So, I just have to post this, because I'm really happy that I found a cheap solution to protecting our cherries from getting eaten by birds & squirrels.   In the five years since we planted our trees, we've watched in frustration while squirrels swung from branches and ate every single cherry before they could ripen..

Basically, the commercial options that I could find on the internet were to buy commercial grade nylon mesh and drape your whole fruit tree.  But this was a concern for birds & squirrels (and in New Zealand, for flying foxes) getting trapped, plus was expensive and ugly and not too practical for me to buy that much fabric, etc.  

So, I opted to take some white translucent shiny gift ribbon (about 2" wide) that I had from some wedding presents, and wrapped it around the branches that actually had some cherries still ripening (the squirrels had stripped most of them by the time I figured this out).  I cleared some leaves around the bunches of cherries, but mostly wrapped right over leaves & cherries.  I tied soft knots in the ends of the ribbon.

Today, after a couple of weeks, the cherries are nearly completely ripe and I haven't seen a single squirrel hanging from the trees eating the cherries.  We just ate a couple of the cherries and they're nearly perfect!  I saved the ribbon, since it's in great shape and not stained or torn at all.

I am finally finished my course!!!!!! No more desperately editing my poems that I'd re-read 40 times and found no more joy in!   I handed in the final portfolio, the process portfolio, and a reading journal and I am FINISHED!  (until next year, that is.)

Wooohooo!!!

I wasn't even sure I could do a course and have two young children all at the same time and I managed it!!!!!

Yay for me!

I handed in my creative writing portfolio today - three weeks earlier than everyone else will be handing them in.  I really really needed to get it done ahead of time because I knew there was no way I could do it once the baby comes.  So, it's finished. It's not great (and my inner perfectionist side wants to have a big cry about that), but most of it is polished.  

I know I should be proud of myself for getting it finished early (and for even DOING the class in the first place, with a toddler running around), but I can't seem to stop fixating on the fact that a couple of the pieces weren't absolutely polished.  Sigh.

Now, the only remaining things are: the final exam which is only worth 10% of my final mark.  And, Chris's photography website that I'm working on.

On the bus ride home, I had a more uncomfortable Braxton Hicks contraction than normal, and I thought "good! Going into labour AFTER the portfolio is complete is totally cool". But I'm not in labour.  

Tick, tick, tick....