Project 52 - The Countdown to Christmas

More house decos up bit by bit - I enjoy taking xmas things out of their boxes.  They are kept in a storeroom which is a bit damp, so  not sure if I will keep them for next year.  I may recycle them to decorate the trees outside and then add them to the plastics waste centre nearby....

Below some decos of angels ( picture 2) I will keep forever, given to me by my sister as a Christmas present in  1999, 15 years ago. 

 

A watchful owl hanging on one one of the pine trees:

Freddy in the garden and a cone from one of the fir trees, sprayed with silver paint for decorative effect:

Another Christmas ornament chime hanging on one of the trees:  

The Christmas wreath has been placed high up next to the door this year, to stop the furbies from bringing it down in their mad scramble before their food trays are carried out of the door!

This week it has been a bit sad as  the one and only chicken we have seems to have suffered a stroke, or been severely traumatized by something, probably while we were out and about the last few days.  She literally seems to be on her last legs and can't walk any more and when she does, she is slow and painfully unsteady.  We have lifted her up and placed her in a more comfy position in an old bowl, under the very watchful eye of Freddy, who seems to be a bit lost.  

Chick News Update: 
Sadly this chicken is no more, and Freddy is on his own, very forlorn.  Last night he was up until very late, hovering round the poor chicken who was completely unable to move or even walk to her pen, so we put her in a special box with water and plenty of sawdust to keep her warm, but this morning, as we feared, she had given up the ghost.... This is the way of nature, and usually people don't get attached to their chickens, but we have and did, so now we need to think about Freddy and the fact that he is on his own, is not a good thing.  Do we buy new chicks, as soon as possible, but as he is much older than them, will this be a problem for the new chicks to settle down with him??  Lots of questions in our minds! This website seems to have some good tips :  

/http://rurallivingtoday.com/livestock/pros-cons-keeping-rooster/

Fluffy
Fluffy has disappeared....  It is now almost 3 weeks since he was last seen, after an almighty cat fight with one of the other Toms.  He once disappeaered for a whole month, and came back, a bit worse for wear.  We took him to the vet's and after a course of antibiotics, he recovered fully, thereby using up one of his 9 lives.  Hopefully he will suddenly re-appear, and we would be very relieved to see him again, so fingers crossed......

Only two more weeks til the end of 2014 - hardly seems possible how time has flown!

Week 31 - Courgettes Galore!

This week has been one for picking courgettes (zucchini) and big marrows.  They are everywhere now and I just couldn't keep up with them.  I have chopped lots of them up and fried them lightly then added them to the freezer, so we can enjoy this veggie for many months to come!

Freshly picked, straight from the veggie plot below:

My bedtime reading has been all about 'Cetrioli' - cucumbers.  They are now growing profusely in the veggie plot, and soon there will be far too many for the two of us to eat!!  Not sure if cucumbers can be frozen, I will have to look into this.

Looking after a multitude of furkids has been challenging but enjoyable the past two weeks.  Just Freddy's behaviour has been a bit off-putting and yesterday again, we had an altercation, and I managed to escape his clutches and beak...  Roll on when K is back later tonight on his motorbike after a journey of over 1,000 miles!!  As of tomorrow evening, he will be dealing with Freddy's bedtime, thank goodness!  

As I write, it is past 7pm now and the cat food is all laid out on two trays ready for feeding them, but Freddy is loitering around outside and I just can't risk me getting pecked by him, as it would be too painful, so in the meantime, I am writing up this blog post, with the dulcit sound of much miaowing in the background.  Below a video I took from the safety of the kitchen the other day!

Week 32 should be infinitely easier with all duties shared once again. 

Week 30 - Feeding Time Mayhem

What a chaotic and hectic week with full-time furkid duties!  Trying to feed a horde of animals takes a lot of skill and planning and sadly I lack the military precision necessary for a smooth operation.  There is a clear and strict order of events, chicks off to their pen first, then cats are fed, then girls are walked and fed.  This week it has all gone a bit pear-shaped with the chicks refusing to go to their pen, hence kitties working themselves into a ravenous frenzy desperate for food.  I got my timing all wrong on Monday and the chickens ended up scoffing most of the cat food and everyone tucked up way too late... a bit of a disaster really.

 Socks waiting for her dinner...

Freddy waiting for me from outside...

The problem is that Freddy has turned on me twice now and it hurt!!!  He knows I am afraid of him, so I have to wait til he voluntarily goes to his pen at night before I can shut it and then feed the cats, then the girls... He deliberately hung around in the garden with his beady eyes waiting for me to come out with the cat food plates on a tray.  I dropped the tray and the plates and ran for the door, leaving all the masses to fight amongst themselves.  It is never mayhem when K does it, but he has had military training and this certainly comes in very handy for such duties!!

Tuesday was a bit better, but still Freddy and co got into their pen at 7.45pm, way past their usual bedtime of 6.15pm. Wednesday I had everyone fed, watered and walked and tucked up by 8pm, and I felt I was getting somewhere at last! At least the girls obey me and we have a nice time walking in the beautiful countryside.  They don't go near their food bowls until I give them a special signal. They sit obediently until I clap my hands and say 'OK!' and then they dash to their bowls.  They are not allowed to start eating until I give them this signal.  I wish cats were as polite and restrained as dogs! 

Samantha and me .....

 This statue of 2 cats is tucked into my mini salad area....

My cherry tomatoes are coming along fine, but so much smaller than the usual tomatoes I have sown in the past!!

 

I was so glad I was protected from this giant hornet by the mosquito frame we have installed.  It was buzzing around angrily just outside the kitchen window and it couldn't fly in through the mesh, thank goodness!  I hate hornets, because they can be very dangerous.

 

It rained buckets and there was lots of thunder and lightning during the weekend!! I had lots of buckets to collect as much of the rain as possible for me to use for watering my plants!!!

 

It was nice to be cheered up by this Castelli mosaic on the coffee table in the kitchen.  It was also lovely to have family visiting and we had a lot of fun together, despite the terrible weather....

We all listened to 'Happy' by Pharrell Williams!  It is used in Zumba classes and for school assemblies for motivation purposes.

 


My niece made me this lovely beaded chain to hang around my neck when I wear my glasses.  It is really pretty and I won't lose my glasses now!

I suggested interesting places to visit in Abruzzo and this book, called Travels in Abruzzo by Ed di Vitto, is full of lovely cartoons which tell a story about Abruzzo and all the beautiful sights.

This week was very busy but enjoyable!  Roll on Week 31

Week 17

Nursing Fluffy back to health has taken up a lot of time this week.  He is getting so bored and he really wants to be let out, but his wounds really need to heal completely.  Even the vet said he was in a very bad state when he examined him, and we were worried he may have used up his proverbial 9 lives.  We were wrong, luckily, and now it is just a waiting game until we can let him out again.  

The weather has been very bad, lots of rain and again, my plants have had to be moved around a bit to avoid getting completely washed out....

We have booked a train trip next week and we are very excited!

It will go from Chieti, and then into the National Park to Cocullo for the Serpent Festival Parade, an age-old Abruzzo custom.  You can read more about this strange festival on Life in Abruzzo.
I am not sure I like the idea of snakes all over the place, but I am hoping to take some interesting photos and then I can add them here.  

I have learned a new word: ophidiophiliacs (snake-lovers)!

The grass has been growing lush and below is the freshly mown lawn with resident feline ambling across......

The figs are developing nicely...

The rosemary bushes dotted around the garden are also getitng bigger...

I throw lots of it into everything I cook!

Some of my containers below, I have to check them every night for snails, which I remove and throw back into nature... the slugs are added into the blue pot and then emptied out later.....

Some of my seedlings and young cuttings are getting ravaged by snails as seen below...... The many sticks are to deter the cats from using the area as a litter tray!  They seem to be able to squeeze themselves into such tiny spaces!

Below some more tubs, with Mini Me loitering in a suspicious fashion ......  You can see some cherry tomato plants right at the front.

We currently have ant invasions on a large scale, so I am dealing with this problem, again at night, when they are most active......

It is all go here, nature wise, and I am enjoying this chance to settle back into the gentle and peaceful way of living here in Abruzzo..... 

Below you can see Freddy and chick hovering in front of the door whilst it is pouring with rain outside. 

 
I have not attended nor presented at the 7th Virtual Round Table e-conference this year, but I hope to catch up with some of the talks as soon as I have a spare moment :-)

Week Eleven

Freddy 
......continues to follow me around every time he sees me.  I wouldn't mind if that is all he does, but unfortunately he seems to have something against me because he flies at me, whenever he can.  This means I have to be a bit vigilant when I go out to my cold frame, as he almost got inside the other day!!
He in fact did chase me and attacked me on Friday, and drew blood.  He caught me on my finger and it really hurt!!  Thankfully, K came to my rescue and managed to shoo Freddy politely away...

The Garden
A lovely few days spent moderating online and out in the garden inbetween. The weather has been beautiful and quite warm at times.

Below some form of weed, or is it a kind of ivy???  It is growing all over the place, and not sure if I like it too much..

I am converting an area into a rockery / shrubbery and this is the initial stage below:

 

Everything is taken from cuttings, and also plants I already have in pots, succulent offshoots etc, so let's hope they all start to blend in together.  The 3 aloe vera cuttings might grow big, so I will rearrange things later if necessary.

Another area below which I hope will be a rockery.  It is full of rosemary at the moment, but I'd like to introduce a few more plants.  I have added a tub full of bulbs my sisters bought me for my Christmas present and I love seeing them bloom in this spot.

Cats
I have found evidence of suspicious cat activity in this concrete tub, which contains my friend Sue's plant gift.  I am going to have to make it anti-cat proof by adding netting ALL around it to prevent them from doing their business....
I simply threw some old olive tree branches across it to stop them gaining access overnight...

My Cold Frame
.... is my new best friend and I am making it very cosy inside.  I am using egg containers to put compost in and add seeds, so let's see what happens...The top closes so it acts like a mini greenhouse.

An old shelf has now been converted into a simple etagere, so I can put 3 tiers of pots on it.  

The egg containers are going across the old wooden posts in the ground, so no space is wasted! 

Old cat and dog tins are now being used as seed containers.

The veggie plot at dusk. I have started to use bamboo canes to demarcate the different areas ready for planting next month.

Fluffy.......
... has been in the wars recently and has been fighting to keep his Alpha Male title. Below a rather atmospheric pose by Fluffy as he quietly contemplates life....

Other poses below with the jungle area in the background:

 He could be a fim star in the making, lol!!

Apart from all the gardening, and being online, I have also been attending a few excellent webinars in the Spring Blog Festival and have really enjoyed each of the sessions, including Marisa's, Shelly's and Sylvia's.  It is always nice to support fellow bloggers and members of my PLN, whenever I can.

Week 11 has been a lovely week, doing what I enjoy most of all...

Roll on Week 12!

Project 52 - Week Six

Monday was a very busy day going to the doctor's with my mum to see about her new medication, then an appointment with the OT in the afternoon.  All was well and my mum has recovered very well from the setback she suffered in January, thank goodness.  Then shopping, lunch together and back home to pack my bags and then early to bed at 9pm.  I set 3 alarms to ensure I would get up on time.

I was up at 3am on Tuesday morning and caught the Stansted coach at the unearthly hour of 3.55am.  An uneventful journey to the airport and the flight arrived into Pescara at 1pm.  K was there to pick me up and off we went home, where I was greeted with this lovely welcome message in the kitchen.

Since then it has been hectic dealing with Telecom Italia engineers who have been here to fix the phone line, which hadn't been working for the past two weeks.  They couldn't believe how terrible the road was and they refused to go down it with their van, so K ended up having to ferry them up and down from the end of the road to our house several times. 

Luckily the water pipe was fixed earlier as well, and it is now above the road looking quite ugly.  They can't bury the piping until the road has been fixed!!  Then off to the local 'Comune' to pay a Rubbish Tax bill and I bumped into the lord Mayor.  I collared him and asked him about when our road was going to be  fixed, but he explained the land was still wet (true) so no point in starting the work until the weather is a bit more stable.  I asked him not to forget us, and that we have great difficulty in getting down the road now, and that it is a very urgent matter...

Checking up in the garden and all my pots was a very important duty for me and it was lovely to see the various furkids POTtering about, pun intended, lol ...

 Despite adding the netting as a deterrent, the kitties still insist on using my pots as a resting area!!

I couldn't resist taking these photos of Fluffy and Olivia chilling on the balcony.

Fluffy enjoying a catnap

Olivia deep in thought

Shopping for bits and pieces on the Wednesday, I spied a lovely carpet, which would be nice for the kitchen or living room area.

The colours are quite vivid, but they are the right ones which would go with the rest of the decor. It measures 160 x 230 cms and may be a bit on the short side, so will have to think about it for a bit longer before buying it....

During this week, I was in communication with Dr Nellie Deutsch about my presentation on WIZiQ for Connecting Online 2014.  She is an amazing person, and I admire her for all the work she does for the teaching community.  She has been organizing the free Connecting Online econferences since 2009.  I am proud to have been a part of this event the past few years both as a presenter and attendee.  All the webinars are free and Dr Nellie organizes everything perfectly.  She is able to attract some of the world's leading educators to present for CO14.

I have attended Vicki Davis' webinar on  Reinventing Writing, and Dr Bob Diotalevi's session on Copyrightdot.com: Teaching Old Dogs New Clicks .  I am looking forward to attending Dr Curtis Bonk's webinar this afternoon called Experiences of Publishing of an Open Access and (free) PDF and then Shelly Terrell's webinar on Reimagining Online Learning & Reflective Multimedia Eportfolios this evening. 

I created a ToonDo comic to highlight this fantastic CPD event this weekend, and also wrote a quick blog post to showcase the information about it here. My presentation is on tonight at 11pm and it is the same one I did for RSCON 2013, so am looking forward to it very much.

It will have been an exciting weekend of CPD!!
 
This week, I have tried to pop in to the EVO ePerfect Book session as often as I can to leave comments.  I am amazed at the creativity and originality of the proposed ebooks and the wonderful energy emanating from the participants.  I wasn't able to attend Saturday's Week 4 HoA, but I have already viewed Andre Sprang's fab Prezi presentation.  I have learned so much from him and from all the team of moderators.  I am also learning from all the keen participants. This collaboration is what makes EVO sessions so incredible, as they are a powerhouse of learning and connectivity!!