Open your eyes

Sunday Morning

Posted on May 20, 2012 by Laura

At 6:45 am, the sun filters into the bedroom window at Tiny House Ontario.  Many birds are singing and the grouse thumps, the temperature is warm but not yet uncomfortable.  The breeze rustles the canopy around us.

“I had a crazy dream last night”, I tell my husband.  I won’t bore you with the detail of it, but the long dream involves rescuing a miniature ape from a helicopter and finding out that it is a very important animal whose hospital wings around the world, are ready for him should anything happen.  Oddly, the ape belongs to my brother and sister in laws who live in Germany, but I don’t know that this animal exists until now.  There is a long snake who tries to bite me but misses and the crash is on my home farm, which is a place which I choose not to be a part of.  It is convoluted.  Still it fills the peace of the forest with a detail of life, no matter how off the mark of reality it is.

We climb down the ladder stairs and I start the propane element on the BBQ for bodum coffee and pat the dogs with my husband while we wait for the kettle to boil.  We settle on yogurt and granola for breakfast, feed the dogs and listen to rustling in the forest.

It is a typical morning at Tiny House Ontario.  There are no electronic interruptions.  There is no news from the outside world.  We know nothing of the last 12 hours as we quietly sit and eat breakfast, chatting.  We pat the dogs some more, laugh at the silly Bad Little Wolf who is harassing his sister and jumping around.  I break the pattern to record this Sunday morning at Tiny House Ontario for you.

I took a clip on this morning from the top of the BBQ with my computer, but I do not know how to upload videos.   Sorry!

Here is a photo of our cloth porch breakfast.

Could you get used to this?

Categories: Cloth Porch, Forest, Off Grid, Ontario, Open your eyes, Tiny house, Tiny House Ontario | Leave a comment

LaMar Alexander

Posted on May 15, 2012 by Laura

Thank you Devlin for sharing LaMar Alexander with me!

He is very clear and he has cheap ebooks, which I am going to get today!

Categories: Environmentalism, Money, Off Grid, Open your eyes, Simple living, Sustainable living, Tiny house | Leave a comment

Waiting and Going Green

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Laura

It has been 15 days since I arrived at Tiny House Ontario.  The forest changes so much every single day; I can’t capture it’s move from brown to green.  A slow motion camera would be fantastic  – or even a shot of photos taken three times a day, every day would have been great too.  Next year, perhaps I will remember to do this?

Now the canopy covers me and Tiny House Ontario disappears into deep forest.

Here is Leo packing up after the build a few days ago… see how green?

These days, the trees are so dense that the dogs hear people arriving before I can see them coming down the half kilometre lane.  Still, they keep me aware of what is going on.  This is Minnie standing guard.

It is so warm now that these plants that I initially had in my window are moved outside.

I start the little 10×10 raised garden too.  At dusk… another day until the soil arrives to the rock.

Categories: Dogs, Erazim Kohák, Forest, Nature, Ontario, Open your eyes, Simple living, Tiny House Ontario | Leave a comment

Evicted!

Posted on May 2, 2012 by Laura

 

Last fall a Ms. Mama Mouse moved into the BBQ at Tiny House Ontario and because I am a person who is highly concerned about the ethical treatment of animals I left her be.   I also fed her and her family when I went home.  She liked Mary’s Organic Crackers (who doesn’t?) and also the peanuts that Liisa brought her were a big hit, and the shells became part of her bedding after, so these had a HUGE added bonus.  Ms. Mouse came to look forward to my visits and would come out to see what sort of tasty treats were coming her way.  When I peeked in with a treat, she would peek out at me.

Even so, now that it is spring, and this is my main means of meal preparation I had to evict Ms. Mouse.

Since she has come to expect nuts, seeds, she sat watching me, totally aghast, as I took her home apart.  Poor little girl.  I think she even cried a little with me.  It was about half removed by the time she decided to run for her life.

After clearing her out, I turned the BBQ on bringing it up to 500 degrees for a good hour and then allowed it to sit at about 200 for an additional hour in order to kill germs or whatever she left behind.  The BBQ is probably in its last year of life, so I think when this happens I will leave it in the forest for the mice.

It is two days now and so far she has not moved back and seems to have accepted the newly located home that I have made for her.

 

 

 

Categories: Forest, Friendship, Nipple, Ontario, Open your eyes, Simple living, Tiny House Ontario | 2 Comments

2012 Season Begins!

Posted on April 30, 2012 by Laura

After we arrived yesterday, and unpacked, it was so great outside so we decided to take the dogs out on a nice walk through the woods and see how spring was looking on the land.  First observation is that the forest is very dry.  It is a dry spring so far.  Also we have at least one black fly that lived through the winter.

The pathway grew in quite a bit with the prickly bush, so we have to do a little more clearing this year so that we can walk through with the dogs.  Their little faces are just the right height to be scratched and their leashes get annoyingly wound up in the branches.

Also a lot of rocks fell at the fence line for the dog’s garden so these had to be put back up to keep them safely in and other critters safely out.

The stone cairns in the back of the land are still there and looking great.  No trees lost, that I can see, but still a few to clear from last year when the storm brought a tornado close to us.

We cleared a path through this morning and will bring the dogs out this afternoon to check it out.  Hopefully it goes a little better this time.

My husband put the rocks back up along the dog’s garden.

It was cold too but with the small camp heater we got cozy and slept long and well.

Now we start the real work!

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Categories: Dogs, Forest, Nature, Off Grid, Ontario, Open your eyes, Simple living, Tiny house, Tiny House Ontario | 1 Comment