Category Archives: Uncategorized

It’s Just Poop!

6 Replies

Oh, night time chores! Yeah, they actually live up to their name because they can be well… quite a chore to have to do. It’s not that it’s really hard work or anything; we just basically have to go out, gather eggs, and close up the coops. Sounds pretty easy, right? Well, it is except that we have to go out after dark because there’s a small group of chickens that like to stay out until the last possible second before the sun sets. It’s just kinda creepy, especially being out in the country, to have to go out in the dark. We just really don’t know what kind of critters might be lurking in the dark shadows.
 Continue reading →

Back From a Break

4 Replies

Well, as you can tell, I took a little break from here. It wasn’t an intentional break, it just kinda happened. Things got busy, life happened, and before I knew it days had passed by before I even had a chance to finish a sentence, let alone a whole post. It’s been one of those crazy summers where no matter how hard I work it just seems like I can’t get ahead. We’ve had some big changes happen with my son moving out and my older daughter working more hours. With them both not around as much and not being able to help out with chores like they used to, we’ve had to make some adjustments and get into a new routine. It’s been a fun, exciting, yet challenging time as we start this new chapter of our life.
 Continue reading →

Our Flock of Guineas is Growing

7 Replies

A long while back we found a nest of guinea eggs out by the stock tank where we keep the pigs. At the time we found it, there were maybe five or six eggs in it. Each day we’d go out there, the number of eggs would increase. Normally we gather them and eat them just like we do chicken eggs, but not knowing how long they’d been there, we left them. We planned to throw them away but never got around to it.

I don’t remember how long it was, but it seemed like a couple weeks later, a guinea hen went broody and started sitting on the nest. We weren’t really too sure the eggs would hatch because most of them had been lying in that open nest for what seemed like a long time. But we left her there anyway, just in case a few would.
 Continue reading →

Mysterious Funk

8 Replies

With all the endless projects we’ve got going on around here, there’s times when our house can become over taken with funk. Sometimes that funk can be mysterious and we have no idea what it’s from; other times it can be pretty obvious and easy to remedy. Like recently for example, we had the baby chicks in a brooder with a heat lamp in the house. For the first week it’s fine; they’re small, don’t eat that much and their brooder can be changed every few days without becoming too smelly. Then once they reach a week old, things start getting a little stinkier, to where the litter needs to be changed once a day. Then, with each day that goes by, they grow bigger, eat more, poop more and by the end of the week… wowzers… no matter how many times a day you change the litter, there’s that never ending, lingering little chick funk. At that point, it’s a sign that the chicks should have been moved out of the house like 5 days ago.


 Continue reading →

Preparing for Thanksgiving

2 Replies

With Thanksgiving quickly approaching, I decided I better start planning our menu. Since Thanksgiving is our first big meal after spending the summer harvesting crops, canning and tending to our animals, I think it’s always fun to see how many homegrown things we can use for our meal. Today I rounded up what we have, that way I can make a list and get the things we still need…


 Continue reading →

Musical Coops

Leave a reply

It’s getting to be that time of the year when we start moving chickens to the barn for the winter. Chickens are such creatures of habit, so it’s always a little difficult getting them trained to go to the barn at night. We usually start out by confining the ones we move to a room for a few weeks until they get used to the idea that it’s their new home. Once the few weeks are up, we turn them loose to free range. If they go back to the barn at night, they are considered successfully trained. If they go back to their old coop, it means we have to chase them around in the dark with flashlights and carry them back to the barn. We lock them up for a few more days and try it all again until they learn to go to the barn.
 Continue reading →

Harsh Winter? What’s Woolly Bear Say?

4 Replies

A while back, we had a big invasion of caterpillars; covering bushes, weaving through the grass, tumbling across the road in the wind, they were everywhere. As I walked through the yard trying not to step on any, I happened to look down. There, among the tan colored waves of fuzz was a woolly bear caterpillar. A different color and larger than the others, it was black with a reddish brown band in the center. Being something different and out of the ordinary around here, and knowing the kids hadn’t seen one before, I got them to come take a look. Brooke collects and pins insects and Miley loves butterflies so they always like finding new insects/caterpillars and researching them. They picked it up, headed in and the research began…
 Continue reading →

When Life’s Busy the Okra Will Eventually Get Pickled

Leave a reply

Oh dear… life’s been kind of busy and a little hectic lately so I haven’t got my Thursday post about chickens done yet. I’ve been working on it, along with a few other posts; it’s just not completely ready yet. Sometimes life just gets in the way, but I’ll get it done as soon as I can. There were more errands than usual to run this week, plus I did some extra activities with the kids. Then one of my cats got really sick so I had to take her to the vet. Luckily, with some antibiotics and lots of TLC she’s back to her cute furry little self….

Continue reading →