Wild Strawberries

I thought I would share some pics of the wild strawberries we have at the cottage. They grow in one area of the yard, near a back corner of the cottage, like a beautiful ground cover. The area is kind of like a tiny meadow with a lot of moisture in the spring and some higher grass nearby. They attract birds, insects and other creatures that love to eat them. Wild strawberries are useful, tasty and look beautiful too.

 The berries are so very tiny but bursting with flavour and taste wonderfully sweet.  They are not something we want to gather and use for cooking or a meal because they are too tiny and really not great a quantity of them hiding in the grass. They are perfect for reaching down and having the occasional little berry nibble. 

My family went to the lake last weekend and brought me back a little handful of the strawberries and took some pictures for me.

Strawberries that in gardens grow
Are plump and juicy fine,
But sweeter far as wise men know
Spring from the woodland vine.
No need for bowl or silver spoon,
Sugar or spice or cream,
Has the wild berry plucked in June
Beside the trickling stream.
One such to melt at the tongue's root,
Confounding taste with scent,
Beats a full peck of garden fruit:
Which points my argument. — Robert Graves

We Love our Lake Cottage Life

We have owned our Lake Cottage for 37 years now, and we still love it.  We opened it up yesterday, and it truly feels like coming home when we pull up to the dock.

 It is not a very fancy place. We have the only cottage located on a tiny island in a gorgeous river/ lake system that is about a 2-hour drive north of our home. It is only a short distance from the mainland shore with other cottages, but the only way to actually get to our island is by boat. We rent a dock on the mainland at a tourist campground.  We arrange to leave the boat there over the winter and in the summer we park the boat at a dock, and when we are there, we leave our car in their parking area. We own the cottage itself and pay taxes to the local municipality, but the property is technically that of the government, and we have a permanent lease with the provincial government. It is considered to be on a navigable waterway because it is an island, and that changes the status of the property so that it can not be owned outright by us.

The cottage itself is rather primitive, and it's showing it's age. We purchased it for a good price off a man who had kind of pieced it together with odds and end of reclaimed construction materials that don't really make a cohesive look to the place, but we always found it kind of fun and funky. We have a lot to do to keep up the repair but Bob, my husband, is fantastic at keeping everything going one way or another. In our first years out there, he set up a solar electrical system with a small back up generator. The stove is propane, the toilet is a composting one, and our primary source of heat in the cooler months is a fireplace. 

Going to cottage country is being discouraged by the provincial government right now because of COVID19. We were careful to follow the recommendations they made that if you did go out you needed to be prepared and minimize your contact with others and try not to utilize their local health care system. We went out there with everything we needed and did not interact with anybody. Heck, we didn't even see anyone on this long weekend Monday!

 Our immediate family, despite some ups and downs,  has done pretty well with being quarantined.

We think that this cottage where we have spent so much time over the years is so isolated that we are kind of used to keeping ourselves occupied and we can be quite self-sufficient. I also think we have learned to spread out and give each other some physical space when needed. The cottage truly is a sanctuary where you can listen to the loons and songbirds, hear waves against the rocks and learn to relax in your own thoughts.

Recycled Burlap & Boxes Make Useful Storage Solutions

This has been a very long summer. I finally got out to the cottage and I really wanted to keep busy but not of the more active projects were a good possibility for keeping me out of trouble. No painting the outside of the cottage? No helping with the new Dock? Sigh.  I do love crafting though and did a few projects with the grandkids one weekend and I began working on crocheting an afghan.

I have a wire rack behind the door of the washroom at the cottage. Storage is at a bit of a premium in there. Every time someone slammed a door the little sample shampoos, and extra lotions and insect repellant slid out of the side and onto the floor. My craft starved brain went wait! We can solve this!

I do like projects made from recycled material.

First, I hate to spend more money than I must and second, I am always working with groups that have few resources, so I am always stretching to find cheap, or better yet, free projects! I always look to find projects that are good looking and if possible useful.  My little question when deciding about projects for Girl Guides/ Scouts was always would the family keep this around for a couple months or does it go straight in the garbage. I also wondered "how much stuff can one family attach to a fridge?"
I thought I would try for a solution to my Washroom door slaming problem, make a way to sort out some arts and craft supplies since I was feeling particularly crafty and make a vase for extra points.

This container project is something that was common years ago with youth groups and thrifty homemakers!  It has a bit of a vintage feel but that tends to be how a lot of recycled material projects start off. Vintage is fun. What makes it more current are the colour choices and details that you choose.
It is very flexible for materials.  I was thinking of Fall at the cottage. right now, so that influenced my colour and texture choices. I am also thinking about the various places my new box containers, my new vase and my new art supplies holders are going to be displayed.

I literally dug through the weekends recycling and came up with some cans from soup and spaghetti sauce and some crackers boxes. We had some twine in the storage room and a bit of white craft glue and some extra tacky glue.  I also had a $3 roll of burlap out here because I was planning on making table decorations for a family Fall dinner or perhaps Thanksgiving dinner at the lake. There was plenty to spare.

First, I tested out my various sized boxes to find one that would fit properly on in the shelves and then I cut the height to the correct size for my location. By this point, I was all excited and planned out what to do with even more of my garbage! grin This is such a flexible project!

I was thinking about putting on a base layer of acrylic paint on my future container. I wanted to add paint to the boxes in particular to kind of seal the paper in case a little soap or lotion came off in the container  Regular acrylic paint  is not the greatest when sticking on aluminum cans so my husband Bob said he had an almost empty bottle of black spray paint and offered to just take the items outside and give them all a coat of paint on their inside and the outside. Yes!

Once the boxes were cut to size I moved on to the cans.

First, I took a metal file to the cut edges just to make sure there were no sharp edges and that nothing would catch.


Next, we got everything painted. The colour peeks out a bit from behind the twine or burlap so it is not the prominent colour you are seeing. I am in a fall mood, we have a lot of black in our cottage, and we had that left-over paint, so my colour choice was simple.  It would be fine in whatever colour you wanted to use. In the summer I would probably go with white or yellow or blue for the cottage!
Once it was dry from being painted I put a bit of tacky glue down the side of the box or the can and just wrapped it around and carefully overlapped the end where it joined up and then I used a bit of extra glue there to secure it.  That simple.

 I did line up the finished bottom edge of the burlap strip on the bottom edge of the container and I folded the excess at the top of my containers to the inside and used a lot of glue for that. I liked the look of it wrapping over on the box top edge and the height of my box worked with the width of the burlap but if the box was taller I would not have worried about wrapping it over the edge
.
To keep everything in place while it dried I used clothespins. - yes, I use clothespins out here. In fact, that is one of the things that are kept on that bathroom shelf.  Binder clips and the big paper clip would have been useful too if I was at home in my office.  I suggest wiggling your clips loose before it is totally dry. The glue is soaking through the fabric and holes and will attach to your clip to your box or can!

The twine wrapping project is just as easy.

I would suggest using a softer twine since some types can be quite harsh and hard on your hands. The one we had in our storage room was perfect.

Prep your containers the same way and then add a bit of glue at the starting point start (I started at the bottom) and begin wrapping, around and around and around. Add the glue on to the container as you go and try and have the glue run all the way up. It is okay if it isn't all glued down so I used just a line along the side seam of the tin can and just pushed it in place as I looped it around the rest of the can. The finishing off can be a little tricky. Try and fray the cut edge a bit so that it is a bit flatter and tuck it under the edge of the previous row. It is not cheating to use a hair dryer to speed up drying in heavy glue areas. 

I wanted to add some extra embellishments to my containers, so I tied some twine around it. There are so many things you could add like lace, ribbon or fake flowers or leaves to the side to make it extra cute.

Give this project a try!

Make it your own.  I would love it if you let me know if you try this project at home for your self, with your youth group or your seniors!

EXTRA   HINTS

• This project is simple to do, if somewhat sticky with the glue. Consider
precutting the boxes and the burlap to the right size before doing it with your group. Give a variety of embellishments to your participants so everyone has a unique finished product. The repetitive nature of wrapping the twine
around might be very calming for some individuals. This would be challenging for people with limited use of a hand. I wonder how well double stick tape would work for getting everything in place.


• Yarn around the jars, cans or boxes does work but be aware that most kinds of yarn stretch a bit when wet. They also shrink down again as they dry. The motto of the story is to take it easy on the glue and if it is getting soggy don’t try and pull it  too tight.


• Consider this project for Earth Day!

The Butterfly Circus

Have you ever watched a butterfly emerge from it's cocoon? I sometimes see that happen with Monarch butterflies at our cottage in lake country. These yellow, white and black caterpillars eat milk-weed like crazy and then form a rather webby cocoon  that changes into an inert looking  green chrysalis. Ten days later, out it comes as a wet soggy bug. It sits there and it's wings gradually pump up and unfurl. It is now a gorgeous orange creature that flies!

What a wonderful inspiring process and what a story of resilience! It starts out as one thing and becomes something very different but wonderful. The caterpillars eat a plant that is hard to consume and is quite toxic to many creatures but that same poison in the milk-weed makes those butterflies kind of toxic to birds that wants to eat them. They display their lovely bright colors as a warning to predators and basically announce to the world that they are tough little survivors.

One of my dreams is to follow the migrating monarchs from Canada to Mexico where some of the them over winter. They can fly 3,000 miles to exactly the same tree where previous generations overwintered. There is one of these spots pretty close to an international Girl Guide and Girl Scout center and some of my Guiding friends have gone to see this magical spot.  One lady told me about her experiences in Mexico. She said the walk up the trail into the forest is fairly difficult but she though that if you take your time, even with a cane, you can eventually get up to where thousands of butterflies are located.

When I  get tired of walking, or going up the stairs I sometimes think that there is no point in doing all this work  and rehabilitation with so little return. Then I picture that caterpillar chomping away on milkweed and the miracle of the chrysalis followed by that 3,000 mile journey.

Someday ... I am going to follow them from my cottage and walk up that forest trail in Mexico  to see a miracle of nature.


Below is a short award winning video featuring the inspiring Nick Vujicic. I hope you enjoy The Butterfly Circus.

HAWMC -Day 14 My Dream Day

 HAWMC Day 14: My Dream Day

Describe your ideal day. How would you spend your time? Who would you spend it with? Have you had this day? If not – how could you make it happen?

The weather is starting to improve around here at long last and lately my dreams are centered around getting out to our summer cottage on our tiny north-woods island.

 My outpatient hospital therapy sent me to sessions of Mindful Meditation Trainings. Occasionally we were asked to picture someplace where we felt at peace and happy and the same image always came to my mind-- the screened porch of our cottage..... so that is the home base for my perfect day.

I love basking in the sunlight and the lake is just outside the window.

My day would begin with waking up slowly to the song birds chirping. (My dream day would include some improved indoor plumbing because things are pretty darn primitive at my cottage)  Next, how about some coffee with husband Bob while we sit on adarondac chairs just outside the back door?

I would go climbing around in the bush and rocks to find sweet wild raspberries and Saskatoon berries, sampling as I go. Some of my kids or grandkids would wake up to the smell of my waffles cooking  and join us on my porch for a breakfast of the waffes, fresh berries and  some maple syrup. Yummmmmy!

Maybe we will do some crafts or perhaps work in the yard. I might read a book or I might go take some pictures. Mid-afternoon we could go for a power boat ride to get some ice-cream with the grandchildren or maybe I will hop into the canoe and paddle to the other side of the island to look for the baby ducks.

A BBQ dinner and then we would sit on the dock afterward. I would not even wish away the mosqitoes because I love the dragonflies and birds and bats that are feeding on them.

It gets darker and we can see the milky way across the sky and, if it is one of those magical nights, we might even lie on the dock wrapped in blankets and watch the northern lights dancing above us. My son might take his little preschoolers down to the water edge with a pail of water and a net and a flashlight to catch some crayfish for the kids to look at,  just like I used to take him not so long ago.

We would cuddle down in our bed and fall asleep to the sound  of waves lapping gently on the shore.

I really do have a lot of summer days that are very much like this, but the climbing is now limited, naps are needed and someone else needs to help me somehow get into that canoe and paddle it. I am fortunate that I have people who care about me enough to make this all still possible. I keep working on doing more on my own and I keep getting stronger. 

I am working on getting that  plumbing improved too.

I look so happy, but poor Bob is paddling his heart out to make up for me dragging my paddle. 

 

Summer at the Lake

I am spending a fair bit of time at the lake right now. Cottage life is a real gauge for me of how much I am improving. You tend to not see changes when you are dealing with your day to day life, but at the cottage I am comparing my activities to what they were last summer.  I told a lady at my Stroke Recovery Support Meeting that I was going to the lake and her response was something of a harsh .. "nice for you just getting to relax at the lake.".  It couldn't be farther from the truth. I don't want to spend my days just relaxing,  I want to cook fun meals, I want to chop wood for the fireplace.  I want to go swimming,  hiking and boating and I want to be helping with the work of repairing and maintaining the cottage. I work very hard to towards those goals and I participate as much as I am able.

My cottage is a little primitive to say the least, but it is the place in the world that makes me the happiest. It is the only cottage on a 5 acre island, and is run on solar energy with a propane stove and BBQ and no fridge. We have had the place for 28 years now and mainly we putter with it making tiny changes each summer. Now we are at the point where we are starting to redo the repairs we made when we first bought the place. The walls are creaking, the paint outside is peeling, the floor is slanting a little, and dock boards need replacing.

 Last year I literally had trouble walking over the floor because of a little slant. This year I only notice it when I am overtired. The 5 steps to get in the cottage are a bit rickety and steep but this year, as long as I am holding the rail I do okay. Midnight trips to the outhouse involved waking up my husband to get me down the back stairs and over a few feet of rocky terrain, This year we understand my problems so much better. We have changed the step and added a whole lot of solar lighting and I can cope on my own much to my families "night time relief".



My other huge issue has been getting in and out of the boat at the docks. We have just resurfaced the mainland dock and there is a dock pole in the just the right spot to hang onto. The dock still needs a bit of leveling but having an even, secure surface is just wonderful! Both docks are solid docks, not floating, and once I get up on it I stop and take a minute to stop feeling dizzy from the upward move.  Getting in and out of the dock is not the simple matter of hopping over the side that it once was and now I need a hand getting out, but this year it doesn't involve 2 peoples help. Last year we needed one person in the boat with me acting as a counter weight and supporting my hip and someone on the dock pulling me upward. It usually wound up with me crying and wanting to vomit.

Next weekend I am going to try swimming in the lake again. Last year I got in the water only one time with great difficulty and once I was in the water I found myself unable to tolerate the movements of tiny little waves against my body. 

A couple days ago my husband installed a swimming pool ladder onto the end of our dock. When he  put it in we found it actually touched a flat rock at the bottom so when I climb  down  I will only be in at thigh deep on about a 2 foot wide rock platform.  All the rest of the way along the dock is deep enough to dive off of.  I think the ladder will make all the difference in my being able to get in and out of the water.  When I was doing pool therapy last year my physiotherapist and the aquatic therapist felt it was a safety issue for me so we put a lot of energy into figuring out how to  use a ladder and get in and out of the pool safely using a ladder and not just ramps or steps.


Here is my to do list for next weekend:

• cut up some more kindling with my clippers

• go swimming using my new ladder

• help lay laminate flooring on my screen porch

• do my at home physio exercises

• practice Guitar. (I have hardly practiced all summer)

• play a card game (think cognitive therapy-- still very hard for me and not a lot of fun)

• work a bit on a little craft for Christmas

• If time and weather allows- help husband paint small bedroom OR power wash our huge dock

Linda-- Fall 2010

And yes, I will still find time to lounge in my adirondack chair on the dock while reading a magazine, and we will sit on our screen porch and enjoy a relaxing candle lit dinner while watching the sun set.

My Very Sore Finger

I have a sore finger on my good hand. It is a real problem to me.

It started off in August when I got a little thorn in my middle finger of my right hand. I was at the cottage, gathering and cutting branches into smaller pieces to fit in the fireplace and one of the branches was a hawthorn and they really do have thorns! I thought I got it all out but it stayed irritated. I thought maybe a tiny bit was still in there and would eventually work it's way out but it just kept not healing and then it seemed to be getting more painful and bleeding easily and getting bigger. I talked to the doctor about it at my regular appointment and he said it just had to take time and heal. Two weeks later it was much bigger so I went back to the doctor.

Don't click on the following link if you get queasy very easily. It was now something called a Pyogenic Granuloma. Basically I have pea sized cluster of capillaries that are probably a benign growth. Most likely it is a weird inflammatory response to a local trauma. It is amazingly painful to touch and bleeds like crazy with the littlest bump. My doctor told his nurse to hold everything he was going to be busy for 10 minutes and went to look it up. He came back with a picture atlas of skin diseases and was all excited. Next he called in his partner saying "Hey wana see a Pyogenic granuloma?" " Oh that's what it looks like!" while they compared me to the book. They decided "Wow, it's a big one.". Hmmmmph.

First they tried burning it with a chemical cauterization and told me that I should come back the next week. Nope didn't work. Okay lets try liquid nitrogen and freeze it off. (cryosurgery) Nope, still didn't work. The next suggestion is we need to freeze it and scrape it off and out, and cauterize the bottom.

They now need to send the sample for biopsy, still assuring me it is not likely to be serious but that we do need to take care of the ugly thing. My doctor can't really do it in the office because I react very badly to local freezing, so I am being referred to a plastic surgeon. It is going to be more than a month to even see the guy and who knows when he will actually do the surgery!

I tried hard to express that the stupid thing is not just a yucky looking bump on my finger. I use a cane in that hand in order to balance and stay upright and this is actually affecting my mobility. I can't keep a good grip on the cane so now I need to go back to using my walker full time again.

I can't believe how slowed down I am because of a little sliver!

Summer Therapy Group: Session 3 - Loss

I was not able to attend this session because I was taking the opportunity to go to the cottage with my daughter on one of her few days off.

I understand that it was a great day and enjoyed very much by the other participants. They let loose helium filled balloons with attached messages about sad things in our lives off over the city from the top of the hospital parking garage. It was letting go of some of the pain and sadness of the past and making way for a new future. I watched the birds and sky at the lake and felt pretty happy with the world too.

I wasn't there --- so no photos today, but the internet provides us with balloon clip art. (Smile)

Our Dock is getting more accessible

Our new, easy to use, mainland dock space.

Today my son and my husband repaired our "new dock". We have been trying for years to get a decent spot to leave our boat on the mainland shore. I can't believe we finally have a spot! There is a new owner at the closest campground and he told us last week we could rent the space if we fixed up a broken dock ourselves. You see the "before repairs" picture above.

We finally have dock space for our boat!

We have been launching our boat every time we go out and hauling it home with us every time. It takes extra time both coming and going from the cottage, and it is really exhausting and sometimes pretty scary to me when I am getting in or out. The dock space we have been using is a very high dock and it has been very hard to do since I have had mobility problems.

I find our cottage dock easier to use, but I still could not possible get in or out of the boat without someone to help pull me and steady me. I must admit it is going a lot easier this year than it was last year, and it is getting a little easier with every trip this year. I guess practice makes perfect.

The long and curving dock at our cottage with our boat, "Big Blue".