Your squirrel stories remind me of my grandmother. When she was still in her house (she’s in a retirement home now) she used to lean out of the window and actually call the squirrels to her. They were all well trained, and would come running from all over the block! She’d toss them crusts, nuts, birdseed, peanut butter on toast… Oh, and if you’re wondering what a squirrel call sounds like, she used this: “Heeeeeeeeeeeere, chipchipchipchipchip! Heeeeeeeeeeeere, chip chip!” in a very high-pitched tone. I have NO idea why that worked!

As for the plastic hearts, might they be purse handles? I can’t say I’ve seen heart-shaped ones, but I’ve seen rings and rectangles, that appear to be similar material and size.

Giggle… Shall I send nuts you can’t eat to feed to the little dear?!

Purse handles were my first thought too, but… no… ???

Could be! Handledn’t occurred to me–thank you!

Chan, I am going to run out of those sugared walnuts soon, and then, boy, I’ll be in trouble.

Well, we all have our place in life, don’t we. Mine, apparently, is to rub Pepper’s head. When I put her down, she climbs right back up my leg!

Humor – (hope I haven’t just shown this one. Sometimes I lose track)

SPORTS QUOTES

“I’ve never had major knee surgery on any other part of my body,”  –Winston Bennett, University of Kentucky basketball forward.

“We’re going to turn this team around 360 degrees,”  –Jason Kidd, upon his drafting to the Dallas Mavericks.
(And this guy went to U.C. Berkeley)

“Half this game is ninety percent mental.”  –Philadelphia Phillies manager, Danny Ozark
(Another mathematical genius.)

“The word “genius” isn’t applicable in football.  A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein,”  — Joe Theisman, NFL football quarterback & sports analyst.

Love that squirrel! Ain’t it a hoot to be adored by a hungry critter! Thus is my life, too. 🙂
Love the flowers, especially!
I’ve no idea on the plastic hearts – are they big enough to be purse handles?

I went to the Auckland (NZ) Lily Show on the weekend where they had a table of hippeastrums, I thought of you. Quite a selection of exotics, including a curled-petal variety.

Loved the finger puppet story…and I don’t think you have a selfish bone in your body…I think friendly children is just a wonderful result of your thoughtfulness… 🙂 The squirrel is so cute. My cousins rescued a squirrel from their cat and nursed it back to health and…made it a house pet. It loved to climb my aunt’s expensive drapes….but, Charlie was adorable and quite the character and very fond of cookies. I can understand how much you’re loving your little squirrels. Maybe one day, they’ll actually come and eat from your hand?
And, my thought was purse handles too…
So glad you’re feeling well and enjoying life again!
Abby

Don’t feed squirrels from your hand! They can end up expecting food directly from people and get very aggressive. An animal control person told me this after a squirrel attacked my son.

A good warning; I’m not about to. Toss only method around here. When I was a kid, we used to sit in the doorway and see how close we could get a raccoon to come to take food, till the day it decided it liked what Mom had cooking in the kitchen behind us better than what we were offering. It was suddenly trying to squeeze in there between us kids, while we were having a panic attack over those sudden claws coming at us.

That was the end of that.

Good job, Nut Lady! Nice grab bag!! I agree, purse handles fitting for the next holiday?

Definitely purse handles – we sell them in the shop. May a nice felted purse, you can do it! (Stand back from the lace needles, put them down slowly ma’am, we don’t want a situation here! Charlie, call for back up, I think she is contemplating a shawl!)

Well, I would be totally charmed also by that squirrel!

No clue on the hearts but will watch for other responses.

Yea!!! the amaryllis are back.

A couple of summers ago, I had a visit from a friend who lives in Canada. She brought along a friend from Austrailia. We went down to the mall in Washington DC to look at the monuments. The Australian was absolutely charmed by the squirrils, who were smart enough to beg, but still smart enough to stay just out of reach. “They’re so CUTE!” she exclaimed. “In Austrailia, we don’t have squirrils, just boring kangaroos all over the place.”

The racoons who came to our kitchen door each evening at dinner time finally became tame enough that we could feed them out of hand. We quit when the county public health service warned that some Montgomery County racoons were carrying rabies and asked that everyone quite feeding them.
Dad

th

they are cute — when we lived in the Bay Area, we had black ones that visited — and one that had a very short, stubby tail — I always wondered if it was because of an injury

here in cold weather country they can be quite destructive — chewing through siding to get into the eaves of the house so they can get out of the cold — cost us $500 to have a guy come and trap them and get them out of the house before they started chewing on wires!

I have NO! idea what the black plastic hearts are. None. Nice yarn though!!!!

Sounds like you had more of Christmas in January, huh? I’m sure it will all be put to good use, one way or the other…

Do you know of the story of the little prince and the fox? It reminds of you and your squirrel. As long as he behaves, enjoy. 🙂

If the hearts split, you could a ball of yarn done up on a ball-winder on them, and use them to keep track of your yarn while out and about. Maybe you could hang them from the pulls on a ceiling fan? 😉

In one of my prior jobs, we had a whole slew of squirrels that lived outside the plant, and the guys would feed them…there was no AC and a lot of hot machinery, so the doors were often left open, and the squirrels would all just troop into the cafeteria at lunch time to get theirs! (We tried to get the guys to stop feeding them, as the little rascals were just about impossible to get out of the building if they didn’t want to go, but the guys were pushovers for a bushy tail.)

Of course the sad part is that the plant closed in 2002 and was demolished…no idea what happened to the squirrels, but I expect that many of them had grown too dependant on humans to survive.

Oh I love Cyclamen. :-}
And I would use the hearts as purse handles, with the pointy bit attached to the purse part.
I have no idea if that is what they are really for, though LOL.
And the squirrel is adorable! I bet he thinks of you as his pet :-}

Hearing aid airing out hooks. Definitely. You hang the heart on the wall and then hang your hearing aids on them. that way you can find them easily in the morning.

Hmmm… Can’t help with the hearts, but the yarn is absolutely stunning! I seem to be buying yarn lately myself. Maybe it’s in the air?

My DH always says that there must be a real streak of non-domesticability in squirrels, otherwise we would certainly keep such cute things as pets. Seems that they’ve decided to domesticate us!

We have squirrels living in the tree in the front yard, and possibly our attic, though my husband is not wild about climbing a ladder and looking.

I will never forget the day that a female jay was sitting on the fence, and a squirrel jumped from the tree right on top of her. There was a HUGE domestic disturbance, with the jay perched on the branch from which the squirrel jumped, giving him the what-for in fishwife squawks, while the squirrel cringed on the fence. Her flounce when she turned and flew off was priceless.