Chickens and Veggies

The chickens have finished their moulting and are producing eggs again.  To celebrate, we've had homemade souffles twice in the last two days.

This last week, we all watched a TEDx talk about organic farming and food allergens.  Million and I watched it first for homeschool, and then Michael and I watched it later and have been discussing it ever since.

We admitted that we don't know exactly what is in the food our chickens are eating and that it would be better for us to search out a source that had less mystery involved.  So our first string remedy is that I've e-mailed many of the grocers in town to determine what happens with their "bad" produce.  Secondly, we have found a source for organic chicken feed.

Why would we raise chickens for the nutritional benefit if we didn't even know what they were eating when we bought conventional chicken food (which could very likely be filled with soy and GMOs.)

Okay.  So there's that little step toward food freedom.

We've also decided that we're going to have a more intentional and focused garden this year and we'll be getting a large portion of our food from a CSA.  We've had fun with a CSA in the past, but the portions in the boxes were small.  We've been purchasing vegetables from the farm we've chosen, and this is their livelihood as opposed to a hobby farm (our first CSA choice a few years ago.)  We know the quality of their produce, and we also know that their will be sufficient supply, weather permitting. Our own garden will have the vegetables that we know how to grow well and that we know we use in large supply.

A Story About Eggs

"The other day, I went back to the chickens, and I found an egg.  It was an egg that was badly broken.  It was smooshed all over and seeping out onto the ground.  Do you know what that egg reminds me of?  It reminds me of you.  You're feeling angry right now, a little bit broken.  Did you know that there is nothing so broken that God cannot fix it?"

As I sat listening to my husband talking to my oldest, tears welled in my eyes.
What Michael didn't tell Million was that the particular egg he was describing was an egg that one of our chickens had cannibalized.  With the cold weather, the egg froze before we could get to it and cracked open.  Sadly, one of our chickens thought it an adequate food source instead of being willing to move down the ladder 3 feet to the feeder.  We will have to determine soon which chicken it is and get rid of it, or the chicken will teach the rest of the chickens to eat the eggs.

Like that egg, Million has been pecked on by others.  He has never had a "fair" chance at life.  His course was predetermined for him.  He has had so many circumstances both in Ethiopia and here in the United States that could lead a child to become angry and embittered.

But...

There is nothing so broken that God cannot fix it.

And that is our hope.  Our faith.  Our prayer.

We acknowledge that we may never see complete healing in him.
But we press on.
Because our God is a healer who delights in making broken things whole.  

Eggs and Paper Christmas

I am grateful today because we have a "normal" amount of eggs in our fridge this morning.
We're not talking about the 8 or so eggs that will probably show up by the end of the day.
There is a great divide between what a person *thinks* 3 to 4 dozen eggs a week will be like and what it is actually like when chickens are on the premise.
By no means am I complaining, I'm just recording this for memory's sake.
I am so grateful for food.
And hoping that Jubilee doesn't have any egg allergies.

We're continuing our paper Christmas.  The boys made Christmas song ornaments this morning, where I would sing a Christmas song and they would draw what they thought about during the song.  Then they got to snip the edges with scissors and hang it up on the tree By Themselves.  Two thirds of our ornaments are now sideways or upside down, but it's their Christmas tree too...

In real food news, I've managed to use the chia seeds twice.  Once, I hid them in some pizza sauce, and everybody knew they were there, but nobody thought it tasted any different.  Today, I hid them in some oatmeal cookies.  I know the chia seeds are in there, but I can't detect any difference whatsoever.  So, hooray for fiber! And magnesium!

Both boys are sick right now, and I am dreading being the third invited to the party.  Hopefully I've built up an immunity simply by virtue of being the recipient of 8000 snotty kisses a day.  We'll see how the rest of this week goes.

Chickens and Eggs

I haven't mentioned the chickens lately, because....

Nothing really was exciting.

They were eating.

And pooping.

And being chickens.

With nothing to show for it.....

Until today.

We found our first two eggs today.

Garden Update: September

I realized I was perhaps a bit behind in posting some garden pictures.  

And I never updated you on the state of our rooster.

He is happily residing in a seasonal zoo at a local apple orchard right now.  At the end of the season, the orchard owner will be giving us a few hens in exchange.  I think we got ourselves a great deal.  

Our garden took off like crazy this summer, despite the odd summer weather.  June was beastly hot, and then July and August never really touched over 80, and they were cloudy and rainy.  

This is supposedly my "pathway" behind the garden.

Mystery flowers.

I was negligent when it came to brocolli and cabbage.  The chickens haven't minded getting overgrown produce for food.

"Mama, the colours are so beautiful.  They make me want to blow God a kiss."

a little butter and honey makes experimental whole wheat bread go down more smoothly.

I e-mailed our DNR to get a few posters from an old 1950's series.  They sent the entire series for free since it was for educational use.  I wasn't, however, anticipating that they be so large.  We could probably wallpaper the entire area I'm planning on using as a homeschool area.

I've been taking online surveys to earn money for Million's homeschool books for his kindergarten year.  It's slow going, but it beats getting a part-time job.  When we get a new book in the mail every two or three days, it's fun to see his face light up.  I actually briefly contemplated going back to some transcription work, but I much prefer surveys because interruptions can happen without penalty.  And interruptions happen around here.

I might try to open our Etsy shop again after Jubilee is born, once we've established a bit of a rhythm.  I really miss selling handmade items.  I do have some other ideas that require me budgeting for a sewing machine, but with everything we're trying to do,  a sewing machine falls under the "want" category.  However, we do know what kind we're looking for, so I've been watching Craigslist for lightly used ones.  If I can only sell off some of our unused instruments, then maybe we'll be able to consider it.

Photo Post

My two kitchen "helpers."  The Bonnie Prince cried when I took his apron off.

Michael mentioned to the neighbor lady that he was going to start using panty-hose to hang up his squash.
She gave him an entire bag of used ones.  I told him to write a thank-you note, but he thought that might be awkward...

We're back to thinking the gender confused chicken is a hen.  Apparently hens can crow.
And it might just be an alpha-hen that grows more quickly than the others.

Heirloom purple beans.  Michael and I enjoy them.  The boys try to sneak theirs to the chickens.

Yellowing! Hooray!

Million has renewed his interest in crochet once again.
I let him pretend because I'm not a skilled teacher in things that I pick up easily.

Chairs, Chickens, and Circles of Life

Our poor boys will grow up thinking it is completely normal to keep wingback chairs in various stages of undress in the middle of the kitchen.  Michael set a goal of August 20th for the grey chair.  Then I'll need to hop right on the blue-green chair, or it just won't be happening until maybe 2017.  After the three chairs, I only have two furniture projects left before I start in on Christmas presents. (Please think of me kindly when I uttered those last few words.  I will be 39 weeks pregnant at Christmas.  Presents just won't happen unless I start early this year.  Or I'll be buying incredibly inappropriate gifts like compression stockings and postpartum pads for everyone on my list.)

I got a little inspiration a few days ago from this post.  (Confession: I'm looking at making some rugs for around the house...Because I obviously need some more hobbies.) I was initially thinking of getting a new glider for when the baby comes, but both Michael and I prefer the idea of a bit of an oversized chair.

My mom found this little green end table on the side of the road.  It's seen better days, which you can't really see in the picture...but she thought it reminded her of a project I would take on.  We agreed.   A little sanding, some paint, and some new hardware, and she'll be as good as new.  The dresser, I mean.

Our squash plants are doing very well.  I'm so pleased.  Michael goes out and counts the pollinated squash blossoms each day.  

In chicken news, there is a concern that one of our hens may actually be a rooster.  Shhhh.  It's not legal here in town.  And we're still in the confirmation process, since the chickens are in the tweenage-developmental phase.  I guess we may be giving the educational talk again about the circle of life that moves our chicks through despair and hope, and onto the dinner plate....

And lastly on a gender identity note, we'll be finding out what gender the baby is next week.  I'm chomping at the bit a little, since it's nearing the end of garage sale season, and if we find out that it's a female (all three guys are hoping for a Jubilee), I'll need to hit some garage sales up.  

Magical Places

I don't intend for this to be a long post.

It's just to say that I was sitting out on our deck this morning after doing all of the chores.  I looked at all of our progress on the yard, and I thought to myself "This will be a magical place this summer."

I'm not an outdoors person.  But the way Michael has worked to transform our yard could easily turn me into one.

It's so purpose-filled.  And I dig that.

We're going to plant an apple tree or two.  We have chickens.  We have four garden beds and three berry patches.  

And we live in the city.  

I like it a lot.  

My greens box was built yesterday.  Hurrah!

75% done.  It will look cuter, I promise.

Area behind the garage where some raspberry bushes snuck over into our yard.  We'll take them.

11 Girls

Three minutes before Michael typically leaves for work, we got a call saying our chicks were in.  And we needed to come get them right away.

I don't know how I thought it was going to go down.  Maybe between the convenient hours of 4 and 6 p.m.  when Michael was done with work...

At any rate, they're safely installed in our kitchen (because it was 40 degrees and rainy this morning and wanted them to transition to colder climates gently.)  They'll be in the garage tonight, now that they've gotten used to the heat lamp.

We ordered 12 chickens.  They sent 13, but two were dead on arrival.  Michael unceremoniously disposed of them in our trash can.  We've probably scarred the boys for life.

Ah well.  That's why this is deemed an "educational experiment."

Speaking of educational.... I, myself, had never held any form of poultry.
And I have done so three times now.
Living life on the edge.  

Backyard "Tour" Before

Let me preface this post by saying that these will not be the most flattering "before" pictures you've ever seen.  That's why they're called "before photos."  Michael (and Million) worked on building one of our raised beds.  Michael was generously given some leftover deck lumber by a coworker, and he had several uses for it.  

Okay....on to the explanation.

This first photo is looking from the southeast corner of our deck.  The corner to the right (and back of our yard) from this view is where the chickens will live in what we're calling a "duplex" system.... one coop with a chicken run on each side.   

This is a little bumpout area that we're not certain what we'll do yet.  It's about 7 x 7, so we're thinking maybe a cold frame here?  But it doesn't get enough sun, so we might move the boys' playthings into this area.

Here's the view behind our garage.  We're going to put a narrow "garden tools/lawnmower" shed back there.

This next photo is where it gets really not-so-flattering.  All of that wood on our deck?  Paneling from the 1970's that Michael tore out of our basement.  That's going to be predominately the material that our chicken coop will be made out of.  You can also see several spots where I was testing house paint colors.  Classy, right?

 Had to add this photo of "the men" working on our raised bed.

So there you have it, not an enormous yard.  (Our old one was 1/3 acre...we've got about 1/8th now, but it seems a pretty standard city lot.)

This is the paint color we're thinking of going with.  It's a weathered brown, but technically the name is "charcoal."

Finally, here Michael is next to where our main raised bed will be.  It will be taller, we just needed a bit more lumber, and he needed to change our van's oil before it rained.  If you look to the right of the pile of paneling on the deck, you can see my paint swatch of "charcoal" in this picture.

Yard Work

We got some yard work done last night.  I wish that if you've never met Michael, you could.  He is the only person I know who can easily make anything fun.  We had such a good time with yard work last night.  He was dancing with our leaf vacuum/shredder/bag thing, (can't remember the technical name) and I was keeping the boys from killing each other with rakes, sticks, and other large found objects.

We also got our chicken permit in the mail yesterday.  So while we were out of doors last night, we worked out a rough idea of where our raised bed garden will go, and where the coop will go, and where the garden shed will go, and where our "cold box" (Michael's idea---I'm not sure what it is, yet) will go.  I'm getting pretty excited to see the progress, when it eventually happens.  We have some free lumber coming from one of Michael's coworkers next week.

I don't mean to mislead you into thinking we've got a humongous yard.  We actually have a much smaller yard than we did at our last house.  Simply, we have a well-laid-out yard for what we're planning on doing.  It's got a little pocket of space behind the garage for our garden tool/lawnmower shed, and some eternally sunny space abutting the garage.

We ate outside last night.  Spaghetti squash, bacon, and carrots.

A side note about bacon: we've started buying only ethically sourced meat from local farmers.  And it has changed our lives (and our budget...and the amount of meat we consume...)  Last night's bacon was the highlight of my week.  It was so sweet and tender and crispy.

How did you guess I ate dirt for dessert? You must be a wizard.

I got 24 of my new afghan/blanket squares sewn up yesterday.  Then I ran out of thread.  So that will be something to do this weekend.   I ran across this blog post from Anna Maria Horner today about the fabric that I'm using.  It made it that much more special.  I've always liked her work, and her personality and openness might be edging me over to preferring her over Amy Butler (gasp!)  (and Joel Dewberry is always close to the top too...don't worry.)

I've been obsessed with aqua lately.  This yarn is gloriously soft.

It's been a quiet start to the month.  We're catching up from last month's controlled chaos.  I'm making great strides with my un-upholstering of one of my armchairs before the reupholstery begins. (It's the armchair that will fortunately hide in our room if things run amuck.)

Million is at the age where he wants to be helping with everything.  Everything.  He will be four this month, and while the idea of a helper is lovely, it's so much work to figure out ways for him to help. Today he spent half an hour trying to get staples out of the armchair with me.  I think he maybe got one out that I surreptitiously pre-loosened.

I've posted three photos of the three chicken breeds I ordered on Monday.  They'll be coming early May, right around the time that our lavender, tomatoes, carnations, pepper plants, and raspberry and blueberry bushes will arrive from the nursery.  That will be a fun week, hopefully.

There are certain things in life that I never imagined myself doing.
Raising chickens is one of them.
Michael is good for me.
(And I'm sure he would reciprocate the sentiment about some of my crazy schemes....)

Million's bedroom addition is coming along nicely.  I'm looking forward to moving him downstairs so that I can rearrange the room the boys now share.