Two Busy Days - Saturday

 Saturday and today were busy.  I just sort of blew off Sunday (I got up late and had to real "get up and go").

Saturday was outside stuff and not much went well (some did).

I started by soaking the ground around the birdfeeder pole, using a 5 gallon bucket with a small hole drilled in the bottom so that the water would drip slowly but deeply.  And then did it again.  When I installed it, I had the thought that a base of 10" black iron pipes in a square would keep the feeder pole upright forever.  Not quite, as it turned out.  It tilted any way.  Frost-heave, I suppose.

The idea was to get the soil muddy at the base so I could wiggle it level again and then use stakes and rope to hold it level while the soil dried.  It is said that "everyone has a brilliant idea that will not work".  This did not work.

When I wiggled the post, it seemed to move slightly.  But then the pole broke!  The feeder fell to the ground and also broke.  The seeds spilled everywhere.  Really, both the top and the base separated from the seed box part.  I laid on my back (the weather was decent and I was warm), watched clouds passing overhead and asked to myself "why me"?  Why now?  I had other things to do...

I shouldn't have been surprised at the collapse and breakege.  I built it 25 years ago and have made a few half-assed repairs on it since then.  Not to say "sour grapes", but I was planning to build a new one anyway.  Now I just have a more immediate reason to do so.

The bird feeder is back up, temporarily.  I pounded a 6' metal rebar stake into the ground 2' and used some zip-ties to attach the birdfeeder pole to it.  Then I applying a heavy layer of outdoor wood glue to the base and fit the seed box onto it.  Scooped up all the seeds I could and added them in.  The top was actually undamaged so that fit back on.

Then I used rope around 2 trees to triangulate pressure on the new support stake to get the birdfeeder pole level again.  It should last the Winter.  By then, I will have built a new one.  Same design, I like it.

The barrel and flat disc defeats the squirrels completely.  The board across the center bothers the blackbirds and starling somewhat (because they are large and don't fit under well) and the overhanging top keeps the seeds in the tray dry.  And it is made of cedar, which discourages bird mites.

And that was just the start of the day!  The weather forecast is for a snowy Winter.  So I decided it was time to bring the snow-blower into the garage.  I pulled it out of the toolshed.  I pulled the starter rope a few times and nothing happened, but it also has an electric starter.  

So I dragged out my heavy-duty outdoor extension cords.  I could find the snowblower plug.  Fell free to laugh, but I had pulled out the roto-tiller, which has no electric starter!  I sure had to laugh at myself about that one.So I got out the actual snowblower.  Plugged it in.  It started right up.  

Which matters, because it is heavy and is nearly impossible to move unpowered.  I had to make space in the garage (which seems to get more clutterred every year).  But there is a usual space for it.  I just had to move the stuff that was there to "elsewhere".

Got the Holiday lights (blue) lit again.  They stayed up last year.  Partly, I was lazy, and partly my neighbor (who helped me so much when I fell off the extension ladder almost 3 years ago) screams at me if I so much get on a 6' stepladder.  But I plugged them in an outdoor outlet, and set the timer.  They come on right at dark.  

I also had a female (the ones with berries  -  some people don't know that) holly tree with some drooping branches and I pruned them.  One big branch is hanging on the front door.  I put 2 smaller ones per side of the mailbox post.  I tend to try to look natural.  

Speaking of holiday decorations, I have seen people driving around with wreathes on the front of their cars.  I used to laugh, but I found a white one with pinecones at Walmart at a decent price and decided to do it.  I like it!

And that wasn't the end of the day.  The street end of my driveway is "barely" lower than the street and lawn.  Rain collects there.  I use a small grub-hoe to scoop a path into the lawn for drainage.  I really have to set in a perforated pipe there for better drainage.  But Sunday was not that day.

I ended Sunday with 3 loads of washer/drier loads.  Then made dinner.  After that, it was just TV and cats on my lap til bedtime.  And two joined me there all night.

Holiday Habits

I got the house lights lit.  Not a big deal, they have been there for 2 years.  But I had to get up on a step ladder to set the timer.   Well, I don't love ladders these days. 

Some of my neighbors do serious yard decorating.  Some have inflatable stuff on the lawn.  Some have fancy  moving lights.  I stay simple.  A line of blue lights along the  lower part of the house.  I'll decorate a fake tree in a day or two,  Just wrap a light string around it near a window so my neighbors can see it.

As they say, it is the thought that counts.

Some years, I do more effort than other years.  LOL!

Best tree a few years ago...:  

Holiday Decorations

Well, I put some Holiday house lights up.  I don't always.  The front of the house hangs over the basement 2 feet, so I can reach the soffit with a stepladder.  I screwed in some cupholder hooks every 3 feet years ago, so it really isn't that hard.  Depends on the weather.  I'll add strings of lights in the front windows.  Maybe.  

Being more science-oriented than religious, I know that all the early Winter holidays are based on the Winter Solstice.   Traditionally/originally, they all celebrated the New Year.  Calendars have changed a few times through history, the dates stay the same.  

I like Solstice.  It's the shortest day and what better time to think a new year has started?  The das srart getting longer again.  The hope of renewal returns.

So I put up some lights most years.  Mine are all blue.  Nice calming color.  Sedate, unflashy, different.  And I don't overdo it.  

Some of my neighbors do a LOT more.  It's their right, but s crowded with decorations a cat couldn't walk through their yard.  But I've seen "more".  One street I drove by on my work commute years ago could probably be seen by from the Space Station.

I may set up a fake tree this year.  I have some strings of bubble lights and I miss seeing those.  When I was a child, my Dad's Parents had these big 8 inch ones and I would sit on the floor (we visited each Christmas) and just stare at them.  I always wondered where the bubbles went.  The ones I found are only 4" but I still wonder when the bubbles go.  Well, I like Lava Lamps too (though I understand THAT)!

The window lights are easy.  I bought some tension rods that fit inside the tops of the windows and I just used to feed the the strings of lights around them and let them drape.  Now I have hooks and that makes it a lot easier.   

I bought a great fake 6' tree years ago.  I seldom use it.  Unfolding the branches is hard; repacking it  takes an hour.  And that is with a trick I worked out pushing the 3 sections into trash bags in a trash can to compress the limbs.  

I like the 3 foot prelit tree these days.  On a TV tray at the front window, it looks like a full tree from outside.  LOL!  But the little tree doesn't hold fancy ornaments, and I have a LOT of them.  Maybe this is a good year to set up the big one.  It it supposed to rain hard and possibly snow later today, the new computer isn't going to arrive for a week, and I went grocery shopping today.  

So maybe I have nothing to do.  Yeah, right.  I haven't had "nothing to do" since I was 12.  But it would be a good opportunity for a serious "all-out" tree decorating event.  If I do, I'll post pictures.  If I don't, I didn't.

Strange thing:  I went out to look at my house lights at 9pm last night.   Stood out on the street until my motion detector lights went off.  Looked nice.  Then I looked down the street and realized that not a single house on my street had lights on.  

Pictures from past years and it will be much the same this year.

The prelit fake tree, unadorned.  From outside, it looks like a big one...

Cheap fake wreath.  The bells help...

Note the sock on the right.  It has my name on it.  Its from childhood   Each Christmas back then, we kids got fancy stuff in them.  A box of chocolate-covered cherries, a navel orange, a red delicious apple, a candy cane of THREE colors, and a couple of tiny games.  Doesn't seem like much NOW, does it?  But in the 50s that was "big stuff".

Looks a lot from the outside, LOL!

See?

Special decorations...  I love the robins' nests with the wood eggs. I love the clear glass ornaments.

Love the glass apples. 

The glass icicles don't show up well here, but I bet I have several hundred.  Mom knew I liked them and sent me a dozen each year.  Precious memories.  Moms know what you like.

Funny story:  Dad used to love adding "tinsel" to the tree.  They were originally actually tin, so he saved them each year.  Later, they were soft pastic, but old habits die hard.  He saved those too in spite of them being nearly free in the stores.  He used to get so aggravated when we kids just tossed them on the tree.  When he thought no one was looking, he would arrange them "properly".

The tree skirt/mat Mom sent me one year...

A tree deserves a cat...

I had forgotten how festive the house can look at times...

And there used to be "real" cards.  And of course, a cat was the puurfect add-on.

The full-size tree (partially-decorated)...