Day 13

It was wonderful waking up in such a quaint cabin this morning. The wood stove had kept us warm all night (it's a soapstone but a little old). It was a bright, sunny morning. We finished up most of the cleaning and enjoyed exploring the cabin, taking in the art work hanging on the walls and interesting pottery, reading titles to books on the shelves. It's a little strange moving into someone's home. We moved a few things around, added a partition for John, and moved in a few of our things this afternoon.


Settling in...







Yesterday after we arrived at the cabin, Steve and I were checking out what was in all the garbage cans in the garage. Each one had a different kind of feed for the wildlife. When we looked in the can of sunflower seeds a chipmunk looked up at us in surprise, dove into the seeds as if it was water and swam around just beneath the surface, popping just his head out every few seconds to see if we were still there. He was very cute. Steve put a container in the can so the chipmunk could escape.

Steve and the kids discovered today that our landlords have made many friends here that are willing to befriend us also. Today John held a chickadee in his hand and had squirrels in his lap eating sunflower seeds. Some of the others got to do the same. There was a bluejay and a chipmunk that kept me company while I hung laundry outside. We watched deer at the feeder while we ate our supper. Steve has been reading 'The Living Forest' series by Sam Campbell aloud to us for quite some time. It's all about befriending and taking care of the animals of the north woods. The kids are just loving all this. The problem...a bear cleaned out the squirrel feeder by the garage last night. We've decided there will be no more feeding of wildlife, except by hand, until the bears hibernate.












Rose is enjoying the wildlife too from the low windows.


The crabapple tree the bear destroyed a few days ago just ten feet from the house. He also tore up a cherry tree just six feet from the house.

Tomorrow we will finish a few things in the cabin and pack for our trip to Iowa on Saturday!!!!! It was hard to wait these few extra days but we wanted to come home to a clean, settled cabin.

As I write this, Steve has a crackling fire in the wood stove and the smell of Moriah's sugar cookies in the oven is wafting it's way up here to the loft. Think I'll make some tea and do a little taste-testing.