My little Cinderella

While at Montessori Etta learned some cleaning skills. I don't think Miss Jeannie would have approved of the dirty feet ON the table though. :)

The coop being put to good use

Different breed of chickies inhabiting the coop!

Chicken coop progress

Hot as blazes and hubby is at work till noon on this fine Saturday morning. When he gets home he plans to get right to work on it.
Hope he doesn't melt! Here is progress to date.

Mid April we started - 1st steps were to tear out my raised beds, remove my old carpet mulch from walkways, add another chain link fence and gate to the rear of the chicken's area to fence the chickens out of my shade garden. Then we began sinking posts for the coop. The hen house will be 4 feet by 5 feet with attached run.


Mid May we made it to this point - Hen house mostly framed in and roof supports started. We need to really reinforce the roof since I hope to convert it to a green roof in the near term.


4th weekend of May - We now have a roof that is ready for shingles.

Wind is blowing me towards Kinder goats

Just watched an atrocious video about abuse of cows at a dairy in Ohio. While I can't imagine most dairies treat their cows this way it spurred me to look into goats again a bit. I know nothing about them but am interested in the self-sufficiency of having them. Would love to have Angora goats for their fiber one day but right now I'm interested in milk. So I looked for small milk goats and came up with Kinder goats. They are supposed to be a cross between a standard Nubian and a Pygmy. Good milk production in a small package. Not imagining it will happen anytime soon. But in the meantime I'll try to locate some milk to try and try to learn more about goat husbandry.
I found this site and enjoyed reading about them a bit and would like to try some recipes.
http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles2/sanderson95.html

Used this link to locate some places that I might be able to buy some milk from.
http://www.realmilk.com/where2.html#ia

So off on another tangent. My poor hubby.

Chicken peace

We gave the chicks their first outing yesterday. I can't tell you how at peace it made me feel watching them outside. For some time I stood there holding my soft, naked babies wearing cloth dipes while my daughter looked over the chickens making themselves comfy amongst the raised beds. I felt that in that moment we were really doing our best to share our lives with Mother Nature rather than just observe her or use her. Sustainable, simple living really can bring you satisfaction! It is not all about sacrifice.

My 3ft tall 35lb gift

My daughter is such a gift to me. She is not only a gift in what she does for me such as trying to help keep the babies amused or filling my water glass, she is a gift in what she does to help me in other ways. She reminds me to be happy with her infectious laugh. She reminds me to have fun with her silly games. She reminds me to be strong as she tests her boundaries. She reminds me to show compassion as she mirrors my words and actions. She is a little bottle of enthusiasm and emotions that reminds me to appreciate my day and to know that every minute of every day is a new one for new chances to love, learn, and truly live.

New Blog - Wordpress to Blogger

I started this blog in 2009 on wordpress and found the set-up over there very cumbersome and lacking in some regards. Then I found out I was pregnant with twins and eventually ended up very sick with pneumonia and unable to do much but sleep for several months until the babies arrived at nearly term right before Thanksgiving. Finally hoping this is the right time where I might have enough time to blog so I moved over here to Blogger. We'll see how this goes. Life is busy and I'd like to use this blog as an external memory (external to my brain that is) to capture highlights in my life, log progress on projects and endeavors, and stay on track in general. Follow along if you'd like.

Chicken coop at a standstill

So it seems my chickens will linger in the basement a bit longer. Last week we were out of town for a graduation. This weekend it seemed we need a break and hubby wasn't feeling great so no progress. I also gave up on the green roof for now since it seemed it was throwing off my hubby's progress as he couldn't envision exactly how he was going to do it. It can always be converted later. April 8th we got the first 5 chicks and then April 13th the other 4 arrived in the mail so they are getting a bit big to still be inside but so far so good,