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Maybe you’re like I was last Halloween, two days before the big day and no costume. If you need a beard (like I did for Hubbs’ costume) and have a skein of yarn lying around, you can make one without … Continue reading
The chicks are two weeks old, and their down is quickly being replaced by beautifully patterned feathers. Bear, in the first picture, is looking more like a scraggly teenaged turkey than the beautiful Wyandotte that she will grow up to be. But I understand, its awkward growing up sometimes. They spent an afternoon outside in the coop the other day where they were able to practice scratching for bugs in real dirt, and give their their growing wings a try. They’re turning out to be a great little chickens.
Posted in Chickens
Number Two of Six:
One Large Vase.
Plus some gravel from the yard.
Plus pretty candles from the clearance rack.
Makes a classy table decoration.
This is a great solution for unusually sized candles (like these ones!) that you might not have candlesticks for.
Important note: Be careful of getting too many flames burning at one time – the glass will heat up quickly and will melt the candles from the bottom up. So if you want the look of six candles in a jar, only burn a couple down at a time, don’t burn six at once as I did above for the picture.
So there I was, stranded, hungry, freezing, stuck in a stalled car on the side of the road, with the line of cars on the two lane road moving so slowly, help wouldn’t reach me for at least an hour … Continue reading
The chicks were one day old when we brought them home last Friday, making them one week old today. Its amazing how they’ve changed in such a short time!
Here’s what I’ve learned in my one week as a chicken owner:
1. Chicks are very possessive of their valuables. When a dried petal dropped in their pen, one of the chicks immediately snatched it up and took off with some impressive evasive action. Instantly that rose petal (which was too big for any of them to swallow, I might add) became the thing of value thing too every chick and there was an absolute frenzy in the pen as they dove, trampled, bounced their way through a huge game of keep-away.
2. Like most little ones, I suppose, chicks are surprisingly brave, and fortunately, resilient. For all the intensity of the flapping, their little wings don’t actually accomplish much. But that doesn’t seem to bother them. No matter how high they are in hand or on roost, they will confidently creep toward the edge, look down, and jump, flapping all the way and bouncing ungracefully as they land.
3. The downy look doesn’t last long. The fluffy feathers that make them such cute little puffballs are already being replaced by fullgrown chicken feathers. Its amazing to see the beautifully layered wings and tail feathers that seem to be sprouting out of nowhere.
4. They like to cuddle. My mom tells a traumatic story of her little brother bringing his favorite banty hen to a backyard camp-out. Although to an eight year old snuggling with a warm cuddly chicken may seem like a great idea, the hen met a sad end during the night at the bottom of his sleeping bag. We too are trying to raise friendly hens (though not to be used as sleeping-bag buddies), which means we’re trying to get them very comfortable with us. One in particular naps in my hand as I sit at the computer or run around the house; I imagine protecting such a fragile little body to be an important task.
5. They are born knowing a whole lot. The chicks were likely hatched in a big egg incubator, shipped off to the feed store at one day old, and have never even seen a full grown chicken. Yet they know how to scratch and peck at the ground for food, that their wings work for flying (well, sort of), and that things they find on the ground (like rose petals) should be snatched up quickly and eaten.
So far, one week into it, Hubbs and I both agree that chicks were a really good decision.
Another Saturday seminar with T got me all inspired to start on a winter Vegetable Garden. The teacher reviewed a long list of plants that should be started now in order to have a harvest through the upcoming cooler months. Some surprising recommendations for this area were strawberries, artichokes, and potatoes.
So now I’m home with my seed packets and my big ideas, and hope to get everything into the ground this week. (Look out green tomatoes still on the vine, your days may be few!)
I scattered Rainbow Swiss Chard seeds in the front flower bed – I think they should do well here with the regular sprinkler watering, and should make a colorful entrance to our front door. (I also expect to be disinclined to run across the sloshy grass to get to the garden for a rainy day harvest, and like the idea of “conveniently growing just outside”.)
These carrot seeds were highlighted in the seminar, what a fun surprise it will be to pull all colors of carrots out of the ground! These will make some beautiful pans of roasted vegetables when they are ripe. Or carrot cake? Wow, what about red carrot cake!
On the subject of beautiful vegetables, the other day some friends dropped off a box of Turkish Delight and a bag of the most richly inky purple Peruvian potatoes. They are in the oven roasting with a little olive oil, salt and pepper as I type this. I’ve never seen potatoes like this before and am sure that there’s some kind of great idea to be had involving white, sweet and purple potatoes… multi-colored fries? tri-colored scalloped potatoes? I’ll have to think about that one some more.
And as I think about that, I’m supposed to be planting everything this week! Where in the world do I get purple seed potatoes?
This gallery contains 9 photos.
Saturday afternoon we took a drive up to the beautiful Napa Valley. The vineyards had splotches of red where the Fall sun had done its work, and we could smell the sweetness of the grapes the farther down the Silverado … Continue reading
Of all the times that we’ve been down to Alamo Hay & Grain and looked at the little chicks and ducks and rabbits, this time was definitely the best. This time the guy gave us a cardboard box with wood shavings at the bottom, and we got to pick out six little chickies to bring home.
After watching these little gals, I’m pretty sure it can be scientifically proven there’s nothing cuter than a one day old puffball with sleepy eyes and giant feet.
They were going crazy chirping and whining while we moved them into their bin, and put the food dish in and filled their waterer. They kept at it for an hour until the moment we got the heat lamp set up – on feeling the warmth, they instantly froze, got quiet, their eyes started to get heavy and every one of them fell asleep standing up, wobbling around in place. A few minutes later they had face-planted in the pine shavings, beaks down and little wings spread.
They’ll live in the house where its warm for a few months, and then move out into their coop, and should start laying in the spring.
Two Rhode Island Reds, one Wyandotte, a Delaware, a Barred Rock, and another variety that slips my mind as I write this. But they sure are cute. As hard as we tried not to name them, it happened anyways. That little black and white lady on the right is Roxy (naturally, since she’s the Barred Rock).
Lastly, this is the landmark horse on the roof in front of AH&G – its lived there a long time, I think, since before my parents were kids.
Things are shaping up perfectly: its a beautiful fall day, the coop is finished and in place, and Hubb’s has the day off… Off to Alamo Hay&Grain we go!
And get ready to see some pictures, they’re gonna be cute.
Sister started out with a great plan. For years, every t-shirt from every youth group and high school event went carefully into the closet, with the intention of one day making a memory-heavy t-shirt quilt. But last year as she made another move into another apartment, reality set in, and she realized that however great the dream, it wasn’t happening. So with a jr. high sleepover to plan, she called to see if we could come up with a great use for the shirts.
Some quick internet research yielded a fantastic project that although the jr. highers didn’t try (they were more interested in collecting all those “vintage” late 90’s shirts), I ended up with a fantastic necklace made out of my own collection of thriftstore-bound clothes. The best part of this versatile necklace is that in the winter it works like a scarf to keep your neck warm. In the summer you can get it wet and it will keep your neck cool!
Supplies needed:
Starting at the bottom edge, cut the shirts into 3/4″-1″ strips. I don’t recommend cutting over printed areas of the shirt, as it will make sort of weird lumps in the necklace, and don’t cut much higher than the armpits. Cut as many strips as you’d like (I used about 25 strips, for reference) out of as many colors or patterns as you’d like. Some nice combanations involve multiple shades of the same color (like multiple shades of grey) or 2 solid colors with 2 coordinating stripes.
Once you have all your strips cut, take each one and stretch it out as far as you can without breaking it. When you let go, the strips will have lost their stretch and have curled in on themselves. Now its easier to see what they really look like, and you can start choosing the ones you’re going to use.
Now you start building the necklace. Start with one strip, and tie one end to the O-ring. Then tie the next and the next, squeezing each knot as close as possible to its neighbor. When you’ve filled up no more than half of the ring, stop and start tying the other sides of the strips onto the ring. Some things to keep in mind:
When you’re done, you can embellish a little more if you’d like, by tying a small piece of a strip around a couple of the strands, or adding a charm, or whatever you’d like. Its hard to go wrong on this project, if you “make a mistake” (hard to do here!) just untie and try again!
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