Field Trip Tuesday

Yesterday we attended “Down on the Farm” day at the local fair with our co-op group.  We started our day off, having Mini Mouse pancakes at our favorite local restaurant. We got up earlier than Papaw was really ready for but we didn't want to miss a thing. Papaw did get a few minutes to nap, before meeting up with the group at the fair.

Doodles was so excited and raring to go!

It was such a wonderful program. Thanks to the University of TN and all the volunteers who helped to put on that program. Our kids had a blast but I do believe, the adults had tons of fun too. Also, thanks to Amber the gal that arranged it all for our group from our co-op. We have the most amazing folks in our co-op that really goes out of their way to coordinate our outings.  

Below are a few photos from the wonderful folks who entertained and educated our group during the "Down on the Farm" day at the fair.

The fellow who opened the show with juggling.

The bug guy was so funny. The kids loved him.

He really cracked us up when he stepped out with the hat on.

The bee keepers group was of interest to Papaw and I too.

The gal doing the "Wow, that Cow" table gave us a lot to thank the cow for.

The kids got to milk a mock version of a cow.

 

The highlight for Doodles was being able to pet all the animals but the horses were at the top of her favorites list. She loved getting to pet the pony too and talk to a gal there with the horses that was a teen. She really thought that was cool.

The kids learned so much about all the grains that the farm and farmer provide. We learned that there are grains and items from the farm, in almost every thing in our homes. 

The kids got to handle soy, wheat berries and dried corn. Doodles was excited to see soy beans. She loves to munch on roasted soy beans and adds them to her salads.

After the program was presented to our group, we were free to go and check out all the other exhibits at the fair. I do think we spent the most time in the poultry house checking out all of the different breeds of chickens, geese, ducks and foul. I can’t tell you how much fun it was to see the different breeds and study their personalities. We certainly know too now, why we really don’t want a rooster. Man those guys were so loud in there yesterday calling back and forth to one another. It was so neat to hear them.  I am just glad we don't hear them here daily on a regular basis.

I know we were never this interested in chickens and birds before we raised our own. After seeing the category of the Red Pullets, we do think we may have been able to enter one of our gals and walked away with a prize winning ribbon. Not that the gals that were entered were not beauties but, we do believe a few of our gals could have brought home a ribbon or two. Even in a couple of the egg categories, I am certain that a dozen of our daily double eggs could have walked away in the largest egg category.  We measured and weighed one of our largest eggs today and it weighed 81 grams. It was 3 inches long and exactly 6 inches around. That surpasses the Jumbo category by the US Standard. I will take a couple of photos of our Extra Jumbo sized eggs and post them in a couple of days. 

Modern Sizes (USA) Size Mass per egg Jumbo Greater than 2.5 oz. or 71g Very Large or Extra Large (XL) Greater than 2.25 oz. or 64g

I have so many photos from the fair that rather than post them all here, I am going to just toss them over on my photo stream. Click here to see more photos from the fair.

There was an abundance of produce. I was surprised to see a variety of red okra. I never knew there was a red okra. I have never tried it but, would love to.  I must give kudos to some of the local growers for growing some beautiful produce. I just hope one day, we are able to grow such a wonderful variety of veggies in our own garden.  I must get to one of the seed saver community meetings before long. I would love to grow our garden from all local seed.

After the morning and afternoon at the fair, we came home for a bit of a rest and some coffee, before heading back out to Wonder Works in Pigeon Forge.


We were so beat after the morning spent at the fair, I know we were all questioning if we could find the energy to continue on. This was also the week Wonder Works was sponsoring their homeschooler week with free and discounted admission for homeschool families. So, for our schedule, Tuesday was really the only day we could go. Doodles has wanted to go there for such a long time. It was a very neat place to go and I do want to return there sometime, when we can spend more time really enjoying each activity.  I do think that Papaw and Uncle Joe Joe really enjoyed the place too. They seem to have lots of fun just playing together there too. Those boys really play together so well. While they were playing, Doodles and I were in the “Dance, Dance, Dance” booth. They were planning late 70’s and early 80’s rock music and we both found a few new moves. The boys found us in there and they had a few moves to share too. I think when Papaw picked Doodles up to spin her in the air for a big finish, they about finished off Uncle Joe Joe with Doodle’s feet. Papaw whipped her around so fast, Uncle Joe Joe barley missed getting hit. To see more photos from Wonder Works click here.

Field trip Tuesday was a lot of fun. My feelings about getting out and enjoying the fall with a few field trips here and there, is a thing we must do. We will be home all winter long, without so many opportunities for field trips. We are just going to go for it and enjoy the fall as much as possible.

Doodlebug still had a full day of school work today. She had a math test, which she scored a 96 on and also, a math lesson that she only missed one question. She had a spelling quiz that she did very well on too. This afternoon, when she went for her piano lesson, she was very tired. Even her piano teacher noted that she seemed a bit more tired this afternoon. I wonder why?  I am sure she will rest well tonight, I know I will.

Many heartfelt blessing to you all!

Someone ask me this past week...

"So, what have you been up to?" For a moment, I had no response. I had to really stop and think for a minute, what have I done all week? It isn't like I haven't been busy. My response was, "ah, not much." Then I did a mind recount of the week's events and this is what I came up with.

Mostly, I spend much of the week hanging out and playing with Doodlebug. We spent the week making a few new outfits for her American Girl doll. She really enjoyed that. She had me to make a dress to match a fall dress that I had made her last fall for her doll. We also made an old fashioned dress too, which is requiring a bonnet and I am in search of pattern for that.

 We also picked a world of tomatoes, green and red. Put a few quarts in the freezer for soups and fried up a few green ones. Those were yummy!

In between crafting with Doodles and working around here, I have been trying to reorganize the sewing room a bit. I started refolding a lot of the fabric and trying to have my fabric stash a bit more visible. It never fails when starting a sewing project, I dig through the stacks of fabric and my shelves are a mess by the time I am done. So, I decided to get it together and get that shelf straightened up. I blog surfed for a bit of inspiration. I am amazed of all the creative ways you gals come up with for organizing your sewing rooms.

I started folded fabric in my spare time for a couple of days only to realize, I wasn't going to be any better off when I was finished. My fabric would still have to be stacked and I would still be digging and making a mess of that self with every project. So, I was back to blog surfing to find some answers. I found really neat fabric organizer boards but they were not within my budge. I kept surfing until I ran across several folk's suggestions of using magazine boards or comic book boards to fold the fabric around. I found a  board that suited my needs, it was BCW "life" magazine boards, 10 7/8 X 14 7/8 inches.They are certified to be acid free so, I won't have to worry about them having an affect on the fabric color. I just placed the order yesterday for the boards. I can't wait until I get them and get things straightened up a bit in here again. I'll let you all know how that works out.

Also, this past week a friend shared with us, several DVDs about the universe and the planets. We watched a couple of those with Doodles. She is always interested in the planets and outer space. She is certain that aliens must exist.  She sweet talked Papaw into working the solar system puzzle with her and they talked a bit about the planets.

I do think Doodlebug is starting to look forward to the start of her homeschool routine again. Papaw and I went on Tuesday to sign her up for her homeschool enrichment classes.

One of the classes that we signed her up for was "Hands on Shakespeare."They will be doing a performance of The Tempest. It should be a lot of fun for her. As you can see from her video clips throughout the blog, she has no fear being in front of a video camera. Put her on a stage and she becomes a completely different Doodlebug. She has a case of stage fright so, we are in hopes this will help her over come that a bit. She loves reading scripts and preforming a play at home. Over the weekend we found a couple of fun books for this school term. They are Scholastic's Folk & Fairy Tale Plays for Building Fluency. This book is for 2nd to 3rd grade reading levels. We also picked up Scholastic's 12 Fabulously Funny Fairy Tale Plays. I can't wait to do Rafunzel and no, I didn't spell it incorrectly. Spiderella also sounds like it may be fun too.

I can't blog without an update from the hen house. Our hens are really keeping up production so, I knew making a couple of breakfast quiche' would cut down on the surplus a bit. These were so tasty. I think I will be making a couple of lemon pound cakes this week for Papaw. That will use up a few more eggs.

And last but certainly not least, we have been doggie sitting Bones. It is like romper room here when we have Bones and Doodles too. It is never quiet, until they are asleep. He gets kind of lonely when she goes home. He is a sweet dog and I enjoy having him around.

So, there you have it, our week as it was. Hope you all had a great week.

Blessings!

More Eggcitement

Breaking news from the hen house: We have just discovered that indeed we do have 2 chickens laying a double yoke egg on an almost daily basis. We noticed that we had an extra large egg daily. Then just today, Papaw said, two of the gals are laying the extremely large double eggs. We cracked a few of those open over the weekend and they always have double yokes. Yeah! Now when a recipe calls for two eggs, I'll just use one of our daily doubles.

 

A Hen House Moment

While in the hen house this weekend re-stuffing nesting boxes with straw, a hen laid an egg on the floor right beside my foot. As you can see in the video clip, the gal wasn't happy. I knew she was ready to lay and couldn't get comfy in the nesting boxes because there was very little straw in them. I went to get the box of straw to get busy re-stuffing but couldn't get it done quick enough. She just backed up in the corner on the floor and dropped her egg in the pine flakes. It was kind of neat. All of the gals seem to be doing well and we are now getting seven eggs a day. That still means, one or two are still not laying daily or they are rotating who gets a day off.

While at the produce stand over the weekend, talking to a couple of old farmers, one was wondering if we would want a breeding pair of quail. We have no idea what raising quail would be like but are going to look into it. If you have any input to the pros or cons of raising quail, please let me know. Comment here or send me an email. I sure would appreciate it.

Blessings to you all!

Learning to Earn

We really wanted to start teaching Doodlebug about saving money. We wanted her to learn that working and saving money for the things she really wants and needs, is a worthwhile thing to do. So back in January, we washed out an old pickle jar, made a hole in the top and placed it on the kitchen counter. Each time Doodles was given a chore, I would remind her about the jar. At the end of the week, I would talk to her about the chores she did or didn’t do, discuss how much she earned or didn’t earn for the week and why. I would give her what she had earned and she would put it into the pickle jar.

Over the next few months while working on money Math, we would pull her jar off the counter for a counting session. She was excited to see how much was adding up. Each time, she would talk about what she really wanted to do with the money and I would encourage her to think about it for a while. At first she thought she would buy an American Girl doll.

One afternoon we had to go to the co-op to pick up a few things and from that day on, she had made up her mind what she was saving for. She fell in love with the baby bunnies at the co-op. For weeks and months, that is all we have heard about were those bunnies.

This morning at the co-op we walked in to pick up supplies and sitting right at the front entrance was a bunny hutch and several little bunnies inside. We sized up the hutch, did a bit of math with the supplies needed and the cost of the bunnies and she had enough to buy them. She is so excited. When we got home this afternoon, we talked with her a bit about what it meant to work and save money and also about how good it felt when a goal of saving was reached.

She still has a little money put back but, her pickle jar now only holds her kindergarten two dollar bill and a bit of spare change.



So, here are photos from today of Doodlebug with Snowy or Snowball, she hasn't decided on it's name yet. The other little one is gray and white. It is Papaw and mine's favorite. She named it Raisin.

 I am waiting for it to cool off a bit this evening so that I can go out to the barn and put a few coats of sealer on the rabbit hutch. We are in need of getting it done so we can get it set up and ready for them. For now, the bunnies are in Doodle’s bathroom in a box. It seems her bathroom is becoming our livestock nursery these days.

We may have to start a business venture with her in the future. We have no idea if we have a pair or the same sex or not. The bunnies are only 6 weeks old and too young to be able to determine that now. I am keeping my fingers crossed we have two of a kind. If not, we will be in the bunny marketing business until we can make a few changes.

An Update From the Hen House: As of today, we are a couple of eggs from our first dozen. We now have two gals laying daily, one in the morning and the other in the afternoon. They are sharing the same nesting box. The eggs are slightly different colors but as the gals are really starting to produce. One of our gals is laying nice dark brown eggs, while the afternoon gal's is a bit lighter in color. They are still a bit small but hopefully with age, they will produce large eggs.

Hope everyone is have a wonderful 4th of July weekend! God bless America and God bless all of you!

So much Eggcitement!

Doodlesbug couldn't wait to pop out to the hen house this morning to check for eggs. She was so eggcited so, I thought I would share just a couple of photos. So far, I guess we have one hen on a roll. She has laid 3 days in a row. Can't wait till the others get on board. I would love to start using some of the eggs and do a bit of baking.


As soon as robbing the 1 nest was over, I jumped on the tractor and cut the grass. Wow, the grass had really grown with all the rain we have had. I noticed that the little garden spot needs weeding and the flower beds as well. I think I will try and get some of that done first thing in the morning, if it doesn't rain. The rain has been good for folk's gardens around here for sure. I am amazed to see how tall some of the neighbor's corn crops are. I think we'll be seeing a bumper crop of corn in the area if the rains keep up as they have.


I am looking forward to making some fried green tomatoes too very soon. Yum!!!

Many blessings to you all!

What Luck?

I know we have been a bit crazy lately and all caught up with our chickens so, let me apologize and say, I am sorry if we have seemed a bit obsessed the last few days. I know the eggcitement will die down soon. {grin} I did want to share this with you though. Can you believe the very first egg our chicken laid was a double yoked egg? I am sure it is a maturity thing but I did research what the odds were of getting double yokes. The stats say, only one in every 1,000 eggs produced in this country is double-yolked.

So, you maybe asking yourself the same thing we did, what about egg number two? Believe it or not, it too was a double yoked egg. They were small yokes but we were impressed with her first attempts and giving us doubles. If I played the lottery, I would be buying a ticket tomorrow.


Now we are laughing it up and wondering how many doubles in a row could this gal lay? We'll let you know.

Doodles got back this evening and we had to fry them up and make egg sandwiches. They were delicious too. She had her's over easy and I scrambled mine up. Papaw said he would try a bite but let us gals have the first two eggs. Tomorrow's egg is all his. We are looking forward to the other gals getting busy here very soon too. Who knows, maybe tomorrow there will be more than one egg in the nesting boxes.










Doodles wants to raise goats and rabbits next. She really wants to turn this place into a "real farm" as she calls it. It has been a wonderful teaching opportunity raising the chicks with her and she felt a real sense of accomplishment while eating her egg sandwich.

Now I promise, no more mention of our chickens again for a while unless...they do something eggtraordinary.

Hope you all have a great week!
Many blessings!!!