Whoa Nellie!

So I'm sitting in my chair in the house Friday afternoon, reading my book while the family is upstairs watching movies and messing around when I catch something out of the corner of my eye and this is what I see...

Five horses walking around our pond and getting a drink.

We don't HAVE any horses.

These are rogues.

Two years ago after the big ice storm we had two horses in the yard one day. I figured trees had fallen across someone's fence and they had escaped. We saw them for a couple of days and then never again. We never heard who they belonged to or knew where they had come from.

Then Friday as we headed to town we saw them again up by the Craig's old place. One inside the fence and one outside the fence munching on our grassy field.

I went out with some tomatoes to try to coax them closer but Ruger decided to make an appearance about the same time so they all scurried of into the woods.

Bryon was out riding the new natural gas line on the four wheeler this afternoon and said that they had cut fences everywhere for that new line. That probably accounts for three of them. I think those other two have been loose for two years now. One of them was REALLY skinny. If we had a fence, we'd have horses now.

Dang.

Zipline!

We had a great weekend this 4th holiday. Grace got to ride in the 130th Annual 4th of July Parade in Marshfield on our churches bible school float. We shot off fire works, made homemade icecream and Bryon made a ZIP LINE!

He's been ordering pieces and parts for it for the past few weeks and the UPS man has been a regular visitor to our house lately. He finally got it all put together with the help of Chris, his Dad and the boys.


Aaron took the first trip, then Bryon and Grace went three times. I waited until today after some "fine tuning" to give it a try. It was pretty fun! You just never know what he's going to come up with :)

From Chickens to Vampires

Know why you aren't supposed to count your chickens before they hatch? Because when you do, you definately do NOT get chickens. Well July 2 was 21 days, the supposed amount of time it takes to incubate fertilized eggs to get baby chickens. This morning, I went out to see if there was anything under the broody hen and found ONE broken egg with a thick dried up yolk in it and a whole lotta stink. That hen was just disgusting and obviously frustrated just like I was. No baby chickens. The past 24 days sitting on that nest in the smoldering heat of the chicken house were for nothing.

Dang.

I'm not sure WHAT happend to all the eggs. I know TWO of them got broken by her sitting on them and squishing then into the edge of the nesting box too hard and I think I remember scooping one egg up off the hen house floor not knowing if it was one of hers or the others. As for the rest of the eggs? I have NO idea.

I went to check on her later this afternoon and she was off the now empty nest and flitting around the chicken yard, finally relieved of her egg watch. I took that opportunity to clean out the nesting box of the dried egg crusted pine shavings. Nice. I filled the boxes up with nice clean shavings and sprinkled some around the bottom of their chicken house and found them some nice clover and carrot tops to munch on. It's nice to be back to normal. I feel bad for her. She did her best, but it just wasn't meant to be. Maybe next time. Maybe not. Life on the farm is hard sometimes.

Bryon mentioned today that maybe his Dad had taken some of those eggs out from under her not realizing we were trying to hatch them and put them in the house in our egg cartons in the fridge. Boy I really hope that is NOT what happended because SOMEONE is going to be in for a surprise if that's the case because we've given a bunch of eggs away and even sold a few.

I better go call him right now!

Or not, I'm feeling pretty lazy right now and just waiting for a free moment to read the Sookie Stackhouse books again.

Ever since my movie marathon last weekend I've been CONSUMED with those books! I finished the first season of True Blood on DVD and a coworker mentioned that the first season was just like the show and that the books followed along pretty closely. Well I Googled and Googled trying to find a place I could watch the new season shows for free but to no avail so I tracked down the books (eight in paper back mercifully) and bought them ALL! I've read three books in the past three days. They are addictive! God I love a series! Especially when I catch onto it near the end or WAY into it so I don't have to WAIT for the next book to come out! You just gotta love those vampires :)

Okay, so that was completely random, but what are ya gonna do? Welcome to my world.

True End of TV Drought

I ended my tv drought this past weekend with at a 12 hour marathon of TrueBlood. It was AWESOME!

I made it 40 days without watching television - at all. Okay, there was that ONE night when we had tornados in the area and I just really need Ron Hearst and Brandon Beck to tell me what to expect when the Big T's are rolling around the countryside.

So what did I learn from 40 days without television?

1. That I could NOT watch it if I really wanted to.
2. That there is a lot of CRAP on television and silence (as if our house ever is) or at least music is preferrable to CRAP.
3. That life lasts longer, or seems to, when it's not divided up into 30 minute intervals with commercial breaks.
4. That I still can't read anymore than I usually get read because clothes still need washed, supper still needs made and Grace still needs a bath.
5. That I still like my shows and find them relaxing to watch.

So was it worth hit? Yeah I think so. Sort of like teaching high school, riding the Katy Trail and childbirth...been there, done that and didn't buy but one t-shirt. I can mark it off the list....

Next.

Well Fed Neighbor Podcast

Okay, so I'm not a fan of Vincent David Jericho, but Bryon is and he listens most mornings. He called to tell me about this show and I went on VDJ's website and downloaded it. This group, Well Fed Neighbor, is RIGHT ON track I think.

Listen and decide for yourself...

http://www.ksgf.com/Portals/67/KSGF%20Audio/This%20week/KSGF_060409_Hr2a_PODCAST-%20Well%20Fed%20Neighborhood.mp3

and check them out at

http://www.wellfedneighbor.com/

The heat is on!

I am a slug.

I am FULL of ambition, ideas and plans right up until the moment the mercury reaches around 90 degrees and suddenly it all evaporates...literally. About this time of the year, EVERY year, I start dreaming of moving to a cooler climate...permanently. Missouri is not kind to the fair weather girl I've become.

But, we are settled, set, entrenched and I wouldn't give up my house and farm now for anything. So as long as the air conditioner keeps working, I'll keep creeping out to do the few things I HAVE TO outside to keep things limping along until relief comes again.

I even put a fan out in the chicken house. It's almost 100 degrees in there and one of the Buff's is sitting on fertilized eggs! This is day 11 for her and apparently if all goes well in 21 days, we could, SHOULD have baby chicks. Charity brought the eggs up from her farm next door since I had a broody hen and she had the fertilized eggs. So which does come first? Hmmmm.

Anyway, I was feeling sorry for her sitting in there sweating her feathers off and put a little fan in there. It did help. Still hot but at least the air is moving around.

We'll see what happens. They are Rhode Island Reds if they hatch out. I'm not sure what the plan is when they do, but I've been thinking of getting Bryon to build me a little chicken hut to attach to the chicken tractor so she and the chicks can use it and keep them separated from the other hens. I'm not sure how or if they would all get along.

Hmmmm...see how optimistic the air conditioning makes me...more projects!

Do you need a mental multivitamin?

My friend Liz sent me a link to this neat blog http://mentalmultivitamin.blogspot.com/2003/10/on-nightstand-archive.html and one of the books she's reading is "How to Be an Explorer of the World" (Keri Smith) The blog says...

In a neat bit of synchronicity, Smith includes a variation on the Kalman quote above (about walking the world with all of the essentials in a backpack) in the opening pages of her "Portable Art Life Museum." Asserting that artists and scientists view their worlds in "surprisingly similar ways" -- observation, collection, analysis, comparison, pattern identification -- Smith describes how to become an explorer of the world:

1. Always be looking. (Notice the ground beneath your feet.)

2. Consider everything alive and animate.

3. Everything is interesting. Look closer.

4. Alter your course often.

5. Observe for long durations (and short ones).

6. Notice the stories going on around you.

7. Notice patterns. Make connections.

8. Document your findings (field notes) in a variety of ways.

9. Incorporate indeterminancy.

10. Observe movement.

11. Create a personal dialogue with your environment. Talk to it.

12. Trace things back to their origins.

13. Use all of the senses in your investigations.

Cool huh?

Grace Funnies

It takes FOREVER for me to get Grace to bed. Bryon and I take turns every other night. He gets her to bed in about 15 minutes. It takes me at least 30 minutes. We read two library books and then rock a little bit and finally I get her into bed. Then she needs a drink of water...and covered up a little more...and needs to tell me something. Working the Mama.

When I'm done rocking her she ALWAYS says, "Just a liiitttlllee bit more". So I rock for like thirty seconds and tell her it's time.

Friday night I thought I'd get smart and warn her ahead of time and bypass the last minute plea of more time. I said, "Okay Grace, I'm going to rock you one more minute and then it's right to bed." We rocked a minute more and I said, "Okay, give me a kiss, it's time for bed." She says, "No, I say a little bit more." I said, "No I SAY now." We argued back a forth for a few more volleys and finally as I'm scooping her up and into bed she puts her hand over her eyes exaperated and says all weepily, "I'm about to tell my teacher on you!".

I guess Ms Dana was the highest authority she could think to report me to.

At least she didn't tattle to Jesus.

Birthday Fence

Ruger has dug his last hole in my garden.

I used my birthday money to buy six hog panels so we could build a fence around the garden this weekend. Come hell or high water that DOG was not getting into the garden again. I was ready to build the thing myself if I had to. Mercifully, I have a very patient and handy husband who took pity on me and my craziness and hopped to it this weekend. Left to me, the thing would have consisted completely of electric fence post, hog panels and quick ties.

Bryon patiently, okay so MOSTLY patiently, measured and squared until we ended up with this...


It took us four hours to build in the hot sun Saturday. We made three "gates" into it and even though it won't keep all the OTHER wildlife out, Ruger has dug his last hole.

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie

Bryon wanted a strawberry rhubarb pie for his birthday which was last weekend. I bought some rhubarb Friday night at the Marshfield Farmers Market and used some of the frozen strawberries I'd bought a couple of weeks ago and made this pie for him today.

I Googled for a recipe and this was the first one that came up http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/001137strawberry_rhubarb_pie.php .

He liked it. I didn't know what it was SUPPOSED to taste like because of course I'd never tried it. I ate a piece tonight though and I have to admit it was pretty good. It didn't really thicken up enough (guess it needed more tapioca) but still not bad for a first try.

And yes, that's a smiley face on it :)