Chiara Convent Life Includes Plants and Animals

Sister JulieAnn Sheahan

January 23, 2022

Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity Sister Kay Klackner updates us on inside and outside news from Chiara Convent, Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

Early in October Sister Anne Turba’s sister Judy and her husband Mike drove from Green Bay with their friends, Sarah and Dan, bearing gifts for us. (Sarah and Dan are their friends who came to the Motherhouse during the summer to treat all the Sisters to homemade donuts.) For the past few years Sarah and Dan had been moving their hibiscus plants to the outdoors during the summer and back into their house for the winter. They were tired of doing this and wondered if we would be interested in their plants. The hibiscus plants turned out to be trees, six to seven feet tall!!!

As the trees were being unloaded from the bed of the truck we were introduced to “Lazarus”. Lazarus was so named because a year or so ago he wasn’t doing too well and was nursed back to life.

After meeting Lazarus we were introduced to “Eileen”, aptly named for her stature as you can see here. Eileen has large, beautiful red blooms. Both have adjusted quite well to their new environment.

We are settling into our home and routines. The animal world is settling in as well. Our playground (patio) outside the dining room has flocks of little birds at the feeders, brown and black squirrels who seem to think they are birds as they attempt to snack on the suet and eat out of the bird feeders. It’s amazing how agile (and annoying) they are as they climb the poles and hang upside down to enjoy their lunch.

As nightfall comes, so appears 1 opossum, 2 opossums, 3 opossums, OH MY!

Picture: The junior opossum is licking the canola oil that we put on the bird feeder pole to try to keep the squirrels from getting to the top.

 

 

 

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