What I am Reading

Ecoholic, published in 2007, tells you something about the kind of reader I am. I love books. I tend to buy piles of them all at once. This is the third time I have read Ecoholic and it is jam packed with information so well worth it. I very, very rarely get rid of books. I hang onto them and re-read them over and over until they are dog-eared. I lend them out but always want them back and I have shelves and shelves of them. If you are in Canada and interested in small steps you can take to reduce your impact on the planet, Ecoholic is an excellent guide to products and services available here. It is all still relevant today. A tagline I read recently says it all - There Is No Planet B!

The Season of Mud and Molt

 

Letting Suzy, Sandy and Mikaela free roam in the house is a big chore. Actually, the free roaming is fine. It is the getting ready to let them free roam that is the work. They all attack cats. Suzy and Sandy to play with them but they are so big, the can hurt a cat really easy. Mikaela attacks to kill. Anything furry and small is for hunting. This is the season, though, that they are free roaming a lot. They need regular brushing, cleaning and nail trimming. Normally, the molt hair is impossible to keep up with no matter how hard we try. About a week into the thaw, we usually throw our hands up and get ready for a few weeks of mud and molt. This year, our winter season has been extremely mild. There is not much molt for us to deal with. None of the dogs developed their full winter coat. Not even Summer. The mud, on the other hand, has arrived with its' usual reliability. Our yard is the only one with snow left and there is not much of it. It is a bit unique in our yard because we have so many trees. It means the snow lasts a few extra days here. With most of it melted, the girls lower pen is a swamp. Time to close that pen until the spring run off is finished and the ground is able to dry. As much work as the next few weeks will be in terms of the dogs, it does mean that the garden will be blooming soon. That is always a plus.

The Charitable Side

Natural Connection is the charitable side of Little Shop of Hoarders. It will locally promote our connection to nature through garden programs. I expect that most of the funding will go towards the pet medical fund but most of the programs will be garden related. The pet programs will assist in keeping pets healthy and in loving homes. We will not be taking animals but rather, will be helping others keep their animals. It will be a much better solution than us taking every stray that shows up broken in the valley! We can't keep up with that.

Little Shop of Hoarders

For 3 years now, I have been thinking of Little Shop of Hoarders. Two years ago, Linda bought the domain name for me of littleshopofhoarders.com. I haven't yet figured out how to forward that to where the site is built at littleshopofhoarders.weebly.com but I will figure it out and get it running. I am determined to open Little Shop this year. I don't expect it to be huge. The main goal is to reduce the amount of stuff going to the local landfill and rescue some things along the way. I don't plan on it ever being a main income source because I want it to stay as local as possible and we do not have a huge population base. We will not have a location but rather, partner with local stores. I do expect it will bring in a little extra money, provide me with an outlet for my creative side and allow me to keep the freedom from 9 - 5 that I enjoy now. What I can do locally for the environment has been on my mind for a very, very long time. It is time to do something about it. I have no idea if it will be April, July or December but Little Shop of Hoarders is opening online in 2012!