My favorite quote from the "News from Lake Wobegon" on A Prairie Home Companion last Saturday, October 23, 2010:

"Those chickens had a look of moral disapproval in their little yellow eyes"

Eggs!

Here are today's eggs -- what a variety of shapes, colors & sizes they are!

The tiny white one is the first egg laid by PeeWee. You can see her in the picture of all 13 girls below -- she's the little meanie marked with the red arrow.

The olive colored egg at the top is from the Aracauna marked with the green arrow. I've named Olive (short for Olive Oyl) because of the color eggs she lays.

I have no idea which of the old girls is laying the GIANT eggs (the one at about 3:oo in the bowl, but they all have double yolks.

The robin's egg blue Araucana eggs are almost round.

I just included this picture because I think the look on her face is funny -- her name's Marie (after Marie Antoinette). She's very friendly, likes to be held, is really curious & thinks she's the queen of the world.

Earning Their Keep in the Coop!

Yesterday, my friend the Bargain Hunter pointed out that I hadn't updated my blog in 6 weeks! I knew it had been a while, but had no idea it had been that long. I know everyone's been waiting to find out how my summer was so I'll be updating more soon.

First, though, is the happy announcement that the new girls have begun laying -- in the last 34 days we've gotten 105 eggs! Soon I'll be able to start selling them again.

The Red Stars started laying at about 4 months old & are really reliable. That great laying power, combined with their friendly, easy dispositions makes they a great breed to have.

The Araucanas finally started laying yesterday -- so far we've gotten 1 misshapen, strangely colored blue-green egg.

Look at how much smaller the little 'pullet eggs' are than the big girls' eggs (actually, than Thelma's eggs, since she's the only resident of the old hen's home who still lays an egg every once in a while).

Here are the eggs from one of the first days -- all different in size & color:

A Nighttime Visitor

For the past 3 nights, this little green tree frog has been on our front door. He's just a little guy -- 1" long -- and he's so cute! The first night he visited, I tried to pick him up (if you know me well, you know I can't resist holding frogs and toads) but he hopped away -- about a foot per hop -- pretty good for a little guy! Now when he comes to visit, I just look at him and leave him alone.

The little frog from inside the house

Not the best picture -- the chair is a reflection; he's not King Kong!

I like cicadas

I know that lots of people are creeped out by cicadas (17 year locusts) -- both the way their shells look and the way they sound. I like them though!

I'll never forget climbing in my favorite tree in the front yard when I was bout 8 or 9 and putting my hand on a cicada shell. I was so freaked out that I almost fell out of the tree! Ever since then I've been fascinated with them and the sound of their droning takes me right back to my childhood.
Every year, a few of them emerge at the base of the pine tree right next to our house. We hear them for a few days and sometimes see the shells. Two days ago, I got to see an adult right after it had emerged! It was so cool that I had to take pictures and share it.

The just-emerged adult

The shell, left on a leaf

I don't know why I do it, but I always save the shells that I find. I think it's a little sad that a creature lies dormant for 17 years, only to emerge and live for 6 weeks. Maybe it's a throwback to the shell that almost drove me out of a maple tree all those years ago.

Nobody here but us girls!

There's peace in the hen house again! My roosters (2 Araucanas and 1 Red Star) were lovely to look at, but getting to be too much for my girls. On Wednesday I took all 3 roosters to a lady in met at the feed store who finds home with 4H kids for unwanted fowl. She assured me that the kids would continue to raise them until next year's fair, where they'll show them as 1-year-olds.

One of the Araucanas -- the baddest man in the coop!

I won't miss the Araucanas at all -- they were both already mean, aggressive and loud and making everyone's lives miserable. The Red Star, though, was a real sweetie and I was very sad to give him up. He was so gentle -- when I went out and sat by the chickens he jumped right up into my lap! I know, though, that sooner or later his rooster nature will come through, so keeping him would just be putting off the inevitable. What's disappointing, though is that Red Stars are 'sex-linked', which means that the male chicks are a different color than the female chicks -- there shouldn't have been a mistake made at the feed store! I'll just be more careful double checking that the lady there picks the right chicks next time.

Mr. Nice Guy and his girls

Now it's time to wait for the eggs to come & the girls to earn their feed -- maybe in September!

Movin' On Up...

Cue The Jeffersons' theme song, 'Movin' On Up'. . .

Today the babies moved in with the old girls, and it was an exciting day, indeed!

I haven't updated about them in a long time so here's a quick catch-up:

Remember these little cuties
and their two-level chick-o-miniums?

Well, they quickly outgrew their brooder bins and
we put the Aracaunas in a cardboard box home
(Turner found this FASCINATING).
Then they outgrew that and we put them in a chicken wire circle in the barn.
When they started having nightly (and then daily) jailbreaks,
we decided that it was time to move in with the big girls.

Today, we created an open chicken wire playground beyond the chicken run so that they could all meet on turf that was no one's territory. Then we allowed the babies access to the door of the chicken coop. You can see how that went!

Belle was very interested in them, but they were afraid to leave familiar territory.

Finally Jim got into the circle and chased them all into the chicken coop. When they finally went outside, I'd expected the big girls (especially LaVerne, the Black Australorp) to pick on them, but there was no bloodshed or fighting (at least not yet -- they haven't all had to find perch space yet!

As you can see below, they keep themselves in 3 flocks!
The big girls are in the foreground,
the Araucanas are in the middle
and the Red Stars (and PeeWee) stayed in the run.
They've stayed almost exclusively in their flocks all day.
In the end,
after an afternoon of sweeping and scraping chicken poo off of lots of surfaces,
we got our barn back!
Now the next step is to find a home for the 2 Aracauna roosters
*****
Anybody interested?

As Angelica used to say, "You Babies -- Be Quiet!"

With 13 chicks in our guest bathroom (in the bi-level chick-onimium), there is a constant din of peeps, baby squacks & tap-tap-taps as they peck & scratch at the floors of the brooders. The sound is starting to drive me crazy!

The chick-onimiums

I can hardly wait until these little girls have their feathers and/or are big enough to go out to the chicken coop to live next to the big girls (not exactly with them yet, but near). That will bring the next challenge -- integrating 2 flocks of chicks into one and then integrating that flock into the flock of 3 old ladies (including 1 mean girl, LaVerne).

All this for fresh eggs and the fun of having chickens!

Chicks - Catching Up

I haven't kept up with 'baby pictures' of the chicks. It's amazing to us how big they're getting -- it seems like you could watch them grow before your eyes!

Here they are at 6 days old:

and here they are at 2 weeks.
They're starting to look less chick-like and more chicken-like.
They're already getting their adult feathers:

Today I picked up 6 new chicks...oops, make that 7! There was one little girl (I hope) I just couldn't resist. More on her in a minute. The six new girls are Red Stars. 3 are 1 week old and 3 are newborns.

Here are the newest chicks (the video is whacked and they look like they're doing head-bobs or something):

You'll notice that there's one very tiny brown chick. She's a Mille Fleur bantam -- she'll be very small and lay tiny eggs. The Red Stars will weigh about 7 lbs. as adults, but she'll only weigh about 1 1/2 lbs. She's so tiny and so sweet, I just couldn't pass her up! Here's a picture of Jim holding her in one hand a large egg in the other.
Oh, did I keep referring to her as 'her'? Well, there's a chance that she might be a he...the hatchery tries to make sure that they ship hens if you want hens, but there's always a chance you'll get a rooster. I want to name her Precious, but may end up calling her Elvis...

Here's what she'll look like grown:

And now, on to the housing problem! How do you put newborns in with 2 week old chicks? We didn't want the bigger chicks to overrun or pick on the tinies. We tried an apartment:
A problem arose, though, when the little ones stuck their heads through the chicken wire (that's why chickens don't rule the world).

So, we ended up with condos:

Now we have 13 chicks in the guest bathroom, and there are constant little 'peeps'. Lucky Charlie and Sarah get to share that bathroom with the girls when they come next month!

Here are Laverne, Belle & Thelma just waiting for their 13 little sisters to come out and play!

It's a girl...and a girl, and a girl...

I picked up the first six of our new chicks today.  Here's a slideshow (including videos)!

Customize your own digital slideshow

If there was ever any doubt that a dog can truly become part of the family, check out my photographic proof. Aunt Cathy, get ready for Turner to line up with the kids at Thanksgiving for his squirt of whipped cream!

Lily's Quilt

Christy wanted me to post something about the quilt I made for Lily. When I gave it to her, I told Crit that I would, but now it seems like boasting -- forgive me if it seems like that to you, too!

The blocks in Lily's quilt are from animal patterns found in "Claire's Cats" and "Grandma's Bunnies", along with others that I made up because I wanted more variety. The fabrics are primarily Aunt Grace's (a reproduction line of 20s and 30s fabrics) and a few vintage ones that had enough strength to stand up to play. The polka dots, which also are the backing fabric, are an Alexander Henry called "Pop Dots" and I know that I bought every yard (and piece of a yard) available online throughout the country (because there is no more available anywhere)!

I love the outdoors and animals and hoped that Lily would have fun learning the animals and colors, discovering the patterns in the fabric and counting. This is, by far, the most fun I've had making a quilt and (I think) the best one I've ever done. The more I sewed, the more my imagination ran away with me and I'm really pleased with the result. Here are pictures of the blocks -- thanks for looking!

Time for an update

I really don't have anything meaningful to blog about, but it's time for an update on what's been going on in my life.

TRAVEL:
Last week, I went to a convention in Chattanooga for our church database software. Chattanooga is a cool little town and southern hospitality is a real thing. Everyone was so nice and friendly. I'm such a geek for being as excited as I was about the classes -- how many people would be energized by the topics "Maintaining a Clean Database" and "Managing Classes and Small Groups"?

AIRLINES:
The flights there and back were just creepy! We were on very small jets (40-50 people), including one that taxied up to the gate with only one propeller working -- that's right, I said propeller! We were also delayed 4 1/2 hours in Charlotte because they first didn't have a plane, then didn't have a crew and finally didn't have a captain -- who wonders why the airline industry is in trouble??

GARDENS:

Gardening time is upon us and I've been busy planting and weeding. We've got lots of strawberry blossoms, which means lots of strawberries! I can hardly wait. They'll come and then the raspberries will be right behind them -- Yum! We're also getting about 1 1/2 pounds of asparagus every day -- enough to eat and freeze some, too!

AUNT GENE'S BIRTHDAY:

We're going to Cincinnati soon to celebrate Aunt Gene's 85th birthday! (If you're one of my boys and you haven't gotten her card yet, be sure to buy it and get it in the mail by Friday.) I might post a happy birthday message for her, but it would be a waste because she's a real technotard!

HEROES:
I'm ashamed to admit it, but I really got hooked on Heroes. The season finale was last night and they did, indeed, save the world (or at least a large chunk of New York City). I was disappointed in the ending though, because one of my favorite characters died. He can, however, return next year from death in true soap opera fashion, since he has the ability to regenerate. Does anyone else watch Heroes? What did you think of the ending?

Turner and the Muskrat

I haven't posted in a while -- I've just been busy with the usual routine, so there wasn't anything to comment on.

We had some excitement here last night, though -- Turner, the 75 pound dog, had close encounter with a muskrat. For about an hour & a half, he ran around the base of one of the pine trees barking and lunging at the muskrat, which was cornered and occasionally lunged back. Turner's legs and paws got cut by the brush & pine branches and when we finally got him out, we spent the next hour finding the cuts, getting the bleeding to stop, bandaging him up and cleaning blood off of him and the kitchen floor. It's so much fun having a big dog in the country!

There are always things to be thankful for, though: he's going to be okay, he's a little subdued today (always a good thing), it was a muskrat and not a skunk and that particular muskrat will never come to our house again!

Chimney Swifts

We have a nest of Chimney Swifts in our chimney. It's surprising how loud the babies are -- I guess the sound is amplified by the chimney. 2 weeks ago, 2 of the babies fell down into the fireplace, along with most of the nest and a dead Mourning Dove. I haven't yet figured out how the dove enters into it all, since I don't think they're aggressive birds. We were having a storm, though, and I wonder if the dove got blown into the chimney, got killed and took out the nest on its way down. At any rate, we put the babies in a box overnight and Danny took them to the nature center's infirmary the next day, where they joined MANY other baby swifts in a cage -- all being fed and watered until they fledged.

One baby is still in the nest and and still making plenty of noise! If you want to see what the nest and babies look like, this is a good site. One family of swifts can eat 12,000 insects A DAY, so if I can figure out how to keep the chimney and fireplace from being covered in bird poo, I'll let them nest there every year. Now I have to figure out how to get Jim to go along with THAT scheme!

Turner - Week One

Turner's been with us one week and I must say, it's been interesting! He's eaten 3 throw pillows, 4 eggs (including the shells) and one squeaky toy. The cats won't come out of the laundry room (Leo won't even come back in the house -- he has to be dragged in!) The obedience trainer really liked Turner, though, and he won't be a puppy forever, so I guess there's hope!

On another positive note, it finally stopped raining! We still can't plant anything tender, though, there are frost warnings for tonight -- and it's almost Memorial Day (isn't Michigan great?)

West Wing is over and I'm very sad. I think the last year was as good as any of the years were; so good, in fact, we were all wondering if they'd change their minds and continue. All of the characters have become so real to me that I almost wonder what's going to happen to them all while we aren't watching anymore. We didn't get the retrospective, either -- we'll all have to wait for the boxed set to come out to see that -- what a disappointment.

Thanks for visiting!

Turner

We have a new dog! He's a 10-month old Border Collie/Lab mix. He's housebroken and (until we undo all his good training) obedience trained. He likes everyone and seems to be a really happy guy. The cats and the chickens don't like him much, though...

Thanks for visiting!