Friday Night Photos #110 on Saturday Morning

I have a pretty hectic weekend and wasn't able to do my Friday Night Photos last night, so here are some Saturday Morning Photos (and one short video) instead...

I already shared a lot of photos from the past week on this post: Dog-Sitting in Illinois, so I won't be redundant and post all of those again. But I do want to again mention the Pig Minds Brewing Co., a vegan brewery that Jerry and I went to for dinner one of the nights, because it was amazing.

The entire menu (of food and drinks) is vegan and the atmosphere was exactly what I'd hoped--casual, relaxed, not too loud, and friendly. (I don't know if this is a "thing", but in my limited experience at vegan restaurants, the employees are SO FRIENDLY and super patient. Jerry and I sat at the bar top and the bartender was awesome.)

I ordered something that sounded delicious but on the healthy side (I didn't want to get out of control with my eating). My meal (Spicy Korean Tofu Bowl) was unbelievably good--I very rarely eat at restaurants because I just don't think it tastes as good as home-cooked food, but this was definitely something I would order again.

Jerry, on the other hand, went for the full bar-experience with a flight of beers and a patty melt with tater tots. I ate a few bites of his patty melt and was blown away at how good it was. I would bet my life that an omnivore wouldn't know it was vegan.

If you are ever in the vicinity of Rockford, Illinois, I highly recommend this place--whether you're vegan or omni!

I love this picture of Jerry with Jeanie's new elderly special needs basset. (I keep saying "new" but she's had him for a while now.) His name is Walter and he is the sweetest dog ever.

I didn't see this until I was going through my pictures yesterday, but apparently Jerry took a picture of me while I was removing and re-caulking Jeanie's kitchen counters. (Why, yes, that is my ice machine, if you're wondering--hahaha! I couldn't NOT have it for a week.)

I was texting and calling Noah and Eli probably way more than necessary, but I was worried about leaving them alone for a week. And my cats! (Joey was with Jerry and me.) Before I left, I made a checklist of things I wanted to make sure the boys got done.

I kept stressing how important it is to keep Duck occupied; he's like a dog in the sense that he needs lots of physical exercise and mental stimulation. (The other cats prefer to sleep most of the day.) Anyway, when I asked Eli on Saturday how it was going, he just responded by texting me a picture of the list I'd made, haha. They were doing great! And when we got home, I was stunned to find that the house was just as clean as we'd left it.

Speaking of squirrels, I haven't posted anything about them lately. Yesterday morning, it looked warmer than it was outside, so I figured I'd go sit outside and feed them their "special" nuts (walnuts and hazelnuts in the shell). Here is a video of one of my favorite squirrels taking a walnut from me. It warms my heart that she trusts me enough to sit there on the post while she eats and then keep coming back for more.

I'm hoping that this summer, the "babies" (who were born last spring) will be a little less shy. They watch the other squirrels take nuts from us, but they still like to keep their distance. I'd like to make it a habit to sit out on the deck with my tea every morning and feed the squirrels--it was a nice start to the day.

This is a project I made for the cats. We are in the process of making what was originally a "cat wall" (and has become all four walls in our bedroom as well as the top of the closet in our bathroom!) and this was part of it. I painted the board/shelf black (I'll show "after" pictures once we have everything done) and I made a side for the shelf by cutting a piece of PVC pipe (I'd asked on our neighborhood social app if anyone had leftover bits of PVC they didn't want, and I actually got a few!). I wrapped thick twine around it, gluing it with a glue gun. You can see the progress in the second picture. I really love how it turned out, and the cats are obsessed! (The twine in the picture was what was leftover from a previous project--I had to use a new roll for the PVC because that obviously wasn't enough.)

I know I write about how Duck is super needy, but Jerry happened to be taking my picture while I was writing a blog post with Duck on my lap. When I pay attention to my computer rather than him, he puts his paw on my face to remind me that he's there. It's endearing, but it drives me crazy at the same time. Whenever I sit down to write is when he suddenly wants all my attention. Trying to type and see my screen with him there is a challenge.

I like to share my DIY projects because sometimes I even impress *myself* with the things I'm able to do. Well, this is to show that some of my DIY's fail--and this is probably the worst. I broke the window pane on Noah's window! Thankfully, it was just the outside pane, but we obviously need to get the glass replaced. (I had been trying to remove those thin white strips around the outside--which should be rather easy--in order to reseal the window in place. The stripping is old and should be replaced, but I'm not sure I'll attempt this again, haha.)

I got a new screen protector for my phone and don't you just love the "easy open" packaging on products? ;)

I never give my cats baths (I've only attempted it once, with Chandler, and wound up with his canine tooth buried up to his gums in the "meat" of my palm--then had to get a tetanus shot at urgent care). Well, Chick smelled really bad and I figured out the source--a few mats of hair under his butt encrusted with dried diarrhea (TMI, sorry). I did my best bathing him, but most cats hate baths--as evidenced by my glove that was intact before I started. After his bath, I trimmed all of the hair on his backside so it was less likely to happen again. (I'm not sure of the source of his diarrhea--maybe separation anxiety while Jerry and I were gone?--but he's back to normal now)

I thought he would never go near me again after the "torture" he'd endured during his bath, but not even an hour later, he sat on my lap and purred. He was probably just happy that he didn't smell bad anymore!

This was literally 30 seconds after I opened an Amazon box...

You know what this means! The start of baseball season in Michigan. This was at Eli's games a couple of days ago and I can't even describe how cold it was, despite being in the 50's. I don't think anyone there was prepared for the cold. I should have brought my winter coat, but it seemed excessive when I left the house. I was so glad to have a hat, two pairs of gloves, and my Buff in the car. I was also wearing heavy-duty long johns with jeans and a hoodie over them. I texted this picture to my friend who replied that I looked like I was going to rob a bank. 

There is pretty much nothing that is more comforting than Duck sleeping against my ear and purring. His warm belly and the purring make me so happy.

I was getting tired of going back and forth to the garage to get different sizes of screws and hand tools, so yesterday morning I decided to organize as much of it as I could. This was the mess I started with. I wish I had an "after" picture, but it was taking much longer than I thought, and I didn't make much progress. Once Jerry got up, we started working on the cat shelves in our room, so I had to set all of this aside for later.

Hopefully I'll have an "after" photo of this next week!

Okay, I'm off to Eli's double header (wearing my warmest winter coat today). Then Jerry and I are supposed to work on some projects around the house--we've got a lot of "maintenance" stuff to do this weekend!

Have a great weekend :)  xo