Way out in the Middle of Nowhere

That's George, Fred is behind him. They're doing well.  I've put up the enclosure again so they can be protected while outside. They have food, water and a bath in their enclosure. The rest of the flock is still harassing them. I don't know why, nor do I care. I just need time to be inside. Carrie is sitting on the last 2 eggs we have. I've incubated them until yesterday when B5 was internally pipping. B3 and B5 were fertile and have progressed well since I popped them in the incubator. By putting them under a broody goose, she gets to be Mom and I get my life back. This is just a nice photo of part of the flock. I can tell right away this is the flock we term "Ron's Flock" because Buddy is in it. Buddy, Ron, Sweet Pea and Gingi are all part of our original flock sent to us over 2 years ago. Everyone else in the group is Ron's offspring: Ronson, Sissysan, Penny, Nelly, Lumpy and Arthur. It was a cool morning after a good rain. We could u...

Sissy's babies hatched! She's got 3 Uncles and one Daddy who are her Nannies.  It's hilarious to see them all looking after these 3 little ones.  They are little fluff balls that waddle behind Mama where ever she goes.  As soon as I can, I will get a pic of the babies on her back.  It's cute. At times they are under her wing, but if they are sufficiently warm, they just nap on her back. There's still a lot of hissing and charging from the Uncles, but Daddy has calmed down a lot. Sissy's got them out for a tour of the lilac bush in the picture. This is Molly on her nest. She got a late start. After spending most of the spring running away from the guys, she finally decided to let them near her...which led to mating.  She's got 11 eggs under her.  Dave's been building nests to see what is the optimum dimensions for them.  This one is 3' square by about 8" high.  The concrete block in front helps her get in an out better. We're revam...

Does anyone else have this issue with knitting...that when you finish one *big* project, you get all scatter-brained and start about a dozen small projects because you can't get it together mentally for a big one? It's been a month or two since finishing both Blessed Days shawls, and I can't seem to focus knitting wise for more than an hour or so.  Nothing has captured my attention long enough to keep at it. I've got two throws, one baby sweater, two hats and a sock on the needles. None of which is close to being done and I'll bet at least 1/2 of them will be frogged.  I do that, when I notice that I am too scattered, I will frog the projects that I come across. Of course, I should give myself a break; school has just gotten done, I've hatched out 18 ducks in the last 2 weeks and have played goose mama to 6 new girls. That's a lot on my plate! OH! I should tell you that Molly, our mail-order bride has started laying eggs.  Buddy's not her mate, ...

I can smell grass! It smells lovely. So here's the count of animals  here: 7 adult geese 4 adult ducks 3 roosters, 4 hens 6 female goslings 3 ducklings of indeterminate gender 6 bantam chicks of indeterminate gender 28 duck eggs incubating 3 bantam eggs incubating 18 eggs on Sissy the goose's nest. 3 human adults 3 cats who do absolutely nothing but eat food. A duckling explaining life to Dave. Isn't he/she adorable???? They've lost much of their yellow fuzz and are replacing it with white down.  After that come the feathers.  They are liking it outside and have been introduced to the flock.  The boys are very interested in the girls. As Mama Goose, I must remind them to keep their distance. In order to help keep the two flocks apart, I made a partition of sorts from a sheet torn into strips with narrow strips of fabric sewn at the corners with enough room to stick bamboo garden stakes through. You'll see it the background of the top photo. ...

Technically, it's Spring.  Technically is the key word here. Let's take a look outside, shall we? Yeah, that's a loaner car next to the van, my car's in the shop again. ~sigh~  My family keeps asking me why I go to the dealer to get my car worked on when there's others who would do it cheaper.  Yeah, but they don't give me loaner cars.  I've got things to do every. single. day. that require a car. And the car rental places charge $50/day for a car.  So...is that really cheaper than the dealer? No. Not even close!  And like I told the Supervisor over there on Friday, I'm giving those mechanics a chance to learn how to fix 'old school' cars without computers, with carburetors etc.  They need the challenge, right? I've been working on a new shawl pattern called, "Blessed Days."  The first one was knitted from handspun wool from a grab bag offered on Etsy. I emailed the lady the pattern, thought she could use it as a marketi...

It's been awhile since you've seen a real picture of the geese. They're full grown, with full grown voices and full grown annoyances. Yeah like teenagers. But here's a few of the others things that hand out back: Four Pekin ducks.  Two breeding pairs so to speak: Two male, two female.  That's great right? Yeah, no. One male has usurped all the females.  Most of the time we've got one male dejected duck by himself. Man, even when you stack the deck, things just don't fall right! The ladies are laying eggs.  We'd love to hatch out the eggs, but right now is not the time to start incubating, with winter being about a month away. Incidentally, I don't think those guys can NOT walk and talk at the same time.  They quack away while waddling one after the other from place to place. This one is a bit hard to puzzle out, but there are two hens and 7 baby chicks in the lilac bushes. We started with 10 chicks, but 2 drowned in the pools and one di...

Honestly, I have been knitting! The thing is though, when you're working on a new design, you have to keep it secret.  This is a cowl that I've designed and now I need to write the pattern out and publish it. It's a nice, close knit pattern great for guys. This morning I wore it outside to test it out since it's 41 here in WI. I'm also working on a stranded hat.  There's about 10 skeins of Knit Picks Palette that I scored for 50 cents a piece at Goodwill some time ago.  I've been playing with different stranded designs.  Sometimes I just want to mess around without a real aim.  The Aidez is taking a time out mainly because I am afraid to mess up the bind-off on the sleeve re-design. I know, ...get over it! It's getting colder, so that might be my impetus to get it done. I find that some of my homework reading is done better if I am knitting at the same time.  I concentrate better. Bantam chicken update: we have 10 baby chicks under two hens i...

About a month before we got the ducks and eating chickens, my Sister asks if we wanted these chickens her Brother-In-Law had. Sure, 'in for a penny, in for a pound'.  So we got 6 chickens.  We did not realize until they got older they were Bantam Chickens, or as my Momma would call them 'Banty Chickens.  They're smaller than your usual chicken. About the size of a Cornish Game Hen. Ah well.  We kept them, threw them in the coop when they got older  and they free range.  I even gave them names:Fried, and Fricasee are the roosters, and Sauteed, Broiled, Broasted and Curried are the hens. Yeah, that was before we realized they were too small to hassle butchering them. They're like 6 months old now.  We have fun watching the rooster displays, holler at Fried and Fricasee to STFU and let them eat bugs. Well Sauteed come up missing one night.  We have a nightly ritual where Dave herds the ducks into the coop with the chickens and I herd the ...

I'm not that old, nor am I MacDonald, but I am part Scottish! To count: Three goslings hatched last week.  That was primarily why I was not blogging.  One was a bit slow emerging from the egg and needed help. There are 24 chickens under that galvanized roof that is the brooder.  They are bigger now, but still UGly! These chickens were bred for meat and show it: large breasts, spotty feather production, stupid as the day is long. We put them in the garage for protection until they are big enough to head on out to the coop. The coop is 99% done - we are working on shingles and that's it.  If it weren't 100 degrees in the shade, that would be done by now. Four ducks. They're fun to watch.  Until a few days ago, they were out in the laundry room. They're only a month old, but they wanted out...really wanted out.  So now they are in the coop with the larger chickens. Yesterday it rained for about 15 minutes.  Those ducks were outside happil...

I mean, what will Google learn about me? Well, that I spin, knit and hang out with many people who think like I do.  My friends and are convinced we're on some sort of watchlist for the Government anyways..we'd like to get assigned to the same re-education camp so we can cause no end of trouble. Since the last post a few months ago, the Brauners have decided to go into poultry raising.  Chickens and Geese -well A goose - right now. This little guy/gal was hatched last night.  That's a goose, by the way.  The one that Dave now says if I get too attached to, will be hard to eat.  That's not something I did not already know, Dave...Thanks! Besides, each flock needs one good guard goose and this little one will probably be it. Now, I announced to my family that we were getting 25 chickens in May. So my Sister comes over one day and asks if we want ones early.  Uh...yeah....sure. We've got no coop ready but I figured she was talking a few weeks before th...