RIP Ms. Judy

Sadly, over the weekend, Ms Judy disappeared from the coop. We've been having a problem with raccoons, so I'm thinking they had a nice chicken dinner.

Man has now started his quest with a trap! No one gets a chicken dinner before him!

Ms. Judy Sunning herself with Arica:

State of the Garden Address....

I know, I know...I'm late! But only by a day (maybe almost two if I don't get this typed fast) The address was on the agenda for the 5th...

The garden is doing very well...surprisingly. Not as well as Dad's but he got his in two/three weeks before ours and loves miracle grow.

All four tomatoes have fruit. We should be able to enjoy some of the cherry tomatoes in the next week or so.

3 baby zuchinis...which is amazing as I always plant it and everyone else that does has zucs coming out their ears and I don't get any to set. This year may be a change.

We have shelling peas that will need to be picked today. And the limas are climbing everywhere. I planted corn for them to grown up (not so much for the actual corn, but as living trellis) but the corn is past knee high, so who knows we may actually get some. The green beans and wax bean patch (The BOY did all the work on this bed) is doing GREAT and we have 1 inch beans the size of string.

Carrots, onions are doing alright...radishes, lettuce and spinach did not...the seed was old, so it was a chance.

I picked up some 1/2 price brussel sprouts and acorn squash at the nursery and it is in. The squash and cantaloup (we call it "did-elope" as we did!) are flowering. The cucumbers/pickles have TONS of flowers and a few that are gerkin sized.

We have a voluntary pumpkin patch from where the chickens wintered and had harvest pumpkins to eat in November. Also we have about 8 voluntary tomatoes. They are growing just not very fast as it's not a very sunny spot.

We are getting raspberries out of the patch planted last spring, strawberries are pretty much done now. We got one bowl full.

I will get the pictures posted soon!

Happy 4th of July

With the way our government is right now, I don't feel like this is much of an Independence Day, but it's a great day for parades, picnics and fireworks!

The BOY and I rode our bikes from home over the dam to downtown...6 miles. Yes, cudos all around...and then after the parade, rode the 6 miles back home...hot...and mostly uphill. There's where the kudos should be! We did it!





















Then Mom and Dad came over for an indoor picnic (it was raining!). Followed by fun on the driveway including sparklers, pop-its, and watermelon.

Then off to my work to sit in the parking lot for front row seats to the local fireworks! It was a great spot!!! Until the 45 mins to 1 hour to get OUT of the parking lot.

Happy 4th of July to YOU!

back to work...

Yup...I'm back... I was so nervous. I didn't need to be, it's like I never left. Except the new faces that think that I am new. :)

I'm still trying to get things done at the house, too. We've powerwashed the deck. And, had concrete work done to try to stop the water into the garage. The new garage door has been ordered. And MAN had someone come to get the logs that we've been wanting to get milled out of the front yard. It will keep some family warm this winter. There are still quite a few that need cut up, but they are not right in front of the door so it's not as urgent.

I found a house that I like that is at the top of our price range, but with the way the market is, we can't make an offer until we have an offer on ours. We're up to 24 showings so far. Yeah!!

T minus 6 days.....

6 days before I rejoin the workforce and become a productive worker. *snort, giggle* No really. I am planning on working hard when I get back...but that would imply that I am not working hard now...wouldn't it?!

So we ended up with 5 showings on Thursday instead of 4. 1 on Friday, 1 on Saturday. But we haven't heard ANYTHING yet.

Today I put my schedule into overdrive...I have so much I want to get done in the next 6 days. It doesn't sound like much but I worked all day on the Boy's room. He has the huge storage closet that runs the length of his room and a step up. It's our "attic" storage. It was FULL! I took the crib and changing table out for the yard sale and it's been in the shed while I waited for a serious flake to come pick it up. Finally I reposted it on Craigslist last night and a guy that works for Rolls Royce came by this morning and bought it and the dresser (so of course I'm frantically tossing all of the Boy's clothes OUT of the dresser as he was on his way! So since MAN is working on building his first dresser for a customer and BOYs is next, I had to find a place for all that stuff and all the jazz in the closet. I ended up spending almost 8 hours in his room today!

Then I went to pick up a computer I bought for him on Craigslist (I haven't mentioned in a while how much I heart Craigslist...) It was a screaming deal $50!!! And it has XP! WOOHOO! Came with the monitor, mouse, keyboard too. Plus, he gave me another one for FREE. He said "give this one for the kid. You keep the other!" So maybe I will be able to upload pictures soon!!! (If not on the new computer, then maybe when I get back to...no...I will be a good productive employee!)

The I planted 3 more plants in my Mother's Day Topsy Turvy. We now have 3 tomatoes, 1 green pepper (sorry, cole! Need it for salsa) Cilantro, and Parsley. Also, the funnest thing happened...where we wintered the chickens has become a voluntary garden! All winter we dumped straw and sawdust in to keep their feet dry. I also feed them pumpkins from harvest time. And leftovers. We have about 12 voluntary tomato plants, and about that many pumpkin plants. And they are doing great. I put one tomato in the Turvy. And put 3 into pots (so if we move we can take them along) and I planted one pumpking into a pot.

The BOY and I moved two bales of straw from winter over to the potato patch. We got 3 eggs today. The peas have blossoms, and we have two huge Zucchini plants. We've been nibbling the strawberries and raspberries as they've been getting ripe, but don't have enough to "do" anything with them.

I cleaned the oven and put up new curtains in the downstairs bathroom. With all the showings, this is the longest our house has been this clean. Oh, had I told you that after my massive yard sale (the best one I've EVER had) I had to buy a vaccum. Yeah. I killed the other one...decisively! Ping POW..something broke on the...umm..man told me what it was. Oh well. So I have a new one that everyone "fights" to use, which considering we have been showing on a daily basis...it's already well used.

What else, went to the grocery store. I will be running out in the morning to pick up about 500 square feet of sod from a guy from...say it together...Craigslist. I just got off the phone with him. Another out of control deal! Oh, and I'm picking up training wheels from a lady on Freecycle. Why training wheels you ask...we're going to put wheels on the coop to make it move easier!

List for tomorrow:
Powerwash deck and table. (DONE)
Powerwash front patio.
Stain deck.
Lay sod. (DONE)
Weed strawberry garden. (DONE)
Weed BOY garden (Flower garden with a statue someone gave us of a little boy, when BOY was born) (DONE)
Weed raspberry patch. (1/2 DONE)

And we are having a few guys out to grind out the end of the drive near the garage and put in drainage. Yes after 7 years of the garage flooding every time it rained..and making MAN crazy, it's finally going to get done. AND we have to get the garage door replaced. The garage door opener popped the center board of our rickety door off.

Pictures of BOY Powerwashing the deck!

Oh my....

So yesterday was wonderful! I reconnected with an old friend I hadn't talked to in a few years (!) and just as I thought, it was like the time had not even passed! Happy Birthday, girl!

No showings yesterday....one today that ended up rescheduling for tomorrow (blessing as I have a migraine) but the phone is just ringing off the hook! We actually have FOUR showings tomorrow!!! And one on Friday. Man and Boy will be going to Cleveland on Friday (and then Amish country) to do a delivery and Amish country to 1-Meet with our wood supplier 2- buy GOOD cheese 3-Go to Lehmans, the best store for folks like us trying to get back to basics. They're going to bring me a catalog!

Say a prayer for one of the lookers to become a buyer!

House Showings!

So we listed the house with Judy Gang, our realtor (the family realtor, really-she's helped my parents buy/sell multiple houses, helped us buy this one) on Friday afternoon. By Sunday morning we had a showing. Then another on Monday (that ended up changing their mind....after I ran around vaccuming and basically stash n dash). But it ended up being for the good, as the folks that came on Sunday came again for another showing last evening. Their kids played with Zachary and they looked for over an hour and then we chatted with them until the misquitos ended up driving everyone away.

We really like these folks and can picture them loving this house like we have. The man works with a contract group that supports the printers at MY work. And the wife works at the building right in front of mine. They have two wonderful twin boys that are about Zachary's age. So we have sent up prayers that we may get another--more reasonable--offer. She wants to live in the country, him the city..so this is a good compromise. Pray please!

well..

We did get an offer...a ridiculous offer! Basically $3000 less than what we still owe on it AND they want us to pay all the closing costs, etc. So we will be listing the house with Judy Gang today...and going on with the search.

What's gone on...

I can't believe I haven't posted yet in June...so much has already gone on! Let's see.

I joined Urban Active and have taken my first aquacize class. It went very well. And I really did work. My calves hurt for 4 days afterwards! Class again today.

Curriculum sale went well! I only bought $3.50 worth of stuff and sold about 1/3 of my stuff. (and gave a bunch away). So I came back with half. And was able to return all the dishes from the wonderful ladies that fed me and my family while I was laid up.

My sister is doing well. Still in pain, but recovering. I'll be running over to her house tomorrow to check on her. My grandma, however, just went into the hospital. SO I will need to run out to Riverside again to see what's going on with all that.

Man, Boy and I built a new tractor for the babies. The chickies are doing well and getting BIG!

Well, I FINALLY had my yard sale on Friday and Saturday! The only two days it didn't rain! And it was GORGEOUS out! Not too hot, not too cool, very sunny and low humidity! OK, I realize...too many !!!! But it went really well and I can't help it!!! It's my first yard sale that actually made $$$ The church about a half mile from us was having a huge rummage sale and tons of people were going to it, and saw my signs. Man made money, Boy had a cookie and pop stand and made money. I made money. WOW! About 1/2 the stuff left. I even put out the crib and changing table. A big step for me....admitting that there likely won't be another baby to put in it. It didn't sell at the sale, but since then I have been contacted by a girl who wants to buy it. I've also sold some of my curriculum since the sale ended! I took 5 boxes and 2 bags (including ALL my Mary Kay bags-another biggie!) to charity. I have 3 boxes to take to Once Upon a Child. And tons of curriculum that I am still slowly selling through Homeschoolclassified.com. And I put out a bunch of Scrapbooking stuff. I did sell a little bit of it, but ended up packing it back up. I don't have the heart to just "get rid of it". Maybe next time.

Oh, and I showed Man's beds to two families during the sale, and one of them placed an order yesterday. OH, and during the sale on Friday I was contacted by a realtor that wanted to show the house on Saturday to a couple from Cincinnati. So Friday night, I spent trying to put the house back together. I think the showing went well, as yesterday (Monday) they drove back up to see it again. Prayers going up, fingers crossed, etc. Their house is already sold, so they have to move fairly quickly. The realtor said it was between our house and one other. I hope they chose ours...but then we will have to move fairly quick and we still haven't found a place to move. God will provide. I had been praying that we would be moved before I had to go back to work....I go back to work in 17 days. So....

The garden is doing really well, I was going to do a "state of the garden" address on the 10th, but the garden may not get harvested by us!

Here's praying the house sells today....I'll keep you updated...then I might be having a MOVING sale!

Updates: Random

We did not have the yard sale this weekend, it was pushed to next weekend. I was not ready.,

I spent Thursday at the hospital, where my sister was having surgery. She is now home and resting. All went well.

Baby chickies are getting too big for the dog kennel, so the Man and I will be building a coop this afternoon.

BIG Curriculum sale with my homeschooling group on Monday night....how did I manage to accummilate all this stuff?? Here's hoping it ALL sells...and I don't find much that we WANT and only what we NEED for next year!

Looking for a homestead...

To say that I am tired of looking for somewhere to move would be an understatement. With the way things have gone, well, discouragement is the best word. I have a theory of what God is doing....When we started this journey...things needed to be just so, x miles from this or that..each time our expectations are lowered. So much so that a house that 6 months ago would have had me screaming and running (and me running????) the other way. Fast forward to now...that same house that has a bad foundation, you can see the sky through the roof, needs all new drywall and a kitchen...we're upset that someone else came in and bought it out from under us! How crazy is that??

We're off to see another home today...and oddly enough...the foundation is collapsing and will need repaired...and we are hoping that our basically intact house will sell so we can buy it. Yes, things have changed. We'll keep you updated on the search.

Oh, and I am having a yard sale on Friday and Saturday...if you are local come on out and shop!

Chicken Update!

Here's what we've missed in the past two months in "Cackleberry Hollow".

Ms Judy and Scarlett have finally been accepted into the fold, although at times the Buffy's with their "Ohio Orpington" attitude still likes to put them in their place. We've discovered that Scarlett lays a pretty pink egg and that Ms. Judy lays an Army green egg. Now that is is Spring/Summer their egg production is up. Usually we get about 3 a day, but some days we're surprised with 1 from each of them for a total of 5.

A week before Easter, we went and picked up our 7 new day olds from Myer Hatchery up in Polk, Ohio. It was quite possibly the coldest day in April. We had 7 of the cutest chick. Summer, the Americauana, that looked like a tiger, and was the Boy's favorite. He held it in the car the whole 2 hour trip home and then constantly the first night. I even saw Summer riding in the back of a Hess truck (a favorite gift from Pawpa). Of course, once I saw it we had to stop it as Summer was only 24 hours old.

Then we had Becky, the Buckeye chicken, Maran, the Cuckoo Maran, and 4 silkies. The silkies were straight run, which means we didn't know if they were boys or girls, so they hadn't been named...except the littlest one, Runt. All started out well. I will post pictures when I get to the library (my computer here is too slow for that...it times out) We started a project with Summer of measuring every day. She was growing about 5/8 of an inch daily. I have some funny pictures because they started out living in a Ramen box...chicken flavored :) Summer was a character and seemed to like being handled as much a the Boy would handle her. On their third night, she even got out of the box and seemed to go looking for him. I heard her crying, loudly, at 3 am and struggled downstairs to find her out of the box in the utility room, all the way on the other side of the playroom. A huge trek for something the size of a tennis ball!!

Sadly, by Easter, my back was getting much worse and it was very difficult to get downstairs. (Or stand, or sit, or...) and the babies ran out of water, became overheated, or something (I'm thinking the first...) and on Easter Monday, the Man had the sad job of letting Boy and I know that all but Maran had perished in the night. Even Summer. It was an awful day. But we tried to learn from the experience and lear that we were responsible for these critters on loan from God. A hard lesson for an 8 year old.

Maran started receiving lots of love and care. I called the hatchery to see if we could get the same breeds. It was going to be months before they had Buckeyes and Americauna babies available again. Sigh. Then....

One week after the tragedy, the Man was gone for the day off doing a delivery to Dayton Ohio. He stopped on the way back from Dayton to the Tractor supply to get the big chickens some feed. When he arrived home at 5ish, he called up the stair to me (where I was now basically confined to bed and had not ventured downstairs in about 5 days.) He called up "Who's hungry?" We said, "we are!" He replied, "Well, I have a bucket of chicken here for you." He came into the room and handed the Boy and I a box that was peeping!!! A box full of new day olds!!! And then we ordered PIZZA!

These ones are surprises!! We don't know exactly what breed they are, what color they will lay, what they will look like as adults..although now that they are a month old we have a better idea. Only 1 of the new birds has a name. Maran is a week older so she has always been bigger, but now the others are catching up. We have 2 white ones, and 4 redish/brown mottled looking ones. The smaller white one is Dini (pronouced "dean-y") for Houdini. She managed to keep getting out of the box, to sit on the top and watch the world go by...or hide behind the cabin, or walk across the floor...) By my best estimate, I think we have two White Rock Chickens and I think they will lay white eggs, and I think the 4 are Rhode Island Reds, and will lay brown eggs. Maran is black with white spots and will lay chocolate brown eggs.

My "chicken" lady that we got the Buffies from last year, heard of our sad news and has emailled that she just had a hatching and would like to trade chickens for wood shavings. So now that the "babies" have graduated out of the utility room (and thank goodness, they were getting smelly) and into a dog cage out by the coop. We may actually get a couple more. If we could find a property (yet another post) and get out of here, we would take lots more. She raises Buckeyes, so we may get another Becky in the next batch. She also has a "Splash Maran" that has the exact opposite coloring as our current Maran. So we may get a Splash. I'll keep you updated, and get pictures posted soon!

Sadly

I'm back!!

Sorry for the long delay! Lots of updates to get through, so watch for multiple posts in the next few days as I have the opportunities.

The surgery went well. The surgeon took out "three pieces" of disc that were resting on the nerve. At this point, I don't think there could be much of that disc left. I didn't handle the anesthesia very well, and was ill again. Apparently, I also had a difficult time waking up from it this time. I spent the night in recovery as they had run out of beds in the hospital. It actually was fine because I basically had a nurse to myself (I shared her with only 1 other patient.) She looked like Sarah Palin, so I was in good hands :) After returning home, I slept for about 3 days, and then started walking and recovering. My wonderful homeschool group brought meals 3 times a week, and a few of my friends came to clean. Talk about humbling. I'm such a messie, and to see the ladies that I respect seeing the "real" me....sigh. But, it's been such a huge blessing! Just this past Thursday, I had my 4 week update with the surgeon. He has given me permission to start being more active, walking in the pool, biking, and lifting MORE than 5 pounds! Yippee. Do you know just how >>little<< 5 pound is???? I couldn't even lift more than 1/2 a gallon of milk for a month! OH, and after the 1st surgery 2 years ago, I had lost all the feeling in my 2 littlest toes on the right. After this surgery, they woke back up!! Of course, I know I can feel them again because the littlest on feels like it is dislocated, but HEY, I can feel it! WOOHOO! And even that is getting better. So that's the update on my crazy back!

Another side bit of news, back in February, the Boy and I went to go get pizza. While waiting we read a little one page newspaper called "The Coffee News". It had a paragraph about they were taking 100 word essays on who you would nominate to win a Urban Active Membership. The Boy said that I needed a membership. (Ah, the frank honesty of a child). So I told him he could write the essay for his English class. He did. Fast forward to the Monday after Easter. We were so sad as 6 of our 7 day-old chicks had met their demise during the night (more in the chicken update), when we got a call that, "Your essay has won the contest!" I was (and am) very proud of my Boy. And now I have a membership to a gym so I can "get skinny" as Boy wrote. In his essay, he mentioned how I've been trying to get fit after the last surgery, and I had to tell the editor from the paper, how I was going in for a second surgery the following week. Luckily, they made the gift certificate good through June. So I could start after being release by the surgeon.

So I have about 4 weeks to get strong, and get the house in order before heading back to work. I've got tons to get done! But I kinda am looking forward to working again.