly in the 80’s since the hurricane came through. We did hit 90’s for 5-6 days and that was pretty miserable. You know how it is…never pleased. Nights are in the low 70’s and even the 60’s a few nights. The promises for cooler and more Fall like weather. We await those days!

Looks like we will be in hurricane recovery mode for a couple of years. I was very fortunate and had very little damage. Some neighbors had there places heavily damaged and a couple were totaled. The street before the Park Of The Pines, all houses on both sides will be getting roof structural repairs and new roofs. Many of the mobile homes are looking the same. Getting a pine tree in the roof isn’t good for the house. Of course, the oaks are not good either. It was rough but no one got badly injured.

Couple of kitties got out and were gone for about 10-14 days. One found his way home and then a neighbor saw the other one and she was truly lost but wasn’t willing to come up when called. But her Mom went to set a food trap but she was out in the open space and Mom just went over and grabbed her. Her eyes were matted shut and she was just wandering. Had never been out on her own before. So it ended well. My kitty did really well with the other two kitties that we took cover with. When they would get hissing and growling, she would just go hide. If they got too hissy, I put one of them them in their carrier to cool off for a bit. We had 3 kitties and a young dog in our room. Sure was glad to get home even if we had no power. We cooked on my little propane grill, and then the rescue operations came in and we had great food and water.

I fixed a nice roast beef last night using AcadianMom’s recipe. It was the first time that we had all gotten together over a home cooked meal in slightly over a month. What a great meal that was! Thought of you Martha, and talked about what a great recipe you passed on. Having some left overs today.

Headed out to do some yard cleanup. Have a great day!

Good morning gals.

Birdie, good to hear from you and that all is well with your home and the lost kitties there.

Sue, We had Birch trees in our yard when I was a kid but they were small. I remember them having two trunks coming out from several of them. They didn't get very big tho and didn't live too long, even tho a few of them were right near the lake. I can usually tell Aspen from Birch since the Aspen is slightly off-white compared to the birch bark. Northern MN along the North Shore has a lot of Birch trees altho many have died from some type of disease over the years. Love the looks of both of them tho.

I feel more energetic and revitalized after being up in the mountains and forest! Altho my calves, ankles and feet are still complaining with pain!

The wind came up strong last night and is still blowing very hard. We have a dust warning for the day so all windows are shut. Only 83* for a high today tho, and tomorrow only 81* and then shoots back up to 100* later in the week. Fall is trying to get here!

Didn't get much done yesterday but not for lack of trying. Seemed everything I started to work on, had problems and I had to stop. Will try again tomorrow, and also work on outdoor things, taking advantage of the cooler temps and less wind.

Need to get ready for work...have a good day!

Good afternoon friends!

Sue, those are some tall trees in the back of your house. It's always good to make sure that none could come down and do damage. Tina, it's so good hearing from you! The pictures of your park following the hurricane were scary. Barbie, I'm so glad you had a good trip. Hopefully you can do something like that again.

It is definitely cooling off in central FL. Our high temperatures this week have been in the mid to high 80's and most days have had a gentle breeze. So we've been spending more time than usual in the pergola reading and relaxing.

I played for a memorial service in church this morning but following the service, we met friends from church at a restaurant and had lunch together. After church tomorrow is the potluck, which is always the first Sunday of the month and I'll take devilled eggs.

Don't forget rabbits after midnight or tomorrow.

Good afternoon. Not too much happening here, house is all back in order, had lunch then a shower. Neighbor has our local handyman over trimming the big tree between us. Two pickup truck loads of branches and leaves. But the tree looks good. I will start taking down my garden as soon as it isnt going to rain. I dont want to be out in the mud and wet. We are expecting some warmer weather later this coming week so will probably do it then.
Birdie so glad to see you are all safe and sound with not too much damage. Good to see you post. We had quite the rain storm last night but not alot of wind just alot of rain. We need it tho so I only complained a little because it got my deck super wet and it is under cover. I plan on trying to seal the seams to help cut down on the leakage. The wind blew the rain halfway across it anyway. Oh well today we have cloudy with a few peeks of sun. Barbi glad you got outta Dodge for a day. Always good to get away even those short jaunts help. Just placed my Safeway order so will go pick it up when they notify me it is ready. Irmi glad you are enjoying your pergola. I can picture you two sitting there relaxing. Sue is busy as usual, me not so much now. Actually pretty much done for the day LOL
Mocha and relaxing time.

The birch trees that Sue has in her yard do best in really cold climates, and in Michigan that means the upper part of the lower peninsula and the entire upper peninsula. A lot of people like to plant a clump of paper white birch trees in their yards, many times in the southern part of Michigan, but they seldom do well because they are susceptible to diseases and bugs where the winters are not super cold. In the far north, where Sue lives, they grow tall and are mostly healthy because the pests are not so common there.

Sorry to hear about the cats that wandered off and glad they are back home. Getting out and wandering are problems with cats because you can't really call them, so they are lucky they did not go very far. (My son's cat, by the way, is no doubt happy I am gone because she does not trust me. She follows me around the house, staying about 15' away from me, keeping her eyes on me as much as she can. I have no idea what she thinks I might do without her watching, but she is definitely always watching me.)

I am in a lousy campground, about 20 miles west of Oak Ridge Tennessee. Not much other than older campgrounds around here, so I took this one, but I don't plan on ever coming back to this one!! Sites are sort-of gravel, and very narrow. I had to back up after parking, but before putting my slides out, because I discovered that my slide would hit the neighbor's awning! And a lot of permanent residents with the usual stuff around. Plus, I had asked for an open site so I could get a clear southwest satellite signal, and the lady at the desk when I checked in tried to sell me on their maybe 15 "satellite" channels. Luckily, when I got set up, I got my satellite signal in spite of tall trees. Also dislike heavy freeway traffic noise. Considering rate was an expensive $50 per night, I had expected better.

Been worrying because my next two weeks is supposed to be spent in a COE campground on Lake Lanier. As I write this, it looks like they will pass a 45-day measure, so I should be OK.

I feel like I've been MIA Thurs night I was at nephew's and I didn't even ask about WIFI now at my cousin's and last night I did ask only the password didn't work so got it taken care of today...
Thurs I found my way to the cemetery and at least found the names of those I was looking for but again I couldn't find them even had the block number the lot numbers ect but couldn't figure out how to decipher what was what and where.... there was another couple there looking and had the same problems I did... finally gave up I did find something that gave me hope that I can find some information on in the family information I had that a possibility of another child that didn't live there was an infant Quinn guess I will put in find a grave infant Quinn and the cemetery and see if by any chance there is a date on the headstone it would help me decide if it was theirs or possibly a grandchild ... the drive over the Rocky Mountains was so pretty I love to see the gold in among the green of the pine trees it was so pretty and got a pick at what I will see going into SLC Monday .... it's prime peak time and it looks to be really pretty... some years the colors are washed out looking forward to the drive .... I say that now but when I crawl into the car my butt is going to say really we are doing this again????
while driving on what ever highway it was I think it was after Craig CO if not it was between Steamboat and Craig I happened to see something on the hillside and thought what was that ??? looked as good as I could driving and it was different dinosaurs made out of iron I guess also had a wagon and horse I would have driven up to look but the road had a gate on it... then saw green fields sorta looked like sagebrush but it was bigger and greener and so much of it I do have on my phone something that I can use to take a picture of it and it will identify the plant bird ect... but have to get close enough to the plant to use it and never saw one close enough to the road to make use of it ... the pretty yellow plant I did google and found the name of it and promptly forgot the name of it...
got to my cousins later than I planned but was greeted with hugs and supper then another cousin came over and then another .... enjoyed our visit... today was my cousin the one I'm staying with birthday so after conference we went out to supper along with other cousins think there was 9 of us... some it's been many years since I've seen them... so good to visit and after we had supper we came back to the house and visited some more... so glad that I decided to come this way
just said RABBITS
I had to laugh ... we must have Tina on the mind as two people referred to her instead of the ones it should have been... Tina we did to hear from you....
glad you had a good outing Barbie
Beth enjoy visiting with you sister
I'm not going to try and mention others as I won't recall what was said other than so glad it's quite for you Anita
you all have a great day
sheila

Got 25 minutes before "Rabbits", then I will go to bed. I am "in" bed right now, have all the windows open in the house since it is nice and cool outside with a slight breeze! Finally can air out the house a little and turn off the AC as well!

It was super windy tho, all day today! Finally let up this evening. It is 67* right now. So nice!

Was fairly busy at work today. One of my old customers came in to see me. She said she has had nothing but bad haircuts there since I left. She gets a razor cut and the younger stylists don't know how to do those.

Irmi, my next quick trip will be up to Big Bear in the other mountain range northeast of LA. About a 2 hour drive from here. I have only been up there once, on my way back to MN from San Diego many years ago. It is beautiful with a huge lake and a ski resort, a zoo and cute little shops. I will probably stay 2 nights up there to have time to see the things I want to see. Need to do that trip before October since they get snow up there fairly early and I don't want to be there for that.

Tomorrow morning I plan to go to church since our old minister will be back for the service. He is so great to listen to and is funny and has great uplifting messages. The new ministers there don't really do it for me. Then I need to go pick up my meds. I stopped tonight to pick them up but the pharmacy was already closed. So will try again tomorrow.
It will be nice out tomorrow so will do the outdoor things on my list. Hope those go better than the indoor things I tried to do yesterday that didn't work out too well.

Sheila, glad you are able to see so many cousins, etc, on your trip. I too love to see the yellow ribbons of color from the Aspens flowing thru the mountains among the pine trees.

Judy, that is a lot of money for a crappy campground! Hope you get to stay at the COE park. Will that have full hookups? They usually don't from what I have read.

Have a good night! "Rabbits!"