Finally, Eggs and an Update on the Snyders

Yahoo!

I'm finally getting eggs! First I had four one day and then a couple days later I went in and found all these. I really love the dark olive green ones. We crossed Americana hens with a Barred Rock rooster and ended up with these really great dark olive eggs.

The pale blue one on the right above is from the Americana and the ones behind it are from the cross. It doesn't make them taste any better but it sure is fun collecting them.

An Update on the Snyder Family:

They recently got a nice, three bedroom house trailer to move onto their property. They put it alongside an existing pole barn which they quickly converted into a big living room and storage. Now they have room for everybody again. The kitchen in the trailer is really bright and roomy and my friend, Gay, is so happy to be living and cooking in her own house again.

I went to a spaghetti dinner and silent auction benefit for the family last night. There was a huge turnout and the whole basement of the church was full. The spaghetti was delicious and the big piece of chocolate cake for dessert was awesome! I bid on a few things and was really excited when I won.

Look what I won!

Isn't this antique picture really beautiful! I absolutely love it. I also won two vases which I gave to Gay to take home. I hope she likes them. One was a beautiful pink with flowers and the other was a really pretty blue.


I also won this yummy banana spice cake and had to have a piece as soon as I got home. I am still full this morning.



I also won this!

Ins't this the coolest cupboard. It's made from really old, weathered barn siding and has three shelves inside.

It makes me happy just to look at it and I was so excited to show Kevin. He loved it too.

Here's the whole entire Snyder family. There were all there last night along with Gay's sister from Hilton Head, NC and Dan's (Gay's husband) mom and sister. I think Gay's family filled up half of the church's basement all by themselves!

Til next time,

Beth

I'm Way Over It!

Well, well, well......... now it's time to test everyone's patience. Christmas was almost two months ago and now what do we look forward to. It's nowhere near time to even think about getting excited for spring. The other day I told someone that I think spring is in the air and they looked at me like I was crazy, I'm not kidding. I really wanted to believe it.

Two days later we got dumped on. I think it was 400 inches that we got here in the snow belt. (Any people south of the Mason Dixon line will never understand.)

People say I shouldn't complain, you live in Ohio, get used to it.

They just don't understand.

I don't think they have to carry five gallon buckets of water to their chickens through 45 inches of drifted snowbanks. Trying to maneuver along a thin trail that the dogs have carved out is impossible. The bucket of water bumps along, usually dumping a half a gallon down my leg and into my boot. Although I actually did get some eggs yesterday! FOUR, yes, four from 12 chickens. That's all since the first of January.

This spring I'm investing in Australorps! I'm going to thin out the flock and get some chickens that actually lay eggs. I'll keep my favorites hens though, the ones that I love. (Which is actually all of them so it's going to be really hard!)

This guy has decided to start sitting up at the top of this tree. It barely looks strong enough to hold him. My brother in law, Tom said it looks like something out of a Dr. Suess book.

Look how funny. He's lucky he's so beautiful because yesterday we went round and round. Him trying to kill me and me trying to get away from him. I ended up wrestling him to the ground, laying on him, with one arm around his body the other hand around his neck (so he wouldn't peck my eyes out). Yelling at him, explaining that I can't clean his water bucket if he is trying to kill me. I think I almost strangled him, the look on his face was crazy. And by the way, he is huge and scary. I had to wrestle him down two times and then he almost left me alone... let's just say he was a little more respectful of the crazy woman.

The other day when I pulled into the driveway after getting home from work I saw that he had flown over the fence, probably from this perch. He ran to the car and commenced to try to surround me. His head reaches up above the car window and he was staring at me, chattering, daring me to come out. If you've never heard a mean turkey- that is the sound they make when they want to kill you, it's kinda like a really mean chattering sound but it ends with a really cute sigh. I'll have to try and record him sometime. I got the snow brush from the back seat of the car and used it as a defense weapon to get out. If I have any kind of long stick in my hand I can bonk him on the head with it and he will back away.

Here is the 400 inches, of course it's not 400 but it may as well be.



This freezer is on the back porch, (how hillbilly is that) anyway, look at the snow and how it drifted. Funny, huh? I couldn't wait for Kevin to get up and show him but it collapsed shortly after this. It was still dark out (maybe 5:30 a.m.) when I took this picture.



That's a lotta snow on that table. Looks like 400 inches to me!




The doggies making their way to go potty. That's similar to the path that I walk through to the chicken house, nice huh. Kevin plowed it once for me but it was just before we got the 400 new inches.

Even with all the snow and everything there is still one thing to look forward to in February!

A box of chocolates and a bottle of champagne.

If you've never had Austi Spumati champagne you need to try it. It's not expensive either. At least this bottle wasn't. I think Kevin said it was like $15.00, not too bad for a special occasion?

Happy Valentines Day Everybody!