Moby Dog Ranch

Posted on by August 23, 2010


We had Bella visiting for a couple days last week and so it was really a zoo for sure here at the Moby! 3 dogs, 3 cats, a guinea pig, 2 ferrets and 2 gerbils! Of course, it was hardly Bella’s fault for pushing us over the edge, we were already hanging on the side of the pet cliff for a good long time.

At first it was chaos, because Evee thought we bought her a new wind up toy and was basically chasing Bella ALL OVER THE PLACE for an hour! A 5 month old herd dog pup is relentless with the focus and drive thing. Poor Bella! We kept snatching her up and trying to keep the two apart a bit… Evee is like a bull moose in a china shop!! She’s at the very very gangly yet powerful puppy teen stage and just doesn’t know her own strength.

So Jessy came to the rescue and she began to get everyone involved in some fun and games with homemade tuna cookies. Pretty quickly, she had the whole canine crew performing tricks and waiting patiently for their turn to wow the judges.



Of course, where tuna cookies are involved, the kitties had to get into the act and Dixie found a good spot on the back of my old wingback chair to do her little litany of tricks! Evee was very intent on learning a few more. She’s definitely the attention queen when it comes to learning new tricks and performing for the masses.




I can’t get over how much she’s grown in just 3 short months! She’s all elbows and long legs and rough and tumble all in one. We’re trying hard to teach her to be a little more graceful, but she’s just all powerhouse and clumsy pup in one! She rips around the Moby like greased lightening and can jump like a gazelle! She can clear the chair’s arm in a single bound and be sitting in it in a heart beat!

She is SOOOO hard to catch when she gets loose, she runs and darts and thinks that we’re just playing with her… silly goose. Maggie figgered out how to catch her though, today, it was so funny. We had spent about 5 minutes on a silly pup chase, trying hard not to “chase” her but get her interested in coming close enough to grab… when Maggie went back to the yard and scooped up Jack from his napping spot on my car! And she walked right over and said, Look at the Kitty! And Evee ran over instantly to get a good sniff of Jack in her arms! She and Jack are not friends and Jack was less than pleased to be used in that manner. Good thing for Maggie, he doesn’t have front claws! (We didn’t do that to him, he was abandoned that way…)

Well, just think… Evee was just a teeny pup not that long ago! Here she was in the middle of May! Awwwww……


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Felting Sweaters…

Posted on by August 23, 2010

I’ve been reading online about felting sweaters. And after seeing some of the most adorable little critters and pouches and such at the Bluegrass Festival on the island, I thought it was time to give it a try ourselves.

Well, just as luck would have it, Maggie and I were driving home from the post office run and there was a garage sale! So we stopped. I had no problem scoring two nice neutral colored men’s sweaters for my evil plans. One was cotton and the other was merino wool.

Or course, when I got home and consulted the old Web Oracle… I discovered that cotton ones don’t felt. Durn. But one site did suggest that you cut cotton ones up and sew them into things, like pouches and little bags or what have you, so I thought, cool… no problem. I’ll cut that one up and make a few things.

But the merino wool? Perfect!!!

First thing you do is cut off all the seams. Cut off the waistband, and the collar and the cuffs. And then cut up the side seams and all that. If you don’t, it might not felt as nicely as it should.



Then you pop the pieces into a hot pot of boiling water!!! Of course, you can do it in a washing machine, but well, we don’t have one, and I didn’t want to go to the laundry just for a craft. So, into the hot pot they went. After all it IS called boiled felt! I just did one clump at a time. Didn’t want to overload the pot.




Boiled about 10 minutes and then pulled it out to drip and cool in the sink. Once I could handle it, I wrung out each piece with my hands.

They did shrink up, about 30% or so. Not quite the 75% that can happen, but to be honest, the thing looked a little felted before I actually even cut it up. That happens a lot… we all have probably felted a wool sweater before without even trying!

But in the end, I got some nice pieces of felt… once they dried! I think I’ll try and make some cute little Ipod and cell phone pouches with it and maybe even a few kitty catnip mousies!

However, with the cotton sweater pieces I began sewing. And let me tell you, it was a minor disaster!!! Apparently cotton sweater is very hard to sew on until you use a binding tape!!! Which I didn’t. So they got all wobbly and stitched funny until I managed to develop a little skill at it.




Actually the wobbly seams were kind of attractive on the edge of a flap or something, but dreadful to try and make nice neat seams. But, hey, they actually turned out kind of cute. I think I’ll add a few little embellishments and maybe some little shoulder straps to a few and see how they fare. I have a little stash of bits and ribbons and such, that might really dress it up a bit.




I made Jessy a nice laptop sleeve! It’s so nice and soft. Of course, it won’t protect it from much, but it’s kind of cute anyway! Not bad for $2 worth of garage sale sweaters! Can’t wait to play with the felted dark gray sweater! Maybe next weekend!

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Freezing Sweet Corn

Posted on by August 23, 2010



Oh the sweet corn in our local farm stands has been so wonderful. I could eat it every day! And I got the idea of getting some of it ready for the freezer… so we could have it through the fall and winter, maybe… if it lasts long enough!!! (haha)

So we got an extra dozen and are giving it a try!


I cut our corn into chunks, like small nibblet corn. We don’t always want a bunch of corn at a meal, so this way we can have a little or have a lot. I like the idea of being able to pop a few in the crockpot too, if we’re having a roast or into a grill packet for BBQ time.




A quick 4 minute blanch into some boiling water and then straight into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking. I suppose that you could skip the blanching step, but everything I’ve read seems to point to the corn getting kind of mushy and loosing some of that sweetness. It seemed easy enough to do, and it was.

Here’s a little trick though, if your corn water stops boiling when you put the corn in, you’re probably cooling the water too much. If it’s not boiling again by less than 1 minute, you need to use either a bigger pot or less corn at a time. Basically, you’re bringing the temperature of the water down toooo cold by adding the corn. Just a little trick.

It took Maggie and I less than an hour and we had enough corn bagged for 6 meals. It only cost us $2 for the corn, and 6 ziploc bags. Not too bad. And we’ve already dug into our store to give it a try and it was just as good as if we had just husked and boiled it! Granted, we only gave it two days in the freezer, but I suspect if it was going to be mushy, it would be mushy right away, pretty much.

I think that we’re going to try a much larger batch of corn and cut it from the cob. I think folks are right, the cobs do take up a lot of space in the freezer. And the idea of adding a little butter to the bag sounds easy to make quick corn in the microwave! Or just pop into a saucepan of boiling water and you’re ready to go!

Oh, our corn on the cobs only took about 5 minutes in boiling water to be perfect! Just add a little butter and some salt and you’ve got fresh picked local sweet corn goodness ready for your table in no time flat!

I can’t wait to see if our corn makes it to the harvest finish line! It tassled and we do have some ears… should be interesting!

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