Just when you think you are getting ahead...

Yesterday, there was a little set back to my fall cleaning, Poppy was home all day! I should have stayed home instead of riding with him to Oxford to pick up the wall clock we had repaired. We then drove to Wake Forest and walked through Lowes, hoping to buy enough carpet for our two small bathrooms. Didn't have any luck with that. 

At Lowes, this couple greeted us at the front door. Her outfit looks like something I might like. :)

Do you ever have a day that, instead of accomplishing things, you only make more work for yourself? Yesterday was like that for us.  

Our late day walk with Eli...

after our walk around the pond, Eli, without his leash, likes to run on the dirt road and fight with Poppy. Well, he decided to check out the weeds on the far side of the ditch and guess what grew there?

Beggar's lice! Poor baby. These things were sticking to his feet and face and his tail was full of them. We couldn't help but laugh. Eli acted like someone had thrown a net over him, like he could not walk. It took some time to pick these sticky little seeds off him, and set him free.

It had been three days with no sign of Wilder. I was propped up at the kitchen sink, looking out the window, when who should hop by...

but Wilder. It's the bunny, I yelled to Poppy. Seeing him making it on his own, makes me happy.

and moving right along with nature,  we found a new tree growing on the property...

This is a possum haw, or deciduous holly. It reminds me of the holly trees here, except the leaves are not tough and sharp pointed. A pretty little tree with lots of red berries.

Better get busy. Poppy is home again today and here it is time for lunch. I might as well go search through the refrigerator. :)

Thank you for visiting.

Love,
Henny

The painted bathroom

Guess I'll go ahead and post about the painted bathroom and get that over with. You see, the color I had in mind was a bright white with just a hint, a hint! of pink. But colors change inside the cabin.

As soon as the paint touched the wall, it became light lavender. I added half a can of white to the paint which lightened it a little more. 

Why, back many years ago when we bought new carpet for the cabin, the color we picked out was the color of a fawn. It was a shock when one of the installers said something about the carpet being a mauve color. It's crazy! 

The new (thrift store) Toile shower curtain.

Our friend Nellie stopped by. When I mentioned to her that I was painting the bathroom light pink, she stuck her head in, looked around and said, "It looks like white to me". 

Funny, the bathroom is so small I can only show you a little at the time.

anyhow, it is a new coat of paint, and clean. 

that out of style border around the back of the sink was my idea. The old vinyl had come unglued in places and was stained. 

When we win the lottery, I am going straight out and buy a beautiful new vanity cabinet and mirror. Trouble is, you can't win the lottery if you don't play. Last time I stopped for gas, for the first time ever, I bought a three dollar scratch-off lottery card, went back to my car and scratched it off. I won three dollars. With that, I decided to hang on to my three dollars. 

It's about bedtime again. They sure roll around quick, don't they. Thank you, friends. 

Love,

Henny

Country Living

Don't know what struck me, but I am still in the throws of fall cleaning.  

Everything has been moved out of the little hall bathroom, the walls and woodwork cleaned and taped, and made ready to paint...brought the paint home yesterday, and plan to do that first thing this morning!

There were two basket sitting on top of the mirrored cabinet that held, probably every tiny seashell that Poppy and I have ever picked up on the beach. Talk about dust!! Anyhow, carrying the two baskets, plus a few more, outside to wash and let dry in the sun, I remembered my old "Country Living" magazine collection starting from the early 1980's.

Oh my goodness friends, I practically lived for each new issue. A regular feature was, "Simple Country Pleasures" written by Jo Northrop. Jo Northrop grew up on a farm in North Carolina. I remember once she wrote about cleaning and how she carried all the baskets down to the pond to wash them and leave them in the sun to dry.

If only I had a farm and a pond to wash baskets in, and a log cabin in the country! It was the early 80's. I was a secretary, living in a two bedroom apartment with two teenage daughters. Far from any kind of country living.

This issue, I just pulled from the stack, happened to be about the changing season, from summer to fall.

"Country Living" magazine was full of everything I dreamed about having. They featured log homes and...

look at these colors. This was 1985. Poppy would move out! Hey?? Just kidding.

I did get the log cabin, with the french doors, and a pond for washing baskets, and in the country. 

so...

here's the dull dreary bathroom I'm fixing to paint...

really dull, with everything moved out. :(

not a lot I can do in such a small room. As Poppy says, you have to back out to turn around. 

I'm getting busy now. Thank you for listening again.

Love,
Henny

Busy as a bee!

We picked these wildflowers along the dirt road..I picked the Goldenrod flowers, and Poppy went through the deep, snaky looking grass for the purple and yellow ones. The two zinnias look pretty bad. 

All summer I've wanted a vase of zinnias for the house, but simply can't bear to cut them. What's wrong with me?? 

These last few days, I've actually been doing some fall cleaning. Remember that dreadful bottle collection in the living room? "Dreadful" because it's me who does the dusting...

the "before" picture from the last cleaning frenzy.

and "after"!

All summer we've had the curtains down. But for fall and winter, with the windows and screens washed and clean, I like the coziness of curtains.

Oh, you can still find dust, I'm not finished yet, but mostly I'm proud of the shiny clean windows and screens...and bottles!

looking out onto the back porch.

and, I washed all the old pots and oil lamps on the porches, and added a clean tablecloth.

have you ever seen anybody as proud of doing a little cleaning?

got the kitchen window washed too and hung the clean curtains. Gosh, didn't see all the wrinkles until now. Maybe the wrinkles will fall out after a few nights of washing dishes in hot water just below them. If not, the ironing board is in the sewing room.

Big ruffled curtains are probably out of style but I still love them.

the old cupboard sure looks better with the dust wiped off.

Still have lots of cleaning to do, but for now I'm off the the grocery store. The kitties finished the last can of food first thing this morning. There will be a lot of meowing before long. 

Thank you, if you're still here. Who wants to hear about cleaning house, anyhow. :)

Love,
Henny

This and That

Thank you for the happy birthday wishes. You are the best friends ever! I appreciated each comment very much. 


I was surprised to find the bean vines in the teeny tiny garden full of beans needing to be picked...

so I picked them...a whole big dishpan full.

then cooked them up nice and tender and seasoned with a little fat back grease...just the way we southerners like them. Well, this southerner anyway.

While I'm in the kitchen, let me show you something pretty a blogging friend sent me...

a very pretty and very red canister set. It is nice! and it's heavy! I LOVE it! and you know how I am about red in the log cabin.  You may know "Vic". I don't think she has a blog, but she does follow and read several blogs. I  have enjoyed comments from Vic on my blog for a long time. 

Anyhow, Vic said they were packing up their belongings from a small home they were selling. A get away home. She said the red canister set made her think of me. So Vic went to the trouble of packaging and mailing it to me. Isn't that just the nicest thing to do? I am tickled to death. Thank you Vic!

and a different kind of surprise. Look who was sitting under the beauty berry bush, washing that cute little face, just before daylight this morning...

I'm thinking the name "wilder" suits him. What do you think?

the pink knockout roses are blooming again.

Well, I've about covered everything for today. Thank you for your friendship. 

Love,
Henny

Checking in

Things have settled down here, a bit. Sweet little Asa is buried next to Shae. It will just take time to get past the sadness of it all. 

I loved these two little goats. Poppy gave them to me for my birthday several years ago. They were young here, we had just brought them home. Where do the years go?

and speaking of birthdays...today happens to be mine, and of all things, I had to get my driver's license renewed. Couldn't help but think about mama. Mama would start worrying six months before the date her driver's license were to expire...afraid she would fail, and not get her license. She would say with disgust, "my old driver's license expire this year". 

The little wild bunny has been showing up in the yard every evening just before dark. It is so cute to walk out and see him sitting there. 

Better start supper. I'll end this, not much of a post, with a picture or two of the little herb garden.

It's nothing special, but has finally started to grow and fill in. This is pineapple sage.

I have no luck growing thyme, and that, to me, is one of the prettiest.

Oh, I have new followers! Thank you! 

Love,
Henny 

Poor sweet animals

Sorry it has been almost a week since my last post. Life is busy, and can sure be sad at times.

As far as my eye problem, it is improving. There are still floaters, but nowhere near as bad as they were. Vision in my right eye is clearing up too.

I hate to even talk about troubles at home with this Hurricane Irma tearing through Florida right now, destroying lives...

But, "Asa", my little black Pygmy goat is dying. In spite of all we have done, she is dying, and it is breaking my heart. 

this was Asa a few months ago, healthy with her black shiny coat.  Asa has always been sweet natured and quiet. My heart has been breaking over this for three days now. 

Also, here on Henny Penny Lane...

It was at least four days ago that Poppy mentioned hearing what sounded like an unusual bird...a very shrill crying kind of call. We decided the sound was coming from a hole in a maple tree between the back porch and the pond. The same tree where the pileated woodpecker lives, or used to live.

On our way down to check things out, a tiny little baby squirrel ran right up to Poppy. It was the sweetest thing...like, help! could you be my mama. I'm cold and hungry. There were more cries and we found another baby clinging to a tree. Now there were two!

This picture was taken by "Hope". Hope is certified by the state to care for little abandoned animals. Isn't "Hope" the perfect name for someone who takes in animals like these? Thank goodness, we found her. She took the first two baby squirrels on Friday. 

You can probably imagine how bad I hated to give up these baby squirrels. But Hope knows exactly what they need. She has formula to mix and the bottles for feeding them.

Poppy and I knew there were more babies. We could hear them crying. It has been cool and breezy today and the babies were not only hungry, they were cold too. Poppy sat in the back yard with the binoculars. Mel, he called. There is another baby coming out of the nest. I held my hands up on the tree and the baby crawled right to me. Shortly, another baby squirrel climbed out of the nest and down the tree into my hands.

I filled a plastic bottle with hot water and wrapped it in a flannel cloth. I held each of the baby squirrels until they were asleep, then tucked them into the warm blankets. Something must have killed their mother. How pitiful that these babies have waited probably four days with no food.  

I called Hope, and we met at a store in town. She now has all four baby squirrels. Thank you Hope. 

There was lots to talk about tonight, but here it is almost 9:30, so it will be for another post. Thank you for your comments and well wishes about my eye, and thank you dear Deb and Connie for checking back on my last post. That was so nice of you. 

Love,
Henny

It's all age related!

Last Wednesday I got these awful floaters in my right eye...Floaters that looked like dragon flies. Then the floaters turned to black loops and swirls. 

Thursday early, I called the eye doctor and was told to come in ASAP. My eye was bleeding very slowly and pooling...it's called Vitreous something?? Anyhow, he sent me right on to another doctor in Raleigh.  I'm going to be fine, hopefully, but right now the vision in my right eye is blurred. It's like looking through a very dirty window and the floaters now look like a wad of curls hanging over my right eye.

The doctor in Raleigh wants to watch this very closely, in fact, I was back in his office on Friday, and have another appointment this coming Friday. 

The teeny tiny garden is looking wild and overgrown these days...

I think it is kind of pretty this way...

too soon it will be gone...

a citron melon vine has volunteered and come up and there are little melons growing...

pink zinnias

and a tangle of tomato vines and pepper plants...

but we found these in the tangle...

tomorrow I want to pickle a quart of these peppers, hot and mild together. I love them!!

That's about it. Thank you for stopping in.

Love,
Henny