Baby gate needed

I would have all four of them roaming around the house if I didn't have this baby gate. Thank goodness for good neighbors - they have a six yr. old and I called them to see if by chance they might have an old baby gate they didn't use any more, and bingo, there it was on my front step.

I need to take it apart and make a real hinged gate, but it works 98% of the time. Sometimes the trio will fly up on top of the gate - wing clipping time! - and sit between the gate and the hanging screen I have there. I've tried to get a real screen door, but the opening is very short of regular door height, and if it opens out, it would hit the eave rafters. I just tacked a fiberglass screen to the top of the opening - it helps with the bugs just fine, but is no match against chickens! LOL

More craft room stuff

I have been slaving away (ha, ha, ha) at moving stuff into the craft room again. My next 'thing' that comes into the room is another bookcase. It will go to the right of the small shelves and bulletin board in the picture below.



Right now there is another tote full of stuff sitting there, but I will just pull it out of the way into the middle of the floor and find a place for it later. I have a lot of those 'later' things to find places for! The tall bookcase you see here has some containers with stuff in them, the rest are empties that will soon be filled with fabric sorted by color. I'm sure I have more fabric than containers, but eventually it will all find a home!

The two light blue totes under the table below are full to overflowing with fleece - I didn't know I had THAT much fleece ... go figure. The purple one has some quilted fabric, like burlap and corduroy and other odds and ends.



This is under the other end of the table! The bottom green tote is filled with batting and by-the-yard felt, the top one is fabric that needs to be sorted and so is the fabric in the three clear containers.



Remember in this room I have a walk in closed too. It is also being filled up! The one bookcase at the end will be ribbons, cords, ruffles, embroidery thread and pattern books. You can see it is filling up fast.



The closet also holds my yarn, knitting and crochet books, needles & hooks. I'll be sure to take lots more pictures when it's done. Will it ever be done ... I think it will just be one project after another until there is more room and then I'll bring more stuff in! Most of the fabrics I have are from remnant racks. I do have yards of fabric that were bought for a specific project - long-forgotten now - but I can always come up with some new projects for it.

Hope you all have happy crafty days ahead.

Hugs

Changes and chickens

The Changes:

I canceled my website registration and hosting company - just too much money a month right now. I've transferred my domain name to a holding site and will transfer it to my final choice in 60 days and begin again.

I am NOT letting it die, there is just a wait for the time being. I should be able to write a whole bunch of content before I launch it again. Like I said, I SHOULD be able to ... and hopefully I will get off my butt and DO IT!!!

I wish there was some way to notify my visitors that I haven't dropped off the earth, but when you didn't own the site, it is still listed in a search, but you don't get the site when it's clicked on. I really wish I could have just changed the first page to read "site under construction", but I can't ... bummer!! If anyone knows how I could do something like that, PLEASE let me know.


The Chickens:

Well, I have three more chickens. These girls are young, not little chicks, but young pre-laying hens. These three girls were raised in a household where they came in the house, sat on laps and watched TV. Ummm, NOT HERE!!

They have made it up the back stairs, but I can hear the clucking and come shoo them back down the steps. None of them have made it inside, but I can't say that for Cinnamon! I don't know how many times I have been out front and here comes that DARN chicken, walked through the house to where she could hear my voice. Thankfully I haven't had any poo to clean up yet, but I know the day is coming ... Uggh!

Update: This evening I had one of the new girls come in. I caught her just inside the door where she left me a present! Thank goodness it was on the back porch linoleum. I think I invited this since I mentioned it in the paragraph above ... LOL


These are the three new girls, aren't they lovely?


And just to be fair here is Cinnamon the "bitchy chicken" that wanders in the house!



She is the only one that laid eggs, but I got one a day, which is enough for me since I'm by myself. I'm waiting for her to stop due to age, and I think Frazzle is past laying, but she is sooo cute!



When I got her she had tons of feathers missing from being picked and pecked on, but she has come a long way. She still looks frazzled because of her Araucana cheek feathers, but that is natural for this breed.


Here are the Three Chickenteers, they are never far from each other. Hopefully that will change as they get use to the yard and the other two. See the dark chicken in the above picture ... if you look real close you can see the second one reaching up to taste the cedar branch. Didn't like it.

I can't keep calling them Chickenteers, but I don't have any names for them yet. I really don't want anything like Tom, Dick and Harry or Larry, Moe or Curly Joe - they are girls and need fine names. I'll come up with something pretty - maybe I'll think of names while we are at deer camp the first week of October.


Here is my big tom cat Joey. He leaves all the girls alone even if he does catch other birds, but he will go into the pen and drink out of their water dish. He was about two feet from Frazzle when I took this picture - neither of them minded.

And my little, itty, bitty tomato garden is coming right along. The plants are still setting a few flowers - the days are nice, but the nights are getting down into the low 40's at night so I don't know how long this will last. The fruits on the plants are still green and it worries me that I might loose them. The hanging plants in the milk jugs, that I showed you in a previous post, just didn't work out. The water sat too close to the stem and they rotted and fell out. Won't do that again!


If you look real close, right in the center, there is a shaded tomato hiding in there! I didn't get very many tomatoes, but I know what I did wrong - planted them too close and not enough water! Now I know!!

Phew, this post ended up covering a lot of ground! I need to pace myself and write less per post but post more often.

Hugs

Last camping trip of the year, except hunting season

We pulled out of my driveway towing the boat, on Thursday morning around 10. Got to the campground at 10:30, got our favorite sites, and set up. It was just Candy and I and SueAnn, my dog. Dale, K and Chaps, their dog came up later after Dale was off work. The first thing after getting the 5th wheel level was to launch the boat.




Park the boat trailer and get the boat ready to go. It needed to be moved to the other side of the dock. In the process of trying to move it, the gear mechanism broke. Bummer. The boat was not able to be used except as a comfortable seat to fish from while tied to the dock.




Our camp is comfortable. The picnic table is under the canopy to the left, lawn chairs close to the fire pit, wood, and SueAnn staking her spot by the fire. The hammock has been hung and relaxation is under way.




Father and daughter trying to share the hammock for an afternoon nap. K couldn't stand it for long, she told Dad that his hands smelled of fish and that the rest of him wasn't too fresh either (this was the 2nd day without a shower); she bailed and Dad slept. We always know when he's asleep - he snores!!! LOL




And lots and lots of fishing got done. In four days there were probably 45-50 fish caught. Croppie in the mornings, perch during the day, and lots and lots of catfish in the evening starting around 7 and going until 10. There must have been about 25 lbs. of fish! The fish in this picture is a channel cat! The channel of the Klamath River is about 40 feet deep - this one must have come up a ways to get caught!




On the last morning, it was fishing in the fog! When I first looked out my window I could not see across the lake; by the time I got some shoes on and out the door it was burning off fast. Most of the catfish were caught the night before, but there were four croppie caught that morning. Dale cleaned 12 fish!




It was predicted to have 20% showers on both Saturday and Sunday, but none came. The sky was filled with dark clouds late in the afternoon and by sundown I thought there was no chance of getting a good picture. But I did capture this, with just a bright spot on the clouds lighting up. It was beautiful!



I think the most amazing part of this trip - a holiday weekend - was that the campground was only half full. And there are only 13 sites for the public! Nice, quiet, peaceful, restful and all other nice descriptive words you can think of.

It was, as it always is, a bit sad to leave. But we will be back there for hunting season. The BLM is keeping it open for hunters, which is nice.

Hugs to everyone and I hope your weekend was just as nice and relaxing.

What I have been doing ...

Nothing ... really, not much, but then again why do I always feel I'm busy? I read my favorite blogs and comment once in a while. Clean the chicken pen and gather my one egg a day. Water my 9 sq. ft. garden, and wait for the tomatoes to ripen! There are now 10!! Woohoo! Next year I will expand, I need more to eat than tomatoes.

Last Sunday, the 30th, Dale and Candy came down and we split wood, and split wood, and split wood! Somewhere between 2 1/2 to 3 cords. Filled the wood shed completely.



The shed is about 6' x 6' x 6' and we filled it - not one more piece would fit! And this is the trusty little machine that made it all possible. Along with Maggie the cat.



We are leaving again for a camping trip in two days. The last shebang of the summer. We don't usually go camping on holiday weekends, but we will try this again. We went on the 4th of July and it was wonderful, so we are taking a chance that it will be so again. I finally got my Senior Pass, so I get 50% off the camping fees - Woohoo! There is still hunting season to camp, but that is sort of a working trip as we need to fill the freezers with meat for the coming year. Still a lot of fun even if the weather is cold - please no snow this year!!!

Yesterday was a funny sort of day. I just lollygagged around cleaning the carport of bark from the splitting, watered the yards (3), and futzed around the house. I woke up at 3:45 this morning in a panic. We are leaving in two days and I'm futzing?? What is wrong with me?? I love camping, so why am I not getting stuff done?? I have no answers. But ... this morning it was move the truck and plug in the camper, do a couple of loads of laundry, take stock of what I need to get at the market for the trip, load some clothes and wipe out the dust from the last trip! All this before 8 a.m. I still need to go to town to shop, but that should be simple, as the camper is usually stocked with staples until after hunting camp when I empty it completely. I just need to get the goodies, and the beer! I've also planned out what yarn I will bring to make more dishcloths. I love knit dishcloths!

I've already set up the mister for the garden even though it is suppose to cool down for the weekend. Four days is just too long without water.

I got my electric bill today. I am on level pay and it will go down by $9 starting next month! Love it!!!

I hope you all have a fun and safe holiday weekend - see you when I get back! This time I will remember to bring my camera and USE it.

Hugs

Hi everybody ... I'm over here ... hello ???

Hi everybody, if you are still paying attention to me - I didn't mean to stay away for so long. Slowly but steadily I have been working on the craft room, pictures soon. I got 2 bookcases moved, have dusted and wiped books, separated them to keep painting, quilting, crochet & knit, general crafts, etc. in their respective areas. Sometimes it's not easy as some of them cross over into various other categories, such as Christmas, Easter, etc. I look at the book and use the category that comes to mind first. I do my best ... LOL

I have a prolific killer living with me. He skulks around corners, rocks and bushes, both here at home and at the neighbors. He will bring home his prize. This picture shows him out back hanging on to his prey, and if you could hear it, there was a lot of growling / clucking going on over this poor little feller. The chicken, Cinnamon, really, really wanted it, but Joey was not about to turn loose. I beat him to the back door before he tried to bring it in ... Well, since this picture he did bring in, unbeknown to me, another victim! I know that has happened when I hear crunching and smacking from anywhere besides the food bowl ... and even that doesn't elicit that kind of excitement.




I trotted out into the back yard one day, and not 15 feet away was this awesome buck! 3 x 3! He was snacking on some bread I had laid out to dry for the chickens. He hopped the fence and just stood there looking at me. I took a ton of pictures, but they are way too dark to publish - I need to work on them to see how light I can get them. Here he is leaving my property on the right, at a very easy gait. Not scared, but not trusting either! If you click on the picture you can get a better view of him.




Last week I was sooo sick, I wasn't sure I was even alive! The county fair was going on and I had promised my friends to feed the rabbits and chickens for them while they were camped at the fair grounds with their goats. I did not make the morning feed last Friday, but did get up there that evening - by the skin of my teeth!!! I'm not sure what I had, but I don't ever want it again. No appetite, no thirst, slept on the couch, slept in bed. Woohoo, life of the party! I'm a whole lot more like myself, but still not 100%. The only thing good to come out of this - I stopped smoking! I've gone a week now without a cigarette! Not that there hasn't been trying moments, but I haven't broken down. I have hard candy for when it gets real bad, and I've had quite a bit, but I'm persevering.

I need to get to the post office, so I'll leave you all with this:
Why am I the only person with a fork in a world full of soup?

Hugs

The craft room saga

I am working on getting the craft room to look like a craft room. The desk has come out of the living room - makes that a bit bigger. I hung the mirror over the sewing machine since my friends just come in when they know I'm home, and I didn't want to be scared to death if they surprised me. I'm looking for a home for some of the things that are sitting around. The table on the left will hold my serger.




This mess is also stuff I need to find a home for, but I think I'll have to wait until I get the book shelves into the room. They will go along the wall on the immediate right. I have a job ahead of me with the shelves as they are still FULL of containers and books, but I will get there.




Here is the walk-in closet that I'm starting to fill up. The dresser will be my yarn area ..and other locations yet to be determined!! LOL There will be two shelving units that will go in there to hold who knows what - anything is possible at this point in time.




Just another view of the room. I drew the curtains because it is starting to warm up and I'd like to keep the predicted high of 91 at bay as long as I can since I don't have a/c. Even though the curtains are good for keeping the heat out, they will be replaced with something better suited to a craft room. I'm mulling over the thought of making window quilts for the whole house to help keep the winter cold outside. I have 7 windows to do this for; 3 large, 3 medium, and a smaller one in the kitchen. More on this later.




I was going to pull up the carpet, lay some interior grade plywood flooring and paint it. I was also going to paint the walls, but all this takes a lot more money than I'm able to get my hands on at the moment. I may get done down the road, or never. Just depends. But I'll tell you something - it will get used A LOT. Should I upgrade it and call it a studio? I love that word. It makes what you create seem more creative when you have a Studio. By the way, the room is 14 x 11 feet! I kept the smaller bedroom to sleep in since all I do in that room is sleep ...

Let me know what you all think.

Ta ta for now.

A little of this, a little of that

This past Saturday (July 11) Dale, Candy & I went out to get some firewood. The dead trees on our properties have pretty much been cut and burned, so we picked up some cutting permits for 8 cord to be split between the two households.

This we hoped was included in the permitted area.


We got a really late start, left my house at 10 and drove around looking for the areas that can be cut. Next time we will leave at 6:30-7:00 so we can cut during the cool part of the day! We worked for 1 1/2 hours for 1/2 cord of wood! Hot, hot, hot!! And we didn't bring enough water to sip - - go figure, we know better ...

These are the kind of piles that you can dig through for usable wood.


The truck doesn't look like it is very full, but we worked our fannies off!!


We headed home around 1 pm and as we pulled into our tiny town, there were a bazillion Harleys at the local watering hole! A Poker Run!

The noise was marvelous - LOVE that Harley sound!!


One of my chickens kept eating the eggs that were laid, which leaves me without breakfast. I had her prepped to go into the freezer for soup come winter. The other two take turns laying as I only have the open area of the dog house. I'd like a couple of nest boxes to see if I can get two eggs a day.

I found out that the dark brown one, her name is Cinnamon, is a Brown Sex-link and lays brown eggs. Don't ask me where they come up with breed names ... LOL. The other one (Frazzle) is an Araucana and she lays green eggs. Where she previously lived, she was picked on by the other chickens and looks really bad feather wise. She looks frazzled - hence the name. I think she will fill in her feathers over time, but frazzled she looks, and Frazzle she is!



Cinnamon decided at the last second that she didn't want her face shown in this picture ... LOL.


They are doing well. I let them out to roam and they have picked spots for dust baths and just relaxing. The dog is curious, but has learned to leave them alone. The cat, well ... he is VERY curious and likes to get close to get a good sniff, but the chickens will flap wings and the cat takes off like a bat out of hell!

I bought a feeder that will hang so I can raise it up a bit and they won't throw the straw into it when scratching around in the pen. It will hold enough food for 3-4 days, so I don't have to worry about them when we take off for a long weekend.

I thank you all for your comments and your visits and your questions make me do some research on the chickens...

Hugs to you all.

I have chickens

Starting about a year ago, I started thinking about getting some chickens. My room mate, D, said "no way!!!" OK, I let it go for the time being. Several months ago, when I knew D was moving, I started up again . . .

I mentioned to my friend Dale that I was again thinking of getting at least two chickens to help with the bugs in the back yard. Time passed and early last night Dale's neighbor showed up with three chickens in a cage. OK!!! I have chickens.



I have a kennel that my Houdini dog broke out of and I had thought that it would be a good place for the chickens after I fixed the hole in the gate. Well, I had to scramble to fix the hole temporarily last night and will do a better job today. I also need feed, but for right now there are weeds and bugs that they are scratching at right now.



I also need some straw. Dale's wife will bring me some this morning to carry me over for a few days. I have the dog bowl for water, so that is fine. They are full grown chickens so they won't drown themselves.

Now I need to find out what kind of chickens they are. I need to put together a coop for them - I just don't think the dog house will work ... LOL. Roosting area and nest boxes.

Those of you out there that know about chickens will probably get some questions from me. Natalie of Chicken Blog, and Siri of Knitting Iris are two of my favorites, and I'm sure they won't mind some questions.

... and if you find me and have some suggestions for me, feel free to comment. I appreciate all the help I can get.

I will keep you posted on the saga of my chickens.

Hugs

4th of July camping trip . . .

Our group of friends usually avoid camping on any holiday weekend, but we decided that four days away from home would be nice - instead of just three, LOL.

We gathered ourselves up and went to our favorite little spot. This is the little campground with only 12-13 campsites that is 10 miles from home. What a wonderful surprise we all got. Very quiet, all campers were there to relax and not whoop it up to any major degree. Most lights were out by 10, just a few die-hards were up later!

There were lots of extra vehicles in most campsites, and lots of boats on the lake, but so nice and quiet. Courtesy at its finest!

The campground is locked from 9 pm until 6 am, but the camp host told everyone that if they wanted to go to town to see the fireworks (50 mi. round trip!) that they would accommodate every one and open the gate. Very nice. We stayed in camp.

The weather was HOT, at least for me, with temps in the mid 80's. If you were in the shade it was pleasant when the breeze came up, but being in the sun was terribly stifling, even with the breeze. There were chances of thunderstorms, but even though we saw lightning way off and thunder too, we never got a drop of rain.

I hope every one had a safe and happy Fourth of July!

See you soon . . .