New Phoebe Update/Question

November 20, 2013

...maybe even angry with us. She’s given me a few baleful looks with those yellow eyes. This behavior is worrisome to us because while we’re willing to do whatever we can to give her time, we want her time to be good. And so far, it’s been really good time. But we don’t want to be instrumental in keeping her alive in a frail, zombie-like state. That’s no life for a cat....

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What does the loving landscape look like?

Mrs. Homegrown

April 16, 2015

Back to the Garden, Gardening

18 Comments

...ong the way, the neighbors began asking for help with their yards and over time, the whole neighborhood has become a little slice of paradise, a shady oasis full of edible trees like pomegranate and mesquite. He said wild animals, like quail, are even moving back in. I still remember the pictures from his presentation, but I’m having a hard time finding anything like them to share with you. I’ve shamelessly screen grabbed a still from a nice short...

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A Day of the Dead Altar

Mrs. Homegrown

October 30, 2015

Domesticus, Thoughtstylings

13 Comments

...ure, such thoughts have been considered morbid, even unhealthy, for a long time–but that is changing. This year I felt ambitious, so built a much bigger altar, or ofrenda, than usual. Actually, the cats made me do it. Given access to the altar, they’d eat the flowers (ending up muerto themselves as a result, no doubt) and bat the rest of the objets to the ground. For the safety of the cats and my treasures, the entire surface needed to be so tight...

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2013 in Review Part II

Mr. Homegrown

December 31, 2013

Thoughtstylings

7 Comments

...than harvesting tomatoes, summer here is not the best time for gardening. Time to contemplate closed vs. open floor plans and catch a crappy Hollywood movie. “Crappy Hollywood” is a redundancy, of course, as all Hollywood movies are crappy. September Mrs. Homegrown complained about my flour storage mess. I just bought a Komo mill and so this mess should diminish in the next few months. In the further interest of cleanliness, I blogged about the s...

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How to Remove Bees from a Wall

Mr. Homegrown

October 5, 2015

Animals, Bees

4 Comments

...ime to calm down. I use burlap in my smoker because it smolders for a long time. Demolition When I do these jobs I tell the homeowner that I’m going to open up their wall, make a mess and I’m not going to repair the damage. If you hire a bee removal service they should put the wall back. I don’t promise repairs. I also don’t do work from ladders. Once the bees had been smoked, John set about peeling off the paneling from the porch wall. You have t...

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