Thursday, March 22, 2012

Punxsutawney Phil Must Have Been Right

   Well, spring is here and it snowed 6 inches over night. I guess the groundhog was right., 6 more weeks of winter. The wind is blowing and the snow is still falling, off and on. According to weather maps, places where it's usually still cold are warmer than we are up here.
   The chicks out grew their box and are now in a bigger box. Actually, they are in a big plastic box because I have smart chickens. They were working on a jail break. I guess it was really a cardboard box break. It seems they aren't really chicks at all, they are chucks. They danced in their water like ducks, got the cardboard nice and soggy and then started to peck and scratch a hole in the bottom. At least it was the bottom and not the side. At the rate the chicks are growing and the way the weather is cooperating, on day I'll wake up and find eggs in their box. I kind of feel like a Ma and Pa Kettle movie.
   Spending this much time with the chicks, I see they have personalities. The 15 chickens we had before seemed unusually stupid, but then, that could have been because we started out with too many chickens. One of the Golden chicks is much bigger than the other 3. I'm still assuming it's a female, but what do I know? It stands up big and tall and acts like it's in charge. Another of the Goldens is much smaller than the rest and is everybody's friend. We call this one Penny.
   The Polish chicks are starting to look really deranged with their feathers coming in on their cone heads. They seem to be trouble makers and I'm pretty sure they were the ones that started the jail break. I've named them Phyllis and Albert after Phyllis Diller and Albert Einstein because of their hair.
Since I still don't know if they are male or female, I have Phillip and Alberta as back up names. I'm kind of leaning toward them both being little roosters. I really hope they are out of the house before then.
   Tim's grandfather raised roosters, the really pretty kind with the bright colors and nice long tail feathers. One winter, his grandmother found a hurt dove and nursed it back to health. It lived in the basement most of the time. Tim and I went to visit his grandparents one time and we slept in the basement. It was a good place to have the guest/everything else room since it was in Kansas. Anyway, one morning this terrible noise woke us up. We just couldn't figure out what it was. We knew it wasn't one of the roosters because we knew what they sound like. We ask Tim's grandma what it was and she said it was the dove. It stopped making dove noise a long time ago and now, it just did it imitation of a rooster crowing.
   I've started cutting up old and outgrown jeans for the quilts I'm making for the grand kids. I've decided straight denim quilts would be too heavy for the kids, since I really don't want to squish them, so I need to go and buy some heavyish bright and kiddish material to go with the denim. Why not start another project when I haven't finished all the others? I do have the towels folded, so I'm good. I'll take pictures of the many crafts as I finish them.

Saturday, March 10, 2012

A New Computer And I still Can't Hit The Right Keys Or Spell

    I bought a new laptop last weekend. It's pretty nice and I'm positive it's more computer than I need. Tim has inherited my old 6 year old one. Do you remember the old days when you actually got a paper owners manual? I miss those days. I haven't even found an owners manual for this computer on the computer. I guess since it's 2012, everyone figures you should know what you're doing by now. Guess again. I guess I just have to waste more time on it trying to figure it out. Maybe, Adobe Digital Editions will work on this computer. Maybe, a newer program didn't like an older computer.
   I've started playing Words With Friends with Daniel, Alyssa and Daniel's girlfriend Amy. Except for Amy, Alyssa was right when she said we really suck at playing Scrabble. I think it would really help if we got some vowels. And a brain.
   The birds are busy making nests, so I guess spring is on it's way, even if we are suppose to get more snow and a lot more rain. Once again, it's not bluebirds building their nest in the bluebird house. Oh well, as long as some bird uses it, it's OK.
   On our trip into town for our Walmart tip, we passed the Big R Farm and Ranch store and noticed they had some fruit trees, so of course, we just had to stop. We bought 2 peach trees, 2 apricot trees, 2 pear trees and 1 apple tree. no partridge, though. We would have bought another apple tree, but they didn't have Honeycrisps in yet. We also bought more ruhbarb to replace ours that didn'tt survive the soggy spring last year.
    Then, we went in to pay for the trees and started looking around. Big mistake, and yes, it was my mistake, but Tim said I could. Seems along with spring comes chicks. There were these really neat looking White Crested Black Polish chicks. Well, I talked Tim into getting a couple. He said as long as I was getting chicks, get some layers, so I got 4 Golden Comet chicks. I hope they're not all roosters, since they were all sold as straight run. The girl who helped with the chicks said the Golden Comets were females. Who knows about the White Crested.
   Now, this wouldn't have been so bad, but we have no chicken coop. Tim was planning on making one this year, now he just gets to build one sooner. Right now, since they are tiny chicks, they are in a box with a heat lamp heating it up on the dryer. (Do you think this will get me out of folding towels?) By next weekend, they will need a bigger box. I know for a fact, they will lay more eggs than we will use. Maybe, I can sell some or give some to a food bank if there is one out here that takes fresh eggs. When we lived in CA and I had all my ducks, I gave the local food bank my surplus duck eggs. I guess it's a good thing all the goslings were in last week, because I miss having geese. The ducklings will be in in a couple of weeks. I miss them, too.
   A long time ago, when I got my first goat, we didn't have a place for him, either. We seem to do things backwards. I noticed yesterday that the people behind us have had a lot of kids born. They were having such a good time playing on their big cable spool. I miss goats, too. I'll just watch the neighbors goats since it's cheaper if I just watch them.
   I guess I'll get up and do the dishes and then see if I can come up with some words playing scrabble. It's a rough life I lead. Oh!! The ice is pretty much melted, so I can start going outside again as long as I don't sink in the mud.