My dear, Eleanor, you were obviously born into the wrong story.

Augh!!!  No more school work!  No more chores!  Everyone just leave me alone!  It's my birthday and I just don't care if My Little Warrior ever understands how to turn a plural noun back into a singular noun nor do I care what My Silly Girl keeps finding as she cleans off the shelves in the laundry room.  Holy crap!  Can they not see that I am trying to do something that I enjoy?!?!?!  Of course they can.  That is why they keep disturbing me.  If I were shoveling the driveway or cleaning the toilet I wouldn't see them for hours, but since I decided to catch up on my blog, they have to be right here tapping me every two seconds.  Why do they tap?  Do they think that I can't see them or hear them?  Do they have to tap on me?  After about the first tap it starts to hurt.  NEW RULE:  NO TAPPING!!!!!!!!

I have wanted to write here forever and just haven't been able to find the time lately.  You may want to give up now.  It's probably going to be long.

My Little Warrior got the haircut of his dreams this fall.  I finally decided that the people who would think badly of him because of it probably already do, so I quit fighting it and let him do what he wanted with it.  The Man of My Dreams and I had a long talk with him about it.  He understood that this would not be an appropriate hairstyle for someone who was representing the Savior as he passes the sacrament or collects fast offerings.  He said that is why he wants it now, because next year he'll turn 12 and he will have to have a "normal" haircut.  The original deal was that he would do it every day.  I've given up on that.  He can't wear his bike helmet with it done and he can't live without his bike.  (Also, he discovered that he can't do it himself, and I don't want to do it every day.)  When he doesn't do it up, I call him my little horse because he looks like he's got a mane.  I thought he'd be tired of it by now, but no.

We went to the Utah State Fair with our friends, the Case family, this fall.  We saw Elder L. Tom Perry in the home arts building.  That was pretty cool.

My Scholar qualified to run in the Utah State Cross Country meet this year.  He was SO excited.  (So was his mommy.)  In fact, it was his final push at the Regional Cross Country meet that qualified him and two of his teammates to go to State.

at the starting line

 There he is -- #197!

 Mandarin oranges after the race

We decided that we need a family room again.  We just don't have any space to move around.  The ideal solution would have been to move or add on, but we didn't do it that way, of course.  The boys moved into the bigger of the kids' rooms together and My Silly Girl moved into My Little Warrior's old room.  My Scholar's bedroom was made out of bookcases in what had been formerly (and is once again now) known as the family room.  These are pictures of the process of turning a pink, girl's room into a boy's room and the final results of turning a junk heap into a girl's room.

The Boys' Room

My Silly Girl's Room

My Little Warrior wanted to be a plain, old ghost with a sheet over his head.  I did a major happy dance at that idea!  The face and hair paint were our compromise.  He wanted to just have eye holes in the sheet and I am anti-mask.

Because we finished the bedrooms (on Halloween morning) our kids got to have their annual Halloween party in the house instead of in the freezing cold garage this year.

 My Scholar had elf ears, but by the time I got down there to take a picture, they were no longer on him.  (I'm sure glad I ran all over the valley and ended up going into that really creepy store to find them for him.)

 The infamous Skittles game!  If you like Skittles, you won't when this game is over.

My Scholar was in the high school musical this year.  They did Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.  They did a fabulous job.  I loved it so much I saw it THREE times.  I cried each time he came out on stage for the first time.  I'm such a big baby.  (I cried at Toy Story 3, too.  I cry at cross country meets, parades - when the flag or my children pass me, dance recitals, choir performances, you name it.)

 He's one of the guards on the right of the pyramid.  The one whose arm is pointing up, away from the pyramid.

 Check out those abs!!!  (Isn't it amazing what a little bit of paint can do?)

My Little Warrior turned eleven last week. 

 The Cake

Pack meeting was the night after his birthday. He received his Arrow of Light at pack meeting. He also received the award for having earned ALL 20 Webelos Activity Badges. Then he crossed the bridge from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts. That's my last Cub. Luckily, I still get to work in Cubs even without a son in the program!

 Bro. Miles -- one of the two greatest Webelos Den Leaders ever (Sis. Miles is the other one), The Man of My Dreams, My Little Warrior, and our Cubmaster.

 This mother's pin ribbon is getting so heavy!  Way to go boys!  Now, if I could just get one of those Eagle pins!

Our bridge is built out of Cub Scouts (usually).  The first section of the bridge is made of representatives of the Wolf Den.  The middle is made of representatives from the Bear Den.  The final section is made of representatives of the Webelos Den.  When you have pack meeting the night before Thanksgiving, you don't always get the all the Cubs there.   It worked out though, because Bro. Case was a former member of a Bear Den and Sis. Miles is a Webelos leader.

I have more I'd like to write, but it will have to wait because it is time for lunch and pretty soon the yelling I did at the beginning of this blog will wear off and they will be back tapping on me again.

But If It Runs Like a Deere, Man, Her Eyes Light Up!

She likes the way it's pullin' while we're tillin' up the land

She's even kind of crazy 'bout my farmer's tan

 

She's the only one who really understands what gets me

She thinks my tractor's sexy

I love this time of year!  Wednesday morning when I went outside to let the chickens out, I was both saddened and excited to find frost on the ground.  In years past this simple act of nature would have sent me into a tailspin.  This year it brought relief.  (Either I'm getting old, or I'm just worn out -- probably both.)  I was sad that the tomatoes and peppers in my garden hadn't produced more this year than they had.  It wasn't a good year for them in our garden.  We had beautiful plants and they produced nice fruit, but nothing ripened or grew as quickly as usual in our garden this year.  The prospect of being done with the garden and having one less thing placing demands on my time was a such a relieving, burden-lifting feeling that I felt more alive than I have for a while.  (It's funny because I never felt the garden was a burden, but to be done with it until next summer felt like someone released me from one of the many chains that bind me to all that has to be done.)  I felt so alive that I wanted to create something.  It was a little chilly to be working out in the yard, so I went back in the house and canned pepper-onion relish, which turned out to be delicious.  (Our family has discovered over the last year that we really love relish, so we have tried several different kinds.  So YUMMY!)

All summer I have wanted a basket that is big enough to gather the vegetables in my garden.  I have watched at the DI -- for those of you whose eyebrows just went up, I did go to the DI two or three times this summer (the DI and my OCD do not get along very well -- thank goodness for rubber gloves) -- and I have looked at some at Michael's and Walmart and such.  The baskets I want always cost upwards of $30.00.  To me that is a ridiculous amount of money to pay for a basket to use to pick fruits and veggies.  So I refuse to buy one.  Then one day when I was looking at some willow baskets and grapevine baskets, it hit me that I have two grapevines in my back yard.  I determined then that I would make my own basket.  So, I checked out several books from the library on basketry, but none of them said anything about grapevine baskets.  I did find several websites that talked about how to make them.  In the end, I decided to do my own thing.  On that first frosty morning, I decided to celebrate the frost by making my basket.  I started it before lunch.  I got a good start on it that day, but I didn't have time to finish it.  I finished it on Friday.  It is really cool to say, I made this.  It's far from perfect, and I learned a lot from it, but I made a basket that will be strong enough to hold my produce.  It is about 18 inches in diameter at the top of the basket.

This is the basket in it's finished form

I learned several things from this basket.  The reason that a lot of baskets have a separate bottom piece that is added on to the basket is because it is VERY difficult to get those vines to weave into the tight little curves that become the bottom of the basket.  Next time I will start with the bottom rather than the top and I will make a flat bottomed basket.   I also read about how basket makers get willow bows to bend without breaking.  I will work on that as well.  So, my finished basket is big and doesn't have as many vines at the bottom as it does at the top.  I have decided to line the basket with muslin.  so the bigger holes at the bottom won't matter.  I had a lot of fun making this basket.

I also checked out a book on making rag rugs and I am very excited to try that.  Now I just have to wait for the time and the funding (although I don't think the funding will take all that long -- I already have tons of fabric scraps that I couldn't throw out.)  Time - or the lack thereof - is my biggest burden.

I am ready to buy a farm and become self-sufficient.  The man of my dreams laughs at me when I say that because I mean self-sufficient with his income.  I want him to keep his job.  Someone has to pay the power bill.  What I want is to have a bigger garden where I can produce all the vegetables that we eat for the whole year, plus some to share with family and friends.  I want a small orchard with a few peach trees, a few apple trees, a few pear trees, and a few apricot trees.  I really like my walnut tree, so I think I'd also like a few nut trees as well.  Then I would have enough to can as much fruit as I'd like instead of rationing it out all year because the peaches cost too much (and have to be purchased during the time that we are recovering from exorbitant school fees -- why don't I remember to plan for those!) 

I'd also like to have five or six sheep and learn to spin and weave.  I'd like to keep a few cows for meat and maybe milk.  (Which of course would mean I'd need to grow hay, too.)  I'd love to have a space for my chickens to free range rather than keeping them in a small run all day.  They love it when I let them free range -- but then I have to watch them or make someone else watch them on a farm, that wouldn't be a problem.  A horse or two would be nice, too.  Then of course, I'd have to have a small tractor.  This is my dream.  It will likely never happen, but it is my greatest desire.  I want to live at least a mile from my nearest neighbor and let my little warrior run as free and wild as he wants there on our little farm.  I'd like to be able to help people who need food because I have an abundance from the labor of my own hands.  I was born to be a farmer!  It's all I ever wanted until I fell in love with a wonderful engineer who puts up with my crazy little whims and indulges as many of them as he can.  (Hence my chickens.)  And then enjoys watching me revel in them.  I love this man!!!

News Flash!

Beauty is acutally a hen.  We have been wondering ever since she came back from her trip to IFA with the roosters.  This morning, my silly girl witnessed her laying her egg.  I'm so glad that the man of my dreams didn't listen to me and brought her back.

Lucy and Ethel still haven't started laying yet.  They are younger than the other chickens so I'm not surprised, but I'm anxious to see what color of eggs they lay.

That's all for now.  I have to finish purging the entertainment center of last year's school books and misc. educational stuff.

Tomorrow is always new with no mistakes in it. . . Yet.

I love the wee hours of the morning when everyone is still asleep and all the house is quiet.  At that time of day, all is right with the world and the day has so much potential.  It is then that I make my "to do" list for the day.  I always think that I will be able to do everything that I put on the list.  I have such visions of idealism that I am certain nothing will interrupt "the list", everything will go smoothly and everyone will cooperate.  I believe this every time even though the last time I had a day like that was back in 1993 B.C. (Before Children)  I have all these grand illusions of what my day will be like and how successful I am going to feel.  Then it is time to get everyone up and have breakfast, and about the third time I have to say, "Eat,"  I realize that I never should have gotten out of bed.

Nothing philosophical or thought-provoking today, just a little update of what's been going on in my chicken coop.  (Someone keeps pointing out that my chicken blog hasn't been much about chickens lately.  Who says that it has to be about chickens?!?!?  It's my blog, and I'll write about what I want to write about.  So there!)

On Saturday, the man of my dreams took my roosters to IFA to give them back.  They were getting to "frisky" with the hens.  (I was nervous to crack open the eggs.  It would break my heart to crack open an egg and find a chicken embryo inside.)  They were also a little loud, but I loved the sound of them.  It's awfully quiet in my hen house now.  My little warrior and my silly girl went with the man of my dreams to drop them off.  Imagine my surprise when my little warrior came running in the house and said, "We got to keep Beauty!" when they returned home.

I have to take partial responsibility for Beauty's coming back home, although I'd love to lay all the blame at my man's feet.  After they'd gone, I started second guessing myself.  I called the man of my dreams and told him to ask someone there if they thought Beauty was a rooster or a hen.  We went back and forth about what to do with Beauty, but before I hung up the phone I said, "Leave Beauty there.  I'm fairly sure that he's a rooster.  Don't bring him back home with you."  That planted enough doubt in the man of my dreams' mind and Beauty came back home.

I know, you're wondering, dear reader, how can you be unsure of the gender of this chicken.  Let me explain.  Beauty is VERY small compared to the rest of the chickens.  He doesn't crow -- he screeches.  (Is there a screech chicken, similar to the screech owl?)  He doesn't screech loudly, though.  It's just annoying, like someone else's crying baby.  (Not that all crying babies are annoying -- don't get offended.)  He never chases the hens or tries to pin them down like the other roosters did.  That could be because the hens are all two to three times bigger than he is and he is intimidated by all those large women.  (Poor Beauty!  Even the girls are bigger than he is.)  Of course, being given a name like Beauty probably didn't help his manly ego much either.  (All the roosters had girly names.  Once they started to display rooster tendencies, I let the kids call them whatever they wanted because I had given them all girl names.  Miss Biddy got cut short to Biddy because we were already used to it.  Sugar is a name my silly girl picked because the chicken was white like sugar.  Rob was short for Robin because my little warrior thought he had the same coloring as a robin.  And poor Beauty's name just stuck.)  If chickens could be gay, I'd guess that Beauty definitely was.

On Saturday morning, I finally gave in and we ate fried eggs from our chickens.  They were yummy, bite-sized, but yummy.  The man of my dreams says they better taste heavenly because these are the most expensive eggs that we will ever eat.  I told him it's not about the eggs, it's about me having my farm, and could we please get a cow?  (He said no.  Dang it!)

Before Saturday I was getting about one egg each day.  Apparently eating the eggs is a signal for the chickens because ever since then I've gotten three each day.  I know that Alice and Bertie are each laying everyday.  Alice's and Bertie's eggs are the size of small eggs at the supermarket.  Bertie's are a deep reddish-brown color.  Alice's are that deep reddish-brown with white speckles or a white film on them.  Lucy & Ethel's eggs are tiny.  They are off-white, and they are soooooo cute!  Only one of them is laying daily.  I think the one who is laying is Lucy.  We have only gotten a few eggs that weren't laid in a nesting box (2 on the floor and 1 outside.)  I think those were Ethel's eggs.  Ethel is doesn't go up into the nesting boxes much until night time.  Poor little Ethel is mostly blind.  I know this because her pupils are white and where the brown/orange/yellow color is in the other chickens' eyes, Ethel's are black.  She's a sweet little chicken and very gentle.  The kids like her because she is easy to catch and hold.  She doesn't like to go outside very often unless it sounds like everyone else is getting a treat.  She's not good at catching bugs like the other girls.  When she gets out of the nesting boxes in the morning, she flies full-force at the window and then crashes to the ground.  If I am the one who lets them out into the yard in the morning, I try to help her down so she doesn't have to crash.  (It was funny the first time it happened.  Now it just makes me sad for her.  Although some uncaring people around here still find it amusing.)

My hens always run to greet me now.  They always hope I will have a treat for them.  They really like the grapes off of our grape vines, or old cucumbers that the slugs started eating in the garden.  Last night we had some left-over corn on the cob which they loved once they realized they needed to peck at it and not hide from it.

Here are some pictures of the chickens and their eggs.

Beauty (the little back one), Ethel (the brown & black one), & Sugar (the white one)

Rob

Bertie & Alice

Biddy (Lucy & Sugar behind him.)

Sugar

Beauty

Biddy

Alice's first egg next to Lucy's or Ethel's first egg.

Fried in my small, eight-inch frying pan.

No, the muffins aren't giants.  They are regular-sized muffins from a normal muffin pan.

Rob crowing one of the last times I heard him.

"Some books should be tasted, some devoured, but only a few should be chewed and digested thoroughly."

Sometimes I have such a need for words. It's a craving more insatiable than any other need or desire I ever feel. When I get this way, I long to read things like To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee and submerse myself in a Shakespeare and spend hours perusing Webster's Dictionary. At times like these I hunger for the wordiness of Dickens or Twain. Most of all in these fits of prose, I yearn to write. I fill pages and pages in my journal when I get this way. In times like these I wish to be back in school taking English class after English class after English class writing paper after paper after paper. I ache to spend more time with inspiring words. I become so weary of the limited scope of phrases such as, “eat your lunch”, “are your chores done”, and “knock it off, you two”. I want so much to feel the richness of words like “perchance” and “languid”.

Then reality slaps me in the face as one of my children chatters on about every ordinary thing in the universe -- on which she is, of course, an authority -- while another child explains to me why he needs this or that new set of Legos (which, by the way, dear reader, we have nearly enough of to build ourselves a house.) When this happens, I realize I am a lone island surrounded by an ocean of mundane nonperplexities (which by the way is not actually a word.) So I am sending out my SOS, someone, please send the coast guard. I think my island is sinking!

Am I a grandma?

Our First Egg!

What an exciting day!  Kylie brought me this egg that she found in the chicken coop.  I held it up to the keyboard of my laptop for a reference point.  It is itty-bitty and oh so cute.  I'm not sure I will be able to use it as food.  Is it ok to save the eggs just to look at?  It feels a little like eating my grandchildren.  I'm sure I will get over it when I need it.  It's just kind of strange to think about it.

After I took the picture, I ran out to try to figure out which chicken laid it.  I started by trapping all of the chickens in the coop (since the run is to short for me to get into it), climbed in there with them, and began examining the chickens' vents  (the exit for all things coming out of the chicken) of whose gender I am not completely certain.  I found that several appeared to be ready to lay eggs (according to what I read in a book), but found no evidence (I was looking for a trace of blood or something -- since there was a little bit of blood on the egg) that the egg had come from any of them.  Then just for the heck of it I checked the chickens that I am fairly certain are roosters.  I thought I had figured out (from looking at the vents) how to tell which ones were roosters, so then I examined the others and found that they all had what I thought were boy parts.

At this point I was totally confused to say the very least!  So I ran in the house to ask my close friend, Google.  You have to be very careful typing in things like "sex of chickens" and "chicken genitalia".  (Just FYI.)  All the information said the same thing.  You tell the gender of a chicken by three main things:  1--roosters crow, 2 -- roosters have spurs on their legs, and 3 -- roosters have more pronounced combs.  That doesn't help me!  I know four of the chickens are roosters.  They crow.  Their combs are more pronounced than the other chickens, too.  The problem comes in the fact that most of my chickens are different breeds and I don't know their ages, so how do I know whose comb just hasn't started to develop yet?  I decided to let the spurs on the legs be the determining factor.  (The lady on the You Tube video said that no matter what the breed of chicken, all roosters have spurs.)  I went back out to the coop and trapped all the chickens in the coop again and climbed in.  I captured each one starting with the known roosters so I could be sure what I was looking for.  The first rooster had spurs.  The next rooster did not.  I looked again and felt up and down the poor chickens legs.  Then I found something that might be considered a spur in its beginning stage.  I worked my way through all of my chickens.  They all had spurs!  Either I am the worst chicken examiner, or someone is messing with me!

I give up.  I'm just going to stake out the chicken coop and see who lays the eggs.  What do you take to a chicken stake out?  Donuts?

I have probably traumatized the poor things so badly they won't lay for several days again.

As summer is winding to a close (thank goodness -- bring on the routine) I just wanted to post some of the fun reminders of the good times we had this summer.

Bear Lake -- Pioneer Day

Ahhh

The infamous beach ninja!

"I am your father."

Ammon's first sunburn! See what happens when you are too old to let Mom put on your sunscreen.

Kylie's Last Year at Oakcrest

Swim Camp

The Man of My Dreams

Nostalgia