All Creatures Great and Small Archives - Page 5 of 24 - Ruffing’s

Posted on September 12, 2015 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Slugs, disembodied dandelions, and flying fur

I am now stuffing and detailing the Hug Me Slugs I have started. It has been too gray to photograph these, but we should get a sunny day soon. These are the larger, 12 inch tall ones. I hope to post them in my toy shop soon, and keep finishing and posting more.

It is finally slightly cooler and it even rained a little, making it possible for me to get another tree in the ground. I am putting in a row of Green Giant Arborvitae, to block the sound from the road, and to enclose the yard. I will be so happy when fall arrives. I am going to keep planting.

I wandered around, taking some photos this morning. The flowers are losing their blooms, but I still find them pretty, like these ageratum. Our friend Linda, back in our old neighborhood, gave some to me, from her yard, and they have continued to reproduce every year.

It is nice to have flowers and trees and bushes from our old home. I hope to add more here to make it feel more comfortable and familiar to me.

The morning glories came with this house, and have continued replanting themselves for the past fourteen years we have been here.

I love this dark purple one.

It is pretty even with its leaves all chewed.

I have no idea where this tiny red morning glory came from. It was suddenly blooming at the end of the porch this morning, having made its way up a bush.

While prowling around the yard, I found one of the few remaining dandelion flowers. The wind was blowing while I tried to get it into focus. It looks like it is floating through green space.

I also came across the abandoned mockingbird nest in my beauty bush. I kind of wish I could climb in there. It looks like a good place to hide out, if you are tiny.

Even decaying things look beautiful. I keep passing this moss on tree bark.

I found a giant mushroom too. I wish I knew what kind this was. If anyone knows, please tell me. I loved to collect them when I was little. Bird nests and mushrooms make me think of homes for magical woodland creatures.

Speaking of woodland creatures, a second little black kitten was spotted, twice now, running up to our front door in the dark, to quickly grab some snacks out from under Santana, when they are put out. As I mentioned before, we have been having strays showing up at our neighbors’ houses, then a kitten, and now a second kitten. I have been trying to trap here, hoping to get the kitten some veterinary help, since I can’t get to where the cats are coming out of the woods behind my next door neighbor’s garage, but it isn’t working.

I turned our porch light on to see this happening, Santana guarding the trap door. So far, I have trapped him twice, and an opossum once. Santana thought that was funny. He was lying next to the trap when I came out to escort the opossum off the porch, and gave me a nod and a meow to let me know he wasn’t the one who fell for it that time.

Santana, who comes from across the cul-de-sac from us, firmly believes our house is his house, and our yard is his yard. He has also been fighting with the cats who cross the lawn, chasing them away. He has bites and scratches every few days lately. He recovers from one set of injuries only to get new ones.

This morning, there was fur all over the lawn, and his face has some scratches. I don’t know who the other participant was, only that he was gray and possibly white. I think Santana’s Convenia shot will probably tide him over for these cuts. I hope the other cat is okay.

It’s tough to control the situation, when none of the cats involved are ours, and the strays are showing up for food at neighbors’ houses. I end up asking for them to trap where the cats are so they can get fixed and vaccinated. There isn’t much hope of any adult cat getting trapped on our property, not with Santana fighting with them, even if he does seem to tolerate kittens and opossums.

Posted on August 16, 2015 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Hug Me Slug Angel, at home

I was trying to decide whether I should add this photo to my last post about this special Hug Me Slug Angel, but since it made me so happy, I decided to share it on its own post. Here he is, united with his companion Hug Me Slug, and their mom, or my customer’s mom. They were both gifts for her. She wrote to tell me her mom loves her Hug Me Slug Angel, who was made in memory of her dad, who passed away last Christmas. Their 57th wedding anniversary would have been this month. She says her mom is enjoying her new independent living apartment. She told me her mom has her slug angel in her living room there, but will likely be taking him out to share with other residents in the community. I hope he makes everyone smile. I enjoy thinking about the conversations with this adorable lady about her slug and the story behind him.

This is what toy making is all about, spreading some joy and some comfort, making someone feel good. That makes my day.

This is how my day begins, with these characters. Oliver Bunny waits for me to get up so he can have his veggies and his banana slice. Sometimes he gets super excited about this. Here he is, with his lips around the bar of his pen, letting me know he needs immediate attention. He was really taking a break from chewing on his litter pan, which is does to make a point. He turns to look at me, to make sure his efforts are effective. He gets what he wants, and then he comes out for the day to hop around.

And this lady below is usually asleep when I wake up, even though she has been yelling during the night lately. I am pretty sure she has hyperthyroidism, since our cats keep coming down with it as they age. I need to make an appointment to take her in for a blood test. I got an iodine test that people use on aquariums, but I don’t know if there is anything to be done if I find iodine in anything, or what the safe levels are. It isn’t regulated in water and no one I’ve asked has had much information. And it isn’t necessarily the cause. The vet and the person I talked to at the local public health department both said there seemed to be a lot of cases of hyperthyroidism in cats in this area. It’s more of a mystery.

Cats have continued to show up here, popping out of the woods behind my next door neighbor’s house in the evening, and then running back. He doesn’t want us to trap there, and Santana, our other neighbors’ cat chases them away from our house. I am hoping his owner can lure them over to her yard, since that seems to be our only option for catching them, to get them fixed. I count four adults so far, and surely one is a female, probably the mom of the kitten that showed up. If this goes on any longer, there will be more kittens and my neighbors will have a colony behind their houses. I don’t have the funds to take care of that situation. They are going to have to come together. If the cats get fixed and vaccinated, it will be okay, but that has to happen.

I’m sewing through stacks of fleece, trying to get more colors of Hug Me Slugs together. I get sleepy when I sit at the sewing machine. Watching the needle go up and down is hypnotic. It is so much easier to stay awake with a movie to watch. I will be able to do that when I move on to stuffing and hand sewing. I also need to take my sewing machine in to be cleaned. I thought I was a year behind, doing that, but Facebook showed me one of those “4 years ago today” posts, and there was my machine, just back from servicing. Oops. There must be a lot of fuzz inside from sewing all that fleece!

Posted on August 1, 2015 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Stuffed animal Hug Me Slugs, and some carrot lips

I have a new group of Hug Me Slugs over in my toy shop. These are 7, 8 and 9 inches tall, in more pretty fleece colors.

I’ve had a couple of very touching emails along with orders from repeat customers/slug adopters recently. I’ll share one now and one next time. The mom of these three little boys is expecting another little boy. Her three sons all insisted that he needed a Hug Me Slug too, and so she ordered one before his arrival. Theirs is one of my favorite photos. She says they love their slugs. One slug looks good enough to eat.

Oliver Bunny prefers to eat carrots. He might lick a Hug Me Slug, given the chance. He loves banana slices most of all.

Carrots give him orange lips, like Popsicles, not that he eats Popsicles. He might, if I were to make one from a frozen banana.

When I am done sewing for the day, I take Jude for his evening walk. He whines incessantly, if I don’t. He also cries when our cat neighbor friends don’t come to visit. Right now, their owner is be away, and they are locked up. No one come has to look after them, either Friday or Saturday, which makes me worry. I offered to do it myself, as I used to look after them, but last time a kid from the neighborhood came eventually, for two minutes. Unfortunately, he was someone who, along with his family, were responsible for some very upsetting animal-related incidents, some that were personal to me. They don’t care about animals. I care about the cats, and took good care of them, and I did it for free. I’m trying not to think about it, but I don’t understand it.

Mr Santana, this big orange boy, another neighbor kitty, was all matted up. I was surprised he let me take a bunch of them out. He looked happy to be rid of them. I was glad I didn’t get bitten this time around. He got himself into more trouble last Monday night. This time, he got a nasty bite, from another fight I guess, which looked terrible. Thankfully, it healed up on its own.

In more neighborhood kitty stress news, another kitten showed up across the cul-de-sac, which makes me feel extra bad about being unable to trap either of those boy cats last month, in case there is an unspayed female they showed up to visit. Kitty drop-offs seem to be an annual occurrence here, and a year-round occurrence in the area. Oliver Bunny was set loose by someone and found in our back yard last year.

These are Jojo and mama Bindi, who were abandoned here three years ago this August. As you can see, they are doing fine. They are much rounder than they used to be. They are indoor kitties, as all of ours are now, aside from Jude during his evening walks.

I wish people would be more responsible about animals and more helpful about getting them fixed. The cumulative effect is so distressing for the animals and the people who try to look after them. I’ve had at least two dreams, since the latest kitten showed up, where I’ve been searching for and finding a kitten. Once one gets dropped off, you hear them everywhere.

If you can, help out the rescues, and the rescuers. Please adopt, and spay and neuter. This year has been crazy for all the cat-helping people I know.

Update: After seeing no one come to take care of my neighbor’s cats, I asked other neighbors, who also had seen no one, and then went to take care of them myself. They had no food, and the envelope with the payment for the kid who was supposed to be cat sitting was still under the clip holding the the food bag closed. So, he obviously hadn’t stopped by. The water hadn’t been changed and the litter box hadn’t been cleaned. The cats were so happy to see me. I gave them food and pets, cleaned up a little, and went back the next morning with my mom and a neighbor who lives on the other side, while I cleaned up the rest of the way, which took a while since nothing had been done. The envelope was still there, and nothing had been cleaned any more than I had left it. I left a note saying what had happened, but never heard a word back, didn’t even receive thank you, except from the cats, who were obviously grateful. The kid finally made an appearance, not long before my neighbor came back from a long weekend. I checked and he at least had the decency to leave the payment behind. All quite disturbing.

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Elizabeth Ruffing

A little stuffed slug toy shop update, and some gardens

I have four new Hug Me Slugs over in my toy shop at the moment. They are red, watermelon pink, bright yellow, and banana yellow fleece, in my 9-inch size. I will continue to add more. Even though it is July, I know the Christmas season will be upon me before I know it, and I hope to have more toys ready this time around.

I have also been trying to make a dent in the yard work I have to do here, more tree planting and cleaning up of gardens that have become overrun with blackberries and weeds and, in some cases, flowers that multiplied profusely.

I met a horticulture student, who showed me around Raleigh City Farm, pictured above and in the two photos below. I didn’t have a camera and so I took these from the Internet.

He has been out planting tomatoes in all the heat we have been having, and the people at Raleigh City Farm have been keeping it doing well in spite of this weather too.

The plants all looked healthy. I felt I should be able to do something more myself. So, I worked on cleaning out one of my garden beds, and cutting out some saplings that had sprouted up.

I don’t have vegetables like they do, which is too bad, because Oliver Bunny would enjoy some of the ones they had there, I am sure. They sell their produce to local restaurants.

I was also introduced to BBC’s show, Gardeners’ World, which is on YouTube. They have my favorite kinds of gardens, the old English cottage style gardens. The photo above, and the two below are screenshots from the show.

I think they look like watercolor paintings. Very beautiful and inspiring. I used to have our yard, where I grew up, planted with such pretty flowers, in big beds and borders, under trees and flowering bushes. I miss it.

I brought some of my plants with me when we moved. I want to clear out those beds before everything gets choked out. My irises have been getting smaller each year, because the blackberries have joined them and are doing much too well.

These are paintings of mine, of flowers I had growing in my yard, irises, blue flax, and foxgloves, some of my favorites. This is “Jubilee” above, and “Iris and Foxgloves” below. I have seen this orange and mauve one bloom by our back door in recent years, but this year I don’t think it did. I see it hiding in there with some other plants. I intend to dig it up and plant it in a new bed. I am sorry I wilt in the heat. Summers are my winters now, the time when I stay inside more. But, I am going to try to go out when I can take the temperature and get more done.