Bat in the Belfrey

I keep forgetting to mention that we had a bat in the house last week. I wanted to take a picture, but the husband nixed that idea as he was carefully relocating the bat to the great outdoors. (He put on a pair of leather gloves and scooped it up.) The bat had managed to squeeze itself in through the window in the upstairs bathroom. Fortunately, the husband spotted it. He said it was probably just looking for a place to spend a quiet day.

The latest wave of ground squirrels has arrived. I’ve been hearing shots around the neighborhood again and the husband got one in the backyard last night after dinner. The damage the ground squirrels are doing in the garden is limited, now, to nibbling on the occasional cucumber. The turkeys, however, are making a nuisance of themselves. I yelled at one camped out in the berry bushes yesterday.

We have a couple of mama deer with babies—a single and one set of twins. We’ve seen quite a few handsome bucks, too, although they will disappear as soon as hunting season starts.

A squirrel (the regular kind) got into the greenhouse and scared the living daylights out of me one morning as it ran past me. After I recovered my wits, I suggested it go back outside, which it did a few minutes later.

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I bought a Spokane Beauty apple at the plant sale in May. Susan grafted this one. She said that I might want to wait to plant it until it had a better root system, so I’ve had it in a pot in the greenhouse. It has done very well in there. A few days ago, I repotted it into a much bigger pot, where it will spend the winter:

Despite the name, I am not sure how this one will do here. I think the tree will grow fine—Susan always grafts onto hardy rootstock—but it is a late bearer. Sometimes the late bearers either don’t ripen in time or we have to clean off the trees so the bears don’t raid them.

We’ll see how it does. Mother Nature loves to surprise.

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I took some time yesterday afternoon to make a muslin of the Burda 6221 dress pattern with the neckline ruffle. I made the front of a short top, not the full dress, because my goal was to work out the bugs with the neckline before trying it on that Simplicity 9649 top. I like the ruffle; however, I need to raise the neckline a bit. I wouldn’t describe it as plunging, but it’s lower than I would like.

Clothing sewing may get shelved until later in the fall, though. I’ve got a quilt to finish and canning is going to take up a chunk of time. The forecast is still calling for a front to come through tomorrow that will drop temps to the lower 70s and possibly even bring some significant precipitation. Hallelujah. Running the air scrubber helps with the smoke and ash, but it’s loud.

I think the husband has a plan of attack for the BMW. Truly, if I weren’t married to my own personal BMW mechanic, I’d be driving a Honda. DD#1’s Acura is a stick shift and will be fun to drive for a few weeks while the BMW gets sorted.

I made a batch of zucchini fritters for my dinner last night. I am trying to perfect my recipe and I think I am close. I use almond flour instead of wheat flour. For yesterday’s batch, I also added a tablespoon of coconut flour. The nice thing about coconut flour is that is absorbs a lot of moisture, so that small amount helps keep the mixture from becoming soggy. (I do salt the zucchini and drain it, but it’s hard to get it completely dry.) The husband even ate two and said they were pretty good.