I have sad news...this will probably be the last installment of the Chicken Chronicles for the rest of the year. I am no longer the happy owner of ANY living chickens.

The story goes like this:

I closed the birds in last night, nice and snug so I thought. Alack and alas! I went out this morning to feed my dozen feathered creatures only to find all but one of them laid about in various positions of rigor mortus. The living bird was clucking incessantly, distressed. She even let me pick her up without any fuss.

I quickly spotted the entry (and likely exit) of the evil, marauding mink . It was up high in the southwest corner. The chicken wire, which never was secured overly well in that position (from the outside it's at least four feet up) was pushed in. The overall consensus is that the nasty varmint was so irritated at being foiled in his plans to get at the birds since Wednesday that he took his revenge. (I don't know if we're the only ones, but we have gathered that mink are rather nasty creatures like that.) Only one bird had had any consumption done on it. Head and neck. That is all that these dirty mink eat--the head and neck down to the shoulders. At least coons eat drumsticks and thighs and more. It's not such a wanton "waste" of meat that way.

Daddy feels really bad about it because he had given brief thought to that upper wire and decided to do nothing. I hadn't really even given it any thought at all...but one must remember that it was cold and after 9 pm when we came in the other night. Besides, who would have thought that a mink would be so determined that he'd climb the side of the coop?? Not I. Especially when there are fat mice and voles around all over the place. 

Well, anyway, I sadly hauled my dead birds off and tossed them into the field. Neither one of us felt like butchering cold stiff birds. The pitiful clucking of the remaining hen was about to make me cry so I went in. Funny thing is, I wasn't mad. I got mad the last time the mink got into them, but I think I was almost in shock this time...

Anyway, I said I didn't have any birds left in the beginning, didn't I? Well, it's true.

I was busy washing the lunch dishes when I happened to look out of the window and see...a blame mink trying to pull my LAST bird through the fencing!!!!!!!!

She was already dead. I knew that. But I started spluttering (more or less) and my heart rate went right through the roof. I dried my hands in a flash and lunged for my revolver (I keep it rather handy frequently). I didn't take time to put on a jacket and barely took the time to shove my feet into my boots.

I barreled out the door, screaming, "DADDDEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!" (He was in the shop.) "He's there!!!"

Or something to that effect. I never let up my sprint until I got to the corner of the barn where I ripped my .22 out of it's holster, just in time to hand it to Daddy, who'd come running right behind me. He had his semi-auto out. We switched guns since his was a little excessive for the skinny rat which had lifted it's head to observe us calmly. I wanted Daddy to shoot it since he's a better shot than I am, besides which I was shaking so bad that I wasn't sure I would have been able to control my breathing well enough for a good shot placement. However, if Daddy hadn't come up when he had, that dirty animal would have found himself staring down a .22 barrel held by a very irate female...

As it is, at least one of Daddy's two shots hit him (I didn't exactly see it because I had stepped away...my .22 is pretty loud and I had no earplugs in). Daddy and I re-exchanged guns again and Daddy told me to go around to the back of the barn. The mink had gone inside (there are tunnels under the barn walls into the back portion of the barn. We had a rabbit die in there last year...but that's another story.)

Anyway to shorten this story, we discovered that the mink (or minks) have been living in the barn this whole time. We found the nest and burrowings...but no mink, dead or alive. However, we did smell the musk. That dirty rat was probably cowered underneath something within pistol range the whole time. Anyway, I hope that a stench arises back there very soon. Still, I may go "hunting" once a day for a while after this...as is, we placed one of the snap traps in what appears to be the main entrance and then I brazenly put the live trap directly in front of it. I would take a great deal of satisfaction in drilling a mink after this...

And that, my friends, is how I am now no longer head dominionist over a flock of fluff brained birds. I think I'll rather miss the silly things. Yup...there went the egg bill back up a notch or two again...

Let me tell you something about Thanksgiving...the food generally lasts into the next few days. 

My mustard greens however, do not quite fit that category. Sure, there were some left over from yesterday. I ate roughly half of them under my eggs this morning for breakfast. I was going to eat the rest of them for lunch, but since I set them on the opposite side of the kitchen from the stove, I forgot. Turns out that was a great idea.

In the middle of making caramel corn for the Mini-Mall open house tomorrow, I decided I needed a snack. Mustard green make a great snack. I was standing there, eating them, in a slightly slurpy fashion, trying not to dribbled too much down my chin. Katherine gave me an eye and asked me if I "could go do that elsewhere?" Sure. Once I got all the greens down, I went and stood over the sink and drained the pot likker down my gizzard. I stood over the sink in case I got a little exuberant and the likker decided to roll down my chin. Turns out I needn't have bothered, but it's best to be prepared. ;)

​I do love my mustard greens...

P.S. The title is a spoof off a WBtS's song "Army Bean", which is to the tune "In the Sweet By and By". "Army Bean" is a giggler of a song, if I ever heard one...

Happy Thanksgiving!! 

I suppose it's "weird" for me to be writing a blog post on Thanksgiving day like this, but oh well. I'm not feeling so super today and the food's all a-cookin' (except for the things that don't need to be fixed yet), so I figured I'd fill you in on the latest chicken escapades and other "things".

Anyway, I went out to feed chickens according to habit yesterday morn. I have been closing them in at night since the last mink-attack and they had apparently not been bothered. I suspect now it was because of the snow being on the ground. Having mostly melted by yesterday morning and therefore softening up the ground, ol' minky had done a little digging and gotten into the coop (from the evidence) and I had lost two more birds. 

I came in a bit steamy. I didn't get any better either--it went so far that Mom walked up to be with this little can of herbal stress/anxiety reliever things and told me to take one. It did seem to help...but that doesn't excuse my temper rearing it's head. I finished that thing off about the time we left for the shop (I go in with Savannah on Wednesdays generally) and had my tea. 

We came home probably around 5-ish. After a bit  Mum came in and asked if I'd go put straw out for Daddy--who was working in the coop. Oh sure...no problem. 

I think I went out about 5:30. We didn't come in until after 9. 

Daddy already had a floor down in the coop, but I helped out by running for tools, a light bulb, zip ties, chicken wire...I measured and cut chicken wire for the west sections of the coop (it was dark by then). Daddy stapled it up first and then he screwed wood strips over the edges to hold it even more securely. He fixed up a new support for the roosting sticks, the nesting boxes having been removed which also doubled as a roosting stick support. He sealed every floor gap up and then built a door for the east entrance. This one fits flush into the frame so there is no gap--I don't think I a mouse could squeeze through.  

In the meantime I was doodling around doing a little of this...a little of that...shifting the position of the lamp...handing screws...digging screws out of the box...chasing down the plug...standing with my hands in my pockets...making fun of the rooster...giggling over the hen that was just purring herself silly in one corner...I also took the old east gate down.

I did eventually put the straw down. It was the second to last thing. Daddy was working on the gate and I put down the straw while he was doing that. 

Katherine came out for a while and did a few odd things, too...we sent her in when we were almost done since it was kinda chilly out there and she had on a light-weight dress. 

I was so cold by the time that we came in that even though I had a hot shower I didn't warm up until sometime after I went to bed (at 11). I was still cold when I went to sleep, so it was pleasant to wake up almost hot this morning....

Hopefully, there won't be any more necessity for "Chicken Chronicles" until we get some new birds...which at six eggs a day (at max for about the last week), we are going to need.

But...Happy Thanksgiving (again!) 

Y'all probably thought that I had totally, completely, irrevocably forgotten about the Cow Cavalry, didn't you?

Think again: ​http://freedomslightfilms.weebly.com/news/an-update-at-long-last_

:) 

I wonder how much AfterEffects work I can knock out tomorrow.....

Today we got our first snow of the season. It has snowed pretty much non-stop since ten this morning. It was still snowing when I came in from locking the chickens into their coop for the night (a new habit which so far as resulted in no more dead birds). 

I spent probably thirty minutes out there knocking snow of the "breezeway" bird netting and trying to straighten up fences crushed under the weight of the snow. Netting was busted right and left and the movable cover for the paddocks was busted. Not just the netting off, but the 2 inch PVC pipe snapped off at the elbow joints. Booger. And I saw this massive hawk perched in the one of the Linden trees this afternoon, too.

Oh. man. I just had a thought. Since the breezeway is intact...I could just shut all the gates and keep the birds in the breezeway until we get the fences/covers fixed up. I'll try to remember that when I go to let the birds loose in the morning. Not that they'll be much inclined to be out in the snow anyway. I remember last year throwing a chicken out into the snow and it's reaction was hilarious as if foundered about absolute disgust at that white stuff. (I forget why I tossed the bird out there like that anyway, but it wasn't just to register it's reaction...) I don't want that hawk wiping out the REST of my birds.

Anyway, I kind of enjoyed my dusk excursion into the snow. I was able to stay pretty warm in my purple coveralls...I didn't even have my coat zipped. Hurrah for sweaters! (I love my red CHAPS sweater...it has cabling on it and a V-neck so's it doesn't choke me half to death. ;] )

We're going to try going to church tomorrow...I hope we can make it and don't have to stay home...

Ha! You thought we were done with these for the year didn't you?

Well...the mink (I think), has other ideas.

I went out this morning and found FIVE of the layers dead. All of them had their necks snapped right at the base of the skull...two of them were actually missing their heads. I was not a happy chicken farmer this morning, that is for sure. This leaves me with sixteen birds, including the rooster who isn't a brave one. He just makes noise from behind the girls...

Well, towards dusk, I got the live trap out of the barn and set it in one spot where I have had two to three dead birds previously (before this morning). Then, Daddy and I got the two small snap traps set. There is a third one probably floating around the barn someplace, but since the critter that was getting into the chicken feed carried it off, we have no idea where it is. I came in and then I recalled that I was supposed to check bait ideas for mink. 

Sounds like just about anything...so I raced out into the growing dark towards the spot where I had thrown the dead birds this morning. I whipped out my knife and hacked the quarters off two of the birds and then bounded across the back barnyard to the chicken area. I set the snap traps with slivers of thigh meat and then decorated the chains with feathers...I also smeared the quarters about on the ground around the traps in an feeble attempt to cover up other smells. I dumped the rest of the meat into the live trap. 

I'm rather hoping to find a critter in my trap(s) tomorrow morning and no dead chickens. If it's a mink I'll be adding another hide to my collection. (I haven't finished the previous mink yet.)

Anyway, I've done all I can and now leave the outcome to Providence. In other words, I'm going to sleep tonight and not worry about things. If I'm to get the varmint, he'll be there and if I'm not, well...he won't be.

Today, I am dressed in a black denim jumper. I look like one of the moms/older girls from my generation of homeschoolers (minus the bangs. I never could have bangs due to my cowlicks, but I no longer want them either.)

Once upon a time, there was a nickname that applied to many homeschooling families--The Denim Brigade. Or at least, it was a nickname I've heard my mother use. While there are still Denim Brigade kind of home educators out there, I have noticed that I no longer can recognize a homeschooled kid simply by the clothes they have on...or the way they carry themselves.

When I was a kid "it takes one to know one" was pretty easy. Our clothes and demeanor told the tale for the most part. The first homeschool conference I ever went to was two years ago (shocking!) and while there I noticed something. The "uniform" no longer exists...not in the way I remember it at any rate. 

I knew that some of those kids were homeschooled only because they were at the venue...they didn't look any different than the average public schooler. There was even the sibling contention and sass. Then, on the other hand, is the sea of maxis and four shirts plus a scarf. (No offense if that's your liking, I'm simply not a fan personally...partly because I'd look shorter than ever and I don't like to layer that much). 
Here and there I spot kids in what I would have worn. T-shirt and skirt...or a jumper (though very few of those). 

At anyrate, I'm not saying that the Denim Brigade needs to make a come back or that we were more "righteous" because we wore different kinds of clothes. It's just...it almost seems to me that there is an element of worldliness that has crept into the Christian Home Education movement. Or maybe I feel like I'm getting to be an old maid and I'm not as cute and perky and skinny and fashionable as these teenage girls in their often too clingy maxi skirts...and I'm stubborn and don't like to stretch. Then again...I'm pretty comfortable in my own skin. Who else do you know who'd go out in public like this:

All in all...there is a difference in today's home educators and I in general think that we have surrendered ground--but it really has nothing to do with the wearing of certain articles of clothing, it goes deeper than that--our theology and orthopraxy. We're wishy washy, to cowardy to stand on our principles for fear of giving offense, to weak to face extra hardship...we don't really believe God and His promises. Maybe it's because we don't really recognize that GOD is ONE-HUNDRED PERCENT SOVERIEGN. Oh, that's so easy to say, but so much harder to actually live (which shows that you actually believe it). 

Life may throw us a few curve balls in the next few years...I don't know, but that's what people keep intimating. How are the homeschoolers going to stand up to it? Are we going to knuckle under, weak and fearful? Or are we going to square our shoulders and press forward, trusting in our awesome, amazing, sovereign King come what may? None of life's curve balls are outside HIS control--each one is ordained for us. Praise Him that it is so! If it weren't I'd be so scared that I couldn't function. There is a great sense of peace in knowing that the Lord does all things for His glory and the good of His people (Rom. 8:28). 

In conclusion then, my jumper isn't a status symbol. It's not worn to shame those wearing skinny jeans. It's not worn to make me feel like I live in the last century. It's worn because I like it, it's comfortable and practical. It doesn't make me more holy. It doesn't even mean that I believe that God is sovereign more than other people do. This really isn't about clothes, but the hearts of the next generations coming to age behind me and around me...and a longing to raise a generation who understand that clothes aren't the issue...but their hearts. Their love for God. Their obedience to the heavenly Father. Clothes don't make the man (or woman). Godly character does. We have no lasting identity outside of Christ our King. No...not even we "homeschoolers". We're just people and as "just people" we have an equal responsibility as any other person to bow our hearts before the Creator King.

I will cease now. May the Lord seize the hearts of the next generation of home educated children!!

I assure you, that if the old saying, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away" were true, I would be set for, oh...I don't know, a couple of months. Apples have been a very enormous part of my life this week.

I opened my week on Monday by picking apples. I ended up with who knows how many pounds--the big bowl full, two and half cardboard boxes full (smaller than book boxes, but not by much) and two five gallon buckets brimming. I woke up the next morning with a glorious crick in my neck that stuck around for most of the remainder of the day. I think, that in addition to the curled up position I was sleeping in, that I got that crick from having my head thrown back and operating the apple picker for several hours on Monday. 

I'm surprised that I didn't have any other real achy muscles because I, non-tree climber that I am, "climbed" into the tree and balanced myself in a few precarious (or what felt like precarious) positions on the thick-ish limbs that split the trunk into a 'V' not very far up. Even at that, I was unable to get to the apples at the highest points. I find it almost amusing, perhaps at my own cowardice, that in these kinds of situations I start to unconsciously repeat short little prayers along the lines of "Please Lord, do not let me slip..." Not that it's a bad thing to pray under the circumstances, (after all, we are commanded to pray at all times), but in comparison with other people in extreme trials, the fact that I'm scared of falling four and a half feet out an apple tree is almost ridiculous. 

I don't remember if I started peeling and coring Monday evening...but I spent a greater portion of my waking hours sitting cross-legged on the floor peeling and peeling and peeling. In between I washed dishes and ate...(I did spend Wednesday at the shop, but I think I came home and peeled apples later in the afternoon). While I didn't actually cut myself this go round, I wore the skin off my right thumb to such a degree that the skin was a almost raw pink. It's kind of more purple now after scrubbing up my crock pots this morning. It's sore, if that's necessary to remark. ;)

I canned a total of something like 21 quarts of applesauce this week. I wonder...how many apples did I actually eat in the process?? Who knows......

I meant to write a post on Tuesday...I meant to write a post yesterday...and I meant to write a post today. Well, now I am...

Tuesday I have three things on the little marker board which I call "mine". They were:

• Chicken coops
• Feed Bees
• Bathroom

I started with the second one on that list, the feeding bees one. I got the syrup started (doing the no-heat version) and didn't get it out until twilight.

Then I pitched into the bathroom. Literally. I didn't intend to do the deep clean that I did when I started. I knew the room was dirty...we haven't been able to keep up with the laundry recently and I, among others, have just kept ignoring the fact that the shower needed scrubbing as did the sink and the toilet. I ended up doing all three of those, but after I had taken the Pig (our vintage vacuum) to practically every square inch of wall and floor (wall to get the dust and spider webs that have accumulated). To get to the floor I ended up moving the washing machine and the dryer (not in that order). Before I put them back in place, I took a soapy rag to the floor too. The ol' bathroom was definitely cleaner by the time I got done.

I fully planned on cleaning the chicken coops after lunch that day, but instead I went to town with Grandma. That ended up being kind of fun after all--despite when Mum first asked me to go I rather growled about it because it messed up "my" plans. 

Therefore, not having the time to clean chicken coops Tuesday, I went right to it after morning tea (which by the way, comes after I wash the breakfast dishes). I started with the brooder coop and hauled a couple of wheel-barrows full of caked straw off. Then I organized a few thing into the coop (might as well use it for storage!) before I marched into the layer's coop and rudely shooed them all out. I gathered up another handful of eggs and started forking the old straw out once I moved everything movable out. I went ahead and knocked the bottom out of the "second-story" nesting box that was rotting out. I could just imagine a chicken and clutch of eggs falling through the trap door...it'd be kind of funny really, but what a waste of eggs!

Roughly half way through the job, I started a down slide, so I when I got done shortly before lunch, I essentially knocked off for the day. I was very useful all afternoon with my feet up in my favorite chair. At least my fingers stayed busy. I finished the first sock of the next pair.

That brings us to today. Now....what did I do today?? *mumbles* "Ate breakfast...dishes (of course)...tried on my dress..."

Speaking of the dress...it was one that Mama got in August when we were supposed to go to a friend's ball out of state--well, the girls went and I stayed home because I was sick. The dress had been partially disassembled, being too long on me (OF COURSE! ;D), but Mama got it fixed today. While it doesn't look exactly like it did before, I still love it. It's black and pale green--what's NOT to love? 

Anyway, I had that dress on a half a dozen times today it seems like. I look forward to actually getting to wear it tomorrow evening. (Somebody please help me understand why my family always does things like dress alterations at the last minute?)

I made lunch...yes, I did! :) 

*returns to mumbles* "After lunch...dishes (of course)...Katherine's dress...that project..."

So I had two sewing projects this afternoon. One was cutting off and hemming Katherine's dress of the ball tomorrow. I got it a wee bit on the short side, but Katherine doesn't seem to mind too much. The bright side of course being that she won't step on it now!

The other project...well...all I'm going to say about that is that it was an experiment more or less--but it was a success. 

I went out to feed the chickens and on the way in Daddy asked me to help him move some wood. Katherine came to help too (poor girl has had some sort of terrible itch for a couple of weeks now!) and even though it got dark on us, we finished! I think it may be time for supper now...so I'm going to abandon y'all. Bye now!

After all the work  that goes into making applesauce, the idea of letting the former batches I had done this year mold and spoil was quite unpleasant. Nearly all the sixteen quarts I had canned in the last month were molding or fixing to mold on top. Apparently my water bath canning process wasn't getting the apples hot enough (even when hot packed). The last six quarts I did (last week's batch) got water bathed twice and they still weren't sealing properly--so Mama suggested oven canning them. That worked. They're nice and tight now. Therefore, this morning I got started opening all the earlier jars, scraping the mold off the top and reheating the apples. Once the jars were washed up, I re-packed them and popped a batch of eight into the oven. One of them busted... After lunch, I did another seven. I  scraped off enough that I don't have a full sixteen quarts now..but you know, that's fine. I'd rather have fourteen quarts than none because I didn't do a good enough job the first time around. I'm pleased to say that all of them are nicely sealed and now I'm not worried about losing over a week's worth work sitting  cross-legged on the floor, plus blisters and a few cuts. :)

Oh, and by the way, it is good applesauce. I'll probably be making some more fairly soon since the trees still have apples on them.

In addition to that today I did some laundry...and doodled around doing a little bit of helping out with a front room clean out/up job. So...while certain areas of the house are a little piled, others feel cleaner because of the vacuuming and dusting and organizing job that got done(ish).

I was planning on cleaning the chicken coops today, but once I got the second batch of apples in the oven and realized that they'd be ready to come out at four...I decided that I would just forget chicken coops today and tackle that job tomorrow. It's supposed to be even warmer (it was 74 today) anyway, so I'll get what may be my last hurrah of summer tomorrow. I hope the chickens will appreciate a clean coop. I don't care if they don't, I will. It's been needing done for quite a while now and I just haven't gotten to it and haven't gotten to it. Lord willing, tomorrow evening will see a freshened up coop and a happy chicken owner.