Weekend Plans

I always seem to plan more than I have time to accomplish. This weekend will be the same. My ducks are just about ready to go outside so we need to get the holes dug and pour the concrete for the posts, get the fence up, make a area for the "pool" to be and hopefully get both the chicken coop and duck coop built. The chicken coop can wait though, but the ducks really need to get outside soon. They went outside yesterday for a visit.

My goose is starting to have a niacin deficiency, so *she* is walking funny but I got some new food for them and I am getting some yeast today so hopefully I can fix it before it gets bad.
The chickens are growing and feathers are coming in. They dont seem to be growing very fast though, I can't see a size difference between then and now. I will post some before and after pictures of them next week. Have a great weekend everyone!

Can't buy lumber on the weekends?!?

I had big plans for this weekend, I was going to wake up real early on Saturday morning and go get some pallets and boards from a local lumberyard so we could start building our Chicken and Duck pen, but they are now not open on Saturday so thats no longer an option. How in the hell does anyone with a job get anything done?!? I work 9-4 most day - some days its 8-5. So if I need to make a doctor appointment the hours I have to chose from are 9-5, Dentist 9-3, Vetranarian 8-5, lumberyard - only open on the weekdays. So if I want to build something I can't go buy lumber on fucking Saturday?!? I HATE this shit.

So I had lots of plans for this weekend and now I don't even want to try to get anything done.

Happy Birthday John and Joann!

This is a little late because John's Birthday was last Wednesday and Joann's was yesterday but they live quite far away so we went and spent yesterday with them and they both got their presents then. I made quits for each of them, Johns is the same tractor fabric that I made my Dad's quilt out of (how lucky am I that both my Dad and my Father in Law like tractors?!?) and Jo's was made with animal prints and mostly cat prints. I made both of these quilts in less than 2 weeks, and yes Chris did help, he helped pick the fabric, he chose the pattern, and he helped me tie all the ties and while I was slaving away sewing them he was taking care of Aleric and the animals. So now for the pictures!

John's Quilt:

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Joann's Quilt:

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Ducks! And a Goose!

The other day after we got home with our chickens, my husband says to me "If they would have had ducks we could have got 2 of them also" this was probably a mistake. See I have been looking at the website Backyard Chickens - and on the forum section of the site there is also a sub-forum for Ducks. You would not believe how many cute pictures are posted of ducks. And there is the chance that Aleric will be able to eat them (he gets hives from chicken eggs). So I called Big R back at least 5 times a day waiting for their shipment of ducklings to come in. After 4 days of waiting I found an ad on Craigslist selling various poultry. I called the guy and he only had 5 ducks left. I asked him to save them for me and went and picked them up after work. When I got there there was also a goose in the box with them, he had 2 of them hatch but one died so he put the other one in with the ducks and they became a family. He said I could have him for only $6.00, that might seem like a lot but they are selling at Big R for $9.00 each and that's a day old chick, the ducks and the one goose I got are over 3 weeks old. SOOOOO we now have 1 human baby, 3 large dogs, 4 cats, 2 fish tanks (3 fish total), 15 chickens, 5 ducks, 1 goose and a bucket of worms. I think I need to stop here, just a few minutes ago the Husband was talking about getting goats and while I would LOVE some goats I think we are at capacity right now! Im not very sure what breeds of ducks I got, the guy who sold them told me that there is a Black and White Magpie, a Swedish Black, a Swedish Blue or Silver, a Rouen and a Khaki Campbell, and the goose I guess is just a goose because there was no type given for him. Who knows if these really are what I got though, I need to wait until they are grown to figure that out. Hopefully we will get 2 or even 3 laying ducks out of this and we can just keep the drakes as the protectors of the flock but if I end up with all drakes, something tells me they will be hitting the dinner table come fall. Now for pictures!

Injury :(

So I haven't ran in over a week now, I want to but I cant. A few weeks ago my toes on my right foot hurt after one of my runs, I figured I had stepped on a rock wrong and it would be fine, then the next day it hurt more, but I still ran on it and it just got worse every time I ran but in the daytime before my run it was fine. Well last week it all of a sudden wasn't fine and I could no longer run on it without it hurting so I took the next day off and my foot started swelling, and has been swollen since that day :( In fact im wearing "normal" shoes today because my foot was so swollen I couldn't even get my 5 fingers on today. I am so upset about this. So hopefully by this weekend the swelling will have gone down, the pain will have gone away and I can resume my regularly scheduled activities. If its not better by Monday I will be making a trip to my local emergency room. I don't know if you can see the swelling in this picture or not but it was pretty bad when I took it.

Chickens!

This weekend we got our chickens, we have wanted them for a while but this year we decided to finally get them because they can be a source of eggs and meat. I really wanted to buy my birds from a local farmer but the one that I could find in my area lacked in the customer service department. In the add they placed it said they have 3 week old chicks, so me and Chris were thinking it would be better to get 3 week old chickens, because that's a 3 week head start. So I called and they answered the phone "hello", now it might just be me but when I call a place of business I expect something other than hello. So I asked "Is this _____ Chicken farm?" thinking I might have dialed wrong and he said "yes" I said "Oh good, in your add it says that you have 3 week old chickens is that correct?" His reply "I think so" hmmmm, you answered the phone at a place of business, now im asking you a question that could make your business money and you cant even answer my questions!?! Next question: "Ok good, now how long would I need to keep these chickens in the house with me?" It went silent, he then says "I don't know" I asked if there was anyone I could speak with, apparently there was someone who was more knowledgeable than he was but he/ she wasn't there and when I asked when I could expect a call back from this person to answer my questions I also got the famous answer of "I don't know". So needless to say this place isn't getting any of my money. The lady who owns the place did call back a few hours later and told me it was her son who answers the phone for her because she was sleeping. I told her that I was very disappointed with her customer service and thanked her for returning my call and if I needed anything in the future we would let them know. We went to Big R and got chickens from them. We bought 15 of them, 10 are pullets (or so they say - we will see in the end) I chose 5 tan ones and 5 black ones, and we got 5 out of the strait run barrel - I chose 5 little yellow ones. I am interested to see what they all grow up to look like and how many actually are going to be laying hens. If we end up with a rooster or two it will be ok, they can protect the flock, if we end up with more than that we will end up eating them. Here are some pictures of our new little chicks!

Aleric LOVES them!:
Not a great picture but this is them a little closer:
And of course I had to include one with Aleric touching them (we don't let him hold or play with them):

Happy Birthday DAD!

Today is Dad's Birthday - His party was on Sunday, so he got his quilt then but I waited until today to post it here. Its a farm theme quilt with lots of tractors. So here are pictures!

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