pictures

Charlie still hasn't decided if he can trust the rest of us yet, but he likes A. He normally likes to chase her around the pasture. She runs, so he runs after her. The worst he's ever done is push her in the back with his nose. But today he let her do this.



It was very cute.

Here is a picture of what is happening in our garden.



And finally, all the wool I ended up with.



Hubby and I went out to celebrate our 7th anniversary tonight. I can't believe we've been married that long. And we have a 5 year old! WOW. It has gone by so quickly.

We are thinking about getting one of those cash back credit cards. It's a little scary considering the fact that I've believed my whole life that credit cards are bad. And they are. but if you were to pay it off each month and just use it for normal purchase you would have enough money for 2 Christmases (at our house at least).

It something we're considering.

The chickens are in their new house. This one has 7 nests and the outside area is twice the size of the other house.

The old house will be disinfected,if necessary and the new chickens will move in once their feathers are fully in and it doesn't look like they could get through the chicken wire.

With Mom and Dad going through their entire house and cleaning up I'm having to battle with my tendency to be a pack rat. Pairs of earmuffs? yeah, that would be great for winter for the girls. Someones unclaimed hoody. Wow its cute and one day it could fit! Bags and bags of cards... well, I'm still not sure on this one. I just think Mom may have been trying to get rid of them and giving them to someone felt better than throwing them out or donating them.

I will either be sharing or donating. I don't need 3 large bags of cards. I don't really send cards. I guess I could start though...

Anyway, this happens right after we spring clean. So unfortunately I've got oodles and oodles of space.

MUST RESIST!

Sheep shearing

Today the sheep got sheared. It took about an hour and a half for all 4 sheep. I guess that because they are Cormo, which is 1/2 merino, they have a lot of wrinkles. That means that you have to shear slowly.

Unfortunately the shearer didn't realize that until he was done with Charlie. Poor Charlie. He got nicked quite a few times. The shearer had a powder of sorts that had an antiseptic and a blood thickener or something like that that he only used on the big cuts. Charlie had 2 big cuts. He also had a lot of small nicks that the flies just loved. I wasn't sure if flies laying maggots in his skin was a good thing or not, so smeared them with Bag Balm which seemed to at least keep the flies away.



The second 2 sheep did pretty well. I think they got some minor cuts. But the last sheep (after escaping the shed and being recaptured) had a large chunk of skin taken out (think quarter sized). The shearer put some of his powder on it and the darn sheep wouldn't let me near to see how it was doing.

I didn't see a whole lot of flies on the others backs (which is all they would let me see) so rather than freaking them out again by trying to catch them and bag balm them, I decided to just watch them.

Am I freaking out? Is getting cut this many times a normal thing? I thought shearers prided themselves on not cutting the animal?

I may research this to see if I need a new shearer or if I just need to calm down.

In other news, the shearer knew of someone giving away 2 angora goats. for FREE.

We'll have to think about that one.

ugh

so this is what happens when you don't blog for a while. You have so much to say that you feel overwhelmed and it seems easier to just not blog.

I'm going to attempt it anyway.

Last week hubby took a week off of work and we made huge strides in the all of our projects.

We put in screen doors! Yay!

We got our square foot garden all put in and even planted some things. We ended up using plastic sheeting under the whole garden including the walkways. Its in huge sheets (not cut up) so we should have 0 weeds coming up. The only holes in the plastic are from the metal anchors used to hold edges of the plastic down and also some fence posts hubby put in for the tomatoes. I'm so excited! We have peas, lettuce, onions, shallots, garlic, and strawberries all planted.

I found a place for extra strawberry plants. My parents garden. They won't need it this next year, and my sister won't want it this summer (she is staying in their house). So I'll either be selling strawberry plants or strawberries next year.

Our broody hen is no more. I ordered chicks to put under her and 2 days before they were supposed to arrive she decided that sitting on a nest was for the birds. So I'm currently raising baby chicks inside in a cardboard box. Yay me.



While I'm sharing pictures, here is Charlie. he is ready for his spring haircut!



I've been plucking our rabbit already this spring (basically gently taking her loose, shedding fur from her). I blended some with some wool last night and boy was I in heaven. It made such a soft yarn. And it didn't take a whole lot either. About 10 parts wool to 1 part rabbit fur. so soft!

So last week we were able to go through almost every room in our house. We cleaned, went through boxes, organized... it feels so good to have everything so organized!!!

Back to the chicks. I ended up getting 2 Rhode Island Red hens and then after much discussion with hubby, a rhode island red rooster. That was done with the understanding that he could quite easily become dinner. I also got 2 straight run Ameracaunas. Straight run means that they haven't been sexed. I also let my 5 year old choose the chicks from the brooder so it would truly be random. So I could have 1 rooster, or 3. Since you only want 1 rooster per 8 hens, we would then have to cull or eat 2. I'm not as traumatized by that thought as I once would have been.

We found a cutter bee house on Craigslist for $30. These are those square box like houses that you see in farmers fields around here. We bought it to make into a hen house. Our current house is just not big enough for 9 chickens...well, it might be, but it would be a squeeze.

Another thing about that darn not-broody chicken. She hasn't been laying me any eggs! So she is eating for free. When chickens go broody they stop laying. so she stopped clear back in March. I may have to resort to the cayenne pepper method that is much talked about over at www.backyardchickens.com . Basically you feed them some cayenne pepper and it does something to kick their egg laying abilities back into gear.

The goats may have to go. They were being agressive with the sheep this morning. They were out of water and I filled up their trough. Well the goats were butting the sheep to get them out of there. Goats could kill sheep that way easily due to their horns and even (in the case of no-horns Lucky) just butting them. Sheep don't butt. Goats could kill sheep because they are so much bigger and they like to butt. Because sheep give us wool and goats don't do anything but eat our weeds (which sheep also do) then the goats are automatically out.

I think that is everything that has been going on around here.

Mom and Dad leave in about 3 weeks! AGH!