Catching Up
Am I still here? Why yes I am.
And here is my blog, faithfully waiting until I feel inspired.
I hope all of you are enjoying a beautiful spring! (or fall if you are in the southern hemisphere!) What have all of you been up to?
My spring has been packed with ever changing energy. In April I took a Permaculture Design Course in Oregon. In so many ways this was a life changing experience for me. I am so inspired by Permaculture and all that it can do for us and the beautiful earth that we live on! And so now I am trying to figure out what ways I want to implement this new found passion and knowledge that I have in my life.
The first of May we packed up all of our belongings out of our little cabin and moved it all into storage at my parents house. We have been helping out around the property doing several garden projects, and helping my dad start out on a new adventure in making a living. He is making the shift from construction work (which is very hard on his body, especially at the age of 62) to making small projects out of his shop, like the Chicken Coop in the photos below! He has a wonderful place near by that will sell these projects for him.
Here Buddha and I are demonstrating the scale of the little chicken coop. Quite fashionable for a small flock!
And while Buddha thought it was quite nice, he wanted to get back home to his coop!
Here you can see the nest boxes on top, and then the storage area below that. Perfect for a couple buckets of feed.
And you can move it!
It was fun to be part of a new chapter in my dads life, and I hope it brings him relaxed days and great joy creating unique and fun projects in his shop!
We will be here for another week, and then we will be hiking the Oregon Coast Trail with some dear friends! It will be a beautiful month long hike enjoying the beauty of nature and the company of lovely people!
This is my life for now. I hope all of you have been well!
Life’s Abundance
The Universe produces endless abundance in infinate forms.
If you feel that you are lacking any form of abundance in your life,
It is as simple as shifting your mindset.
When we appreciate the abundance that is already in our lives,
We will attract more abundance into our experience.
And often there is MUCH abundance in our lives that we simply may be overlooking,
So just take a few moments to reflect on what is abundant in your life.
The more time you reflect upon and appreciate your abundance,
You will be amazed to find so much more flowing into your life!
My life is filled with so many forms of abundance,
And I appreciate all of it!
One form of abundance in our lives on the farm lately is eggs…….
We have close to 100 chickens (hens and roosters) at the moment.
A couple months ago we were not getting a single egg from our girls,
Due to a hard molt (loosing their feathers) and the lack of sunlight.
Well we told them they needed to get with the program.
Be careful what you wish for…..
It started with one egg and the numbers kept rising.
We are currently getting on average 20 eggs a day at this moment,
With the numbers at a slow but steady rise.
We love our farm fresh eggs! What a beautiful healthy gift they are,
But there is no way that we can eat anywhere near 20 eggs a day.
So how is abundance present in your life in this moment?
How Many Are There?
Ok, I said I was going to get a picture to show the sheer numbers of chickens. This is just part of them, these are the ones that I could get to come when I threw food out, there are MANY more. Sorry you see more tail feather than heads, but they were chowing down. Does anyone want to attempt counting the chickens in this picture? I can tell you there are over 50. The other day I sat down on the front portch and counted the “little” group that was in front of me, and there were 26 chickens, it was a very small group of the whole flock. Scary.
We had a rain system roll in yesterday and today. The chickens have smartly been staying inside the barn most of the day. It’s funny to me they don’t enjoy the rain at all. This picture was taken yesterday when the storm clouds parted for a while, and they were catching up on their outdoor time.
Now I am off to cuddle up in the living room and work on some shopping bag sewing. Rainy dyas are always good to do crafts!
Meet Mr. and Mrs.
Well if you remember my posts from this spring, we were collecting chicks in large numbers. Well now all those chicks, plus many batches hatched out by our hens through the summer are all grown up (well we do still have some small chicks still). There are chickens EVERYWHERE! This makes me happy as can be though, I just love to watch them all. Some are pure breeds that mom bought from the hatchery, and some are mutts from here on the farm. Most are beautiful, a few are homely.
There is a pair, that my parents named Mr. and Mrs. who hang out around the yard. They are the cutest little chickens. They follow us around because my parents were feeding them out of their hands this summer. Lately who ever goes out on the porch first in the morning is greeted by Mr. and Mrs. standing by the front door. You just never know, maybe someone would open the door with chicken food in their hands, its worth the inquiry. This is a picture of Mr. and Mrs. lounging in the mid-day sun. Don’t they look like they are tourists sunbathing on a beach somewhere? Ok, maybe thats just me.
I will have to make my way out to the chicken yard and capture some of our more ‘interesting’ chicken creations to share with all of you. I need to get geared up and try selling some before the winter. I will do that….. really.
A Weekend Full Of Spring
My Dad and I outside of the Farmers Market
This weekend finally felt like spring. We had REAL spring weather. Today it made it up to 68 degrees, wow!! And the energy felt like spring also. We got to do some fresh, new things. Saturday started out with my parents and I going to a local car auction. It is a once monthly thing, and there are some great deals sometimes.
My car is on its last legs, so I am looking around for some new possibilities. Unfortunatly I have little money to invest in a new car, so I am looking for the best deals out there. I had my eye on a couple of the cars, but they ended up going for a little more than what I could afford. I think they were still a very good deal, but just not for me. I will most likely go again when we get back from our hike.
And then we went to opening day of the Bellingham Farmers Market. I LOVE farmers markets, as I have said many times before, so it was really nice to go and enjoy it again. Bernie did not have interest in the auction, so he met us at the farmers market. I got to visit with some people I know that are vendors there. Christie my good friend that I work for some times was selling her body products, and doing very well.
Bernie and I went to visit Heather, the lady that made my purse (which you can see by going here) . She is such a sweet and loving soul, she always gives me a great big hug when I see her, and I barely know her! I can tell she is someone I would really enjoy getting to know more. We told her we are getting ready to hike the PCT, and she was very excited for us. Its always been a dream of hers to hike the PCT. She told us to chose one of her little pouches to carry with us on the trail, to put our things in. So sweet and generous! This is the one I chose, her new peacock design. It will be cherished, and well used!
We have a hen hatching out chicks. What we have been doing with the chicks from the last hen and this hen is to take most of the chicks away as they hatch and raise them in the trough with the chicks that we bought. Then the last couple of chicks to hatch (they hatch over a few day period) we leave with the mother. We have been doing this because in the past when we have let the hens raise all of their chicks, things go well for about a day if we are lucky. Then a chick dissapears here, and then there, and over the next couple of weeks we whittle our way down to one or two chicks. So instead of loosing those ones, we are simply raising them ourselves, and letting the moms handle the number they seem to be able to keep track of. It works really well!
This lovely trio is the chicks that I pulled out of the nest today to join our growing group in the chick trough. They are sooooo sweet! I had them out in the lawn, featuring as models for an upcoming post. These are some of the behind the scenes photos of them snuggling with me in between takes. They really thought I was their mother. They were sticking close to me, and I could tap my finger around in the grass and dirt and they would run over to see what little snacks I had found for them. My family was making fun of me (in good nature of course) of my love for chickens. I am a bit lost on chickens….. oh well. How could you not love that?
It was a very lovely weekend all said and done. Productive and full of fresh spring energy.
Little Puffs of Joy
We have a hand full of hens sitting on nests, but we had two that we werent sure when they started, and so not quite sure when they would hatch out. Last night doing our rounds with chores, mom and I decided to go check on these two.
These two hens are “Margie” and her daughter from last year. Its almost like when Margie decided to start a nest, the daughter just followed along because she wasnt sure what to do.
Well as the chicks started to hatch out Margies daughter decided to abandon her nest a foot away, and come sit on top of her mom and the chicks. When we showed up on the scene the chicks were getting a wee bit too much love from two overly hormoned hens. I love chickens to death, but there are a few times that I really question their intelligence. Well I peeled Margie and the babies out from under the other hen, and put them in a cage for a couple of days, until the other hen hatches out whats left of the eggs, and then maybe everyone can head outside together.
It NEVER works having two hens sitting together. The reason these two got away with it is because there is a small group of chickens that do not live in the chicken house with the rest of the flock. They moved into our horses (Foxy) mini barn. Its a one stall barn with a little side room for hay storage. So we call them Foxy’s chickens. This winter when there was snow on the ground, and the chickens refused to go outside, these guys would get in Foxy’s grain bin and eat their share of her food. I am not sure Foxy was overly thrilled with the set up, but the chickens sure liked it. There are 10 hens and one rooster that live out there. Anyways, I digress.
The chicks are so darned cute! Little peeping puff balls. Hopefully they will do well, we are not completely done with our cooler weather, so this is probably a little early for them. But if their mothers don’t act too stupid, they should do fine.
We should have some more from one of the other hens in a few days!! Couldn’t they stay small and fluffy?
Strike A Pose
Time for another Chicken post. For a lack of anything else to take pictures of around here, I went out and did a Chicken photo shoot the other day. Some of them really liked to pose for their glamour shots, and others were a little more shy about the whole process. This is just a small selection of our collection of Banty Chickens.
I know most people are used to the full sized chickens, but if you have never had the chance to live with a Banty I highly recomend a little chicken friend. They are just as good at laying eggs as the regular sized girls, sure their eggs are a wee bit smaller, but you just round up for your recipes. To me they seem to be a little bit cleaner than the big girls (smaller bottoms, smaller poo). Don’t get me wrong, I love all chickens, but there is something so cute about these little guys.
It’s taken me a while, but I finally picked a name for my favorite little rooster. Buddha. He is such a zen little guy (most of the time, he has his moments with some of the other roosters), and he is so round, it seemed like the perfect name for him. Look at those soulful eyes….. he will just look at me like that when I am out talking to all of them. He likes to stay close to me while I am wandering around the chicken yard, but I can’t say its his favorite thing to be picked up. He tollerates it, but is quite happy to get back on solid ground, and away from the crazy lady holding him and telling him how cute and handsom he is.
And then this adorable little lady is Muffin. I named her that because of her muffin top head. She is rather shy over all, and does not come very close to me in general. She seems to know I am not a great threat, but it might be a better idea to keep some space from the lady scooping up chickens to oogle them. I have always loved her colors, and her little hat that wobbles around as she turns her head to look at this or that. Isn’t that expression adorable looking out from under her hair doo?
This little lady is one of last summers chicks. I love the genetics project that happens out in the chicken yard, with the different varieties that cross together to create some really beautiful chickens. Both Muffin and this hen are crosses. This lovely buff lady does not have a name yet….. any suggestions? She is quite shy, and did not know what to think of this person following her around clicking away.
Up and Down Weather
Our weather has been a bit up and down lately. I know its all part of the shift between winter and spring, but it keep catching me off guard. Perhaps a bit of the reason is because of our month spent down in California. We were immersed in the begining of spring while we were down there, flowers were starting to pop out all over the place.
We drove back up to Washington the end of February, the day after we got back it snowed about 4 to 5 inches. It took it a few days to slowly melt off, but since then we have been in a cycle of rain and sun, a little more rain than sun. But it has been getting a bit warmer, we even had a couple flowers pop up in the yard. I was getting all excited about spring, and then it surprises me again!
I woke up to snow this morning…… It’s a swift reminder that we aren’t quite out of winter yet, and probably to get me to enjoy what winter has to offer. This morning it was slightly challenging to want to go out and do chores, but once I got out there, moving around it was just fine. I moved a little faster than I might usually, getting things set up for the cold windy weather. The chickens however thought that the weather was less than desireable to come out in, and requested that I close their door as I left. So I did.
I came back inside and finished working on a shopping bag I started the other day. It is the same style and fabric as the bag I gave away during the bloggy giveaway. It felt good to get it finished. I am not always the best at finishing a project I start, something I have been working on. By finishing a project, I clear space in my mind to start on something new and fresh.
This afternoon the sun slowly burned off the clouds that had been spitting snow all morning long. With the strong energy of the sun, the snow slowly began its surender. As if the snow knew it has few opportunities left this season, in this area. We gave the chickens a second chance at the out and about thing for the day, and the sun made the snow much more appealing aparently. This is one of my new favorite chickies. She was hatched out by incubator last September, so she is still rather young. She is a silkie cochin cross, so she has those big brown eyes from the silkie, and the cute bowling ball shape from the cochin. I really should come up with some cute name for her, any ideas?
After following the chickens around with a camera for a few minutes, Bernie and I decided to go for an outing. We headed to Hovander Park for a walk/jog along the river. It really was a beautiful day, the chill air was extremely refreshing. We are trying to get out most days to get exercise in my quest for getting in shape for the hike. Again this includes the mental aspect. And so today along our walk, we spent some good time coming up with mantras and intentions for me to practice for getting rid of the tensions in my body.
“If a man’s mind becomes pure, his surroundings will also become pure” ~BuddhaFelting Photo Shoot
Here are my latest needle felting projects. I am really enjoying making little creatures out of felt, and I hope to get more creative as time goes by. Don’t they make fine models? They enjoyed their outing to a park in Lynden to get photographed. They were hamming it up in front of the camera, quite the characters.
I did this Bluebird of Love first. I saw other people online that were doing different birds and such, so that sparked the idea for me. I thought about some of my favorite birds, and I just love the colors of the blue birds. It’s probably my favorite out of these three, I think its too cute.
Then I went to a local class and did the penguin. I didn’t want to do the traditional black and white, so I got a little creative with my colors. I think she is quite cute in purple and blue.
The last one is my rooster I finished the other evening. He was an original idea, which I am quite proud of, because there are many times that I feel like I am not being creative, and just copying other peoples ideas. The more I can come up with my own designs the more unique and cute they will be I think.
I am signed up for another class in a couple of weeks, at which we will be making sheep. That should be a lot of fun, because I have a big soft spot for sheep. These little guys are a great project to do in the evening while sitting in front of the tv, or just relaxing listening to some good music.
Fluffy White Snow
This morning we awoke to snow falling. It made a good effort to come down all day long, and finally slowed down this afternoon just as the high winds started up once again. Today’s snow is much more beautiful than the other day, but now I wonder if it will all be blown off. We ended up getting around 4 inches of snow, maybe a bit more. Unfortunatly I didn’t get any good pictures of our place today, they just all look dark and dismal. But I did get this one of the birds trying to get some food in their little tummies. I feel bad for them out there having to make their living in this weather. We have a small pond in the yard, I tried to get a picture, but you really cant tell that there is supposed to be a pond under all that snow. We keep a stock tank heater in one end, that keeps a hole open for the fish that live in there, and the birds have access to water. So it works out really well, its nice to see them be able to get a drink in between snacks.
I went out to let the chickens out late this morning, and usually when I open the door they all rush out no matter what the weather is, but today they took one look at that snow and gave me a look of ‘do we look crazy?’. So the chickens spent the day inside.
Just before dark Bernie came out and played in the snow with me! We went sledding down one of the hills in our back pasture. I haven’t gone sledding in such a long time, and I thought it sounded fun. Unfortunately its rather dry snow (strange for here!) and we weren’t sliding all that well, but we still had fun! We don’t get tons of snow here usually, so I figured I better go play in it while I have the chance.
I really thought I was going to get all kinds of crafts done today, but it just didn’t happen. I am having a bit of a relaps into my cold, so I just felt like sitting on the couch and complaining (until I went out and frolicked in the snow). Maybe I will get something accomplished this evening while we watch TV. I am really wondering if I am going to be able to make it into the craft show on Friday to sell the crafts…. we have a long driveway, and the drifts make it hard to get out sometimes. So we will see what the rest of the week brings! I did get some of our gifts shipped off, so that is a good feeling.
If nothing else, this kind of weather is really good for spending time just relaxing and reflecting. Maybe I will do a little more of that this evening, reflecting on what I would like to accomplish this week, month, next year, in this life, so on and so forth.
I am off to eat some dinner and warm up in front of the woodstove!
Any Ideas?
Its been much too long since I did a chicken entry. I love our little banty chickens, they provide me endless entertainment when I go out to talk with them. Over all we have a very friendly flock. I cant say any of them are overly enthused about being picked up, but I snatch them up every now and then, I just cant help it, they are so cute they need to be cuddled and pet. I went out the other day and took pictures of them, unfortunately they were not being good subjects, so most of the pictures were dumped. The only ones that were somewhat cooperative were the cochins. This picture is of my beloved little white rooster, he is my favorite out of the flock, and that is quite a feat, because I think they are all the cutest things on two legs (well we do have a couple that are a little homely, but we wont tell them that).
This little guy is just the sweetest rooster you ever will see. He has such a zen attitude. He follows you around when you are out in the chicken yard, he makes these soft little sounds as he goes about his business, talking to who ever will listen. He will crow once in a while, but not nearly as often as all our other roosters. I love to sit down and talk to him, and the gold laced cochin girls that we have. They are quite friendly themselves. They want to come up close to me and visit, and then they look all surprised when I scoop them up off the ground. I don’t think it’s the goal they were aiming for, I think they were going more for the feeding option.
I will have to go out on another sunny day and try to get more of these guys to cooperate. There is quite the rainbow of chickens out in the yard, I love all the different kinds. While my mom would like to keep all the off spring produced around the chicken yard purebreds (which never happens, because they never get separated out into breeding groups) I love to see the genetics project that goes on out there each year. You never know what those chicks are going to grow up to look like. We have gotten some really unique looking chickens out of the mix. Muffin, one of my other favorites out there is a cross that was raised here on the farm, I will have to get a picture of her, because I think she is too cute also.
So I would love to name this little guy instead of calling him my white rooster, unfortunately I just haven’t gotten around to being creative. I like looking for really unique names, if any of you can think of something different, but beautiful/creative let me know. I will let you all know if something strikes me as matching his personality!
A Good Day to Reflect
We have finally hit typical western Washington fall weather. The last couple of days have just been steady rain. Its great for all the plants, but it doesn’t make for enjoyable outdoor trips. So I have been enjoying the time for reading, and doing some crafting. I have been working on my needle felting.
We put an add on craigslist to sell some of our chickens, and we have gotten a couple of calls. I always get nervous about selling our animals to other people. Our chickens have it so good here, I can only hope that they will end up in homes that treat them well and let them roam around. We had a couple come last night to get 4 hens and a rooster as a birthday present for their 7 year old daughter, who wants chickens. Hopefully their girl will love them.
I have been reading a book called Money and the Law of Attraction by Esther and Jerry Hicks. I really love their books. Their books The Law of Attraction, and Ask and it is given, are both really good ones for changing your perspective on the world. All of their books teach you how to release the negativity in your life, and focus on what you want. If you have never heard of any of these books I highly recommend going to the library or book store and checking one of them out, you might be surprised at what you learn.
Enjoy each moment, and always follow your dreams.
A New Purse!
Today was an exciting one for me, I got my new purse! It was a belated birthday present from Bernie. I custom ordered it from Heather (http://textilesbyheather.blogspot.com), and she got it done for todays farmers market. I absolutely love it!! She does an amazing job on her purses, all sorts of really cute designs.
I am proud of my little purse set up, over all it is quite local. I have the purse that Heather made, a wallet made by another local lady, Shelby, and a check book cover that I made. They all have so much more personality than something that you would buy from some mega store.
Not only did I get my new purse today, I had quite the nice social hour at the market. I made my rounds going from booth to booth of the people I know. There are now 4 people I talk to just about every weekend.
Yesterday of course was Halloween, it’s also Bernie’s birthday. We spent part of the day running around town doing little things here and there. We got some pictures printed up to turn into our cards for the holiday markets, and for me to finally get that owl picture done and sent out. So I got that one matted, framed and all packaged up, ready to be sent out into the big world.
Thats the excitement for the last couple of days. I think its another movie night….. time ti get the ice cream and curl up on the couch. I hope you all had a great Halloween!
Chickens, gardens, and creatures…. oh my
I thought I would write an entry about the “farmer” side of me. I was lucky to grow up on 10 acres, learning the basics of raising your own food. We have not gotten to the point of raising most of our own food, but we have always had a good padding of our own organic home grown food to add to the items we buy from the grocery store.
One thing that we are far from short on is chickens. We have quite the group of little banty chickens, probably growing close to 100 at this point. As I wrote in a previous post, they are completely free range. They wander all over our 10 acres, and keep things cleaned up. No matter where you walk around our yard you always get to see a chicken or two, cleaning up a garden bed, or just on a walk about. We are still having problems with their egg laying, I really don’t know why they aren’t laying in their nest boxes, some times they hide some of their eggs in secret spots, but we have never had this much trouble before. So usually we have quite a supply of eggs through the year, they are so rich and healthy, because the hens have the such a healthy diet. They get to eat greens, bugs and so much more. We don’t eat any of our chickens, but it would be premium organic free range chicken if we did.
Chickens make wonderful pets, because if you have the space for them to be free range they are quite low maintenance. Even if you need to keep them in some type of pen, they don’t take a whole lot of work, just a little more cleaning than the free range set up. If you have a chance to handle your chicks from a couple days old, they can become little companions also. They can be very social animals. Even our chickens who were not handled a whole lot as chicks are very friendly, many of them come up to you if you are close to where they are roaming around. And when its feeding time, you are swarmed. Their personalities crack me up.
We have a small herd of cows at the moment. The cutest one being a miniature bull. He is full grown and he is roughly 3 feet tall at the shoulder, I am not 100% sure on that number, so next time I am out there I will have to get a picture of him, and see how tall he really is. Talk about personality. He can be a bit of a brat some times, as bulls will be, but if you have an apple, he will be your best friend forever. The cows absolutely adore apples. I really eat very little meat, but my parents get one of their cows slaughtered every couple of years and put it up in their freezers. Its high quality beef that we know was raised in an open field (no meat lots here) and we know that there are no antibiotics and other nasty things pumped into them. If you don’t have the room to raise your own cows, and you eat beef on a regular basis, I would strongly suggest buying some from a local farmer that raises their cows free range and none of the antibiotics.
It really saddens me on how most of our food is raised. And I am not limiting that statement to just the animal kingdom of our diet. I think our fruits and vegetables are grown in horrible conditions also. I know it is slightly challenging to do at this point for a lot of people still, but the more that we can buy local, from farmers that are treating their crops with respect (whether that is animals or plants) the healthier we and our planet will be. I am far from accomplishing this goal also, but I try to grow some of my own food, and buy from other locals.
Farmers Markets are a wonderful resource to get local food, and in some cases (like our farmers market www.bellinghamfarmers.org) get some wonderful local crafts and supplies. Its also a wonderful place to make some new friends. We have been going to our market almost every weekend this fall, and it has become more of a social hour than shopping trip. I end up talking to a hand full of people that I have known for a while, and some that I have just met this year. I know most farmers markets are closing up for most areas around this time of the year, but if you are lucky enough to live in an area that has a year round farmers market take advantage of it.
Gardening is another thing that I am passionate about. This summer I was on an adventure, so I didn’t have the chance to do my own garden. But for the last two years before that I had my own vegetable garden when we were living in Winthrop, WA. Its an extremely satisfying experience to watch a plant grow from a seed that you planted in ground that you prepared. And then to go out on a warm summers evening and pick the ingredients for your dinner, its so much fun. Those fresh veggies always taste so good! Gardening is one of those things that almost any one can do, even if you are living in an apartment. You can have a little balcony container garden, or even a couple of plants in pots in your kitchen and living room. For those that are lucky to have a yard of any size, putting in a small or large garden is a fun process. If you have children it’s a great way for them to learn where their food is coming from, and kids always love to play in the dirt. And think of how much healthier it is for everyone! You can even throw in a few flowers here and there, adding beautiful color, and drawing in all those little pollinators.
Well this is really an endless subject and I could go on and on, but that’s a little bit about my farmer side, and how I see the world. If any of this is a passion of yours, and you haven’t done it yet, go for it! There is always a way to follow our dreams, and remember, do what you love!
Todays Outing
Today was enjoyed fully in the beautiful fall weather. It was sunny all day, with a few pretty wispy clouds hanging in the sky. We started off the day just hanging around home. Since my parents are out of town, I am the animal caretaker. So I did a few chores in the creature realm. I have a rooster with an infected eye that I am trying to clear up, poor little guy.
Around noon we headed out for an adventure. We went to Boulevard Park, an enjoyable park on the water front. There is usually some birds down there for Bernie to take pictures of, and right now the fall colors make a nice backdrop. We spent the whole afternoon there. There are a couple of pier type board walks that run along the shoreline. It is always an interesting perspective walking along them.
Then we sat for a little while in the heart of the park, and watched people and wildlife. There was a small group of people tossing around a Frisbee, and a guy practicing his balance on a line strung between two trees. He was pretty talented, great balance. Later we saw a couple of girls on their own balance line. I love to people watch, and I admit eavesdrop on their conversations once and a while. It gives me perspective on the world, the things that people are interested in and concerned with. Sometimes it makes me laugh, we humans are interesting creatures.
To stretch our legs we walked down the path, that seems to be the old railroad bed. Its a pretty nice trail. There are all sorts of trees hanging over it, creating a nice little tunnel along certain stretches. The light was beautiful filtering through the multi colored leafs. We both got some nice shots along this area. Bernie has been trying out people shots along with his wildlife photography. He got a nice one today of a young lady running down the path, it looks like she is running into a painting, the colors are beautiful.
It was quite a nice day over all. It felt good to get out of the house, and enjoy the beautiful outdoors. The fall weather is bringing in a slight chill to the air, but at the same time its crisp and refreshing. Tonight is another movie night, we didn’t get around to Sweeney Todd last night, so its on tonight’s list. I’m excited, I know its going to be a morbid movie, but I love Tim Burton, and Johnny Depp. I’m off into movie land! Have a great week everyone!
Keeping Busy
The weather yesterday and today has been beautiful! There is not a cloud in sight outside right now. I am getting ready to go to work right now. The nice thing is, I get to work outside and enjoy the sun. Bernie is going to go take pictures hopefully, it’s a great day to get some wildlife shots.
On Monday Bernie and I went for a very short walk, through the fragrance garden at Tennant Lake. We had intended to go on the board walk there, but it was shut down for hunting season. Bern did get a decent picture of me in the garden.
Yesterday before I headed into work, I got the chickens nest boxes cleaned out. The chickens are my favorite creatures here on the farm. We have around 100 banty chickens, and they are too cute! They make me laugh all the time. So much personality in a small package. They are all pretty friendly, especially when it is feeding time. We recently had a batch of chicks hatch in the incubator. You can never have enough. The problem right now though, is the girls seem to be hiding their eggs somewhere. I was hoping with a clean nest box they might move back home with the egg laying operation. When they are laying where they are supposed to be, we get a good amount of eggs, which is so nice. Our chickens are the true definition of free range, they have absolutely no fences to keep them in. There is a short fence around their house to keep dogs and such out, but it doesn’t slow down the chickens, and they roam all over our 10acres, and often onto the neighbors land also.
Yesterday the two Piliated Woodpeckers came to our suet feeders, boy they are big birds! Bernie got a couple fun shots of them, I am putting one on here, but if you want to see more, he has them on his blog.
Alright, I am off for now. More later…..
