Murder of Crows

We do a lot of (ok, some) stuff around our house in town to foster the presence of Little Brown Birds. We have a couple of bird baths, bird houses, I hang short yarn ends on the shrubbery in the spring for nesting materials, and I know for certain they help the chickens eat their food. We don't put out feeders any more just because of the cats in the neighborhood, but we did for a while.

I don't know all the types of Little Brown Birds in my yard, but my Mother-in-Law tells me most of them are Juncos. I especially enjoy one particular bird house on top of the swing. Every year we get at least one bunch of bird babies out of it and I can see it from my bedroom window. I love waking up to their song, and I sit on the edge of the bed and watch them for a few minutes before beginning my day. It's such a gentle way to start the morning - especially after years and years of waking to an alarm clock at O-dark-thirty!

This is my favorite birdhouse.

And here are this years' occupants patiently waiting for me to move away from their home. Such a shy young couple!

Yesterday afternoon I heard the familiar raucous cawing of several crows in the yard. Noooooo! I ran out and looked and three or four crows are flying around the top of a redwood tree. They're being dive-bombed by a couple of mostly ineffectual Little Brown Birds, but the crows won out. While I was frantically trying to get at the pellet gun, they proceeded to kill and eat the contents of that nest. Not sure if there were hatchlings or just eggs in there. They were just about done by the time I located the tin of pellets and gone when I finally had the pellet gun loaded and ready to put some sting in their butts. Murder of crows, indeed. They probably flew right back over to the nearest fast food restaurant and ate stale french fries out of the dumpster for dessert. Or some flattened, dried out road kill lying in the street. Nasty birds.

I've heard that crows are smart and that they can remember an angry face for years. I hope they remember this angry face and make our yard a no-fly zone. But I'm ready now and the loaded pellet gun is leaning by the door.

It was a little quiet this morning. Luckily, the crows stopped at that one nest. They didn't get at the eggs in my favorite birdhouse. Maybe I'll hear them sing tomorrow.

Yard Sale Footstool Redo

I've been without wheels these last few days because Hubby is away with the truck. I'm in easy walking distance to a little corner market and I have everything I could possibly need anyway, so I'm enjoying the quiet time. We had such beautiful weather over the weekend I decided to take a peek at Craigslist Yard Sales to see if there were any close by. By happy coincidence there were! My trusty True and I walked to one of the sales in the neighborhood and guess what?! I finally found it! (Not the sale, silly, the thing I've been looking for.)

I've been looking for a small simple footstool to prop my feet on in the evenings. I didn't want a big ottoman or anything that'd take up too much space, but this little guy was just right! And at $2.00 I couldn't walk away without it.

Just right except for the ugly factor.

So I decided to fix it. Make it pretty. Replace the grubby blue crushed velvet with something . . . more.

So I took it apart.

Eek! That's MY mannish, garden ravaged hand? 

Just undid the four corner screws that were holding the top to the stool and pried off aaaalllllll the staples that were holding the different layers of coverings on it. When I got down to the cushion, I was pleased to see it was still in pretty good shape. All I need is a new cover.

I decided to crochet one from a pattern called Retro Circles by Adele at threebeansinapodcrochet.blogspot.com.au .  Just love this variation on ye olde Granny Square!

The Retro Circles were joined using the Simulated Braid Join pattern by Carolyn at Gourmet Crochet. You can see it here: Simulated braid join.

Then I whipstitched the new crocheted piece directly onto the new muslin I'd already stapled on and re-screwed the top piece to the footstool.

And here's my new li'l footstool!

Isn't it cute? Now it matches all the blocky wooden things and funky homemade things I have in my house. And it's just the right height to rest my tootsies on. For $2.00 (and a nice afternoon walk), plus another few bucks for the fabric- and yarn-stash stuff, I think it's a pretty good deal!

Best Ground Cover

Irish Moss. It's amazing. About 20 years ago we decided to put flagstone around our patio. I bought a little flat of Irish Moss to plant in all those little spaces between the stones. The yard has gone through several incarnations since then, but the moss is still going strong. And it's spread. I find bits of it in the funniest places. All over. So I started gathering the bits and put them in two of my garden beds. And then I used the bits in my greenhouse.

I think it likes it in there.

As do the grape and Roma tomatoes (at least I think they're Romas, they're compost volunteers), the peppers, the baby avocado trees and the infant apple trees I planted from seeds (but the Meyer lemons haven't peeked out yet). With the greenhouse door open all the time, it stays a relatively stable 80 degrees.

Now I need to think up another project to use more Irish Moss. It's coming up again in amongst the onions and potatoes.

Don't mind the beer can. It's a slug trap.

Maybe I'll put it around the stones in the garden entrance. The oregano is taking too long to spread. If you have a small area where you'd like a low, hardy, pretty - it has tiny white flowers when it blooms - ground cover, I'd recommend Irish Moss. It gives a really good return on your investment.

There's another ground cover we use a lot. Of the two, I'd have to say Irish Moss is the best. It wears better in foot traffic areas, but I'll post about that another time.

It's Bloomin' Beautiful!

Just had to show you . . .

I'm surrounded by a flagrance of flowers, a bonanza of blooms, a profusion of petals, a . . . . do you want me to stop?

Judging by the blooms, we should have plenty of apples and blackberries, and some raspberries and blueberries too. We've never gotten much from the raspberry brambles or the stunted blueberry bushes, but we might at least get a few this year.

But it wasn't the edibles I was talking about when I mentioned the blooms! I took a walk around the property, and then the neighborhood and was struck by the sinful bounty of flowers. They're everywhere!

My single rhododendron

And my single azalea

The lilacs smell heavenly

My Mama gave me a dried seed pod of these oriental poppies. I crushed the pod onto the four-foot-wide strip of dirt that serves as my front yard about 25 years ago. The poppies popped and are still going strong.

magnolias down the street

The rhodies and azaleas in the neighborhood are by far the showiest of the lot. Spring. Couldn't beat it if you had TWO sticks. :)

Brooding Chicks

So, you'd be amazed how fast chicks grow! It's been, what? Two weeks?

Look at how they've feathered out! And they've almost doubled in size. They needed more space. So I got out the bigger tub, cleaned it out, put down newspaper and straw and let my little chickadees check out their new home.

I also raised the heat lamp a bit more. I knew they were plenty warm because they were starting to hang out on the edges of the lit area where it's a little cooler.

They liked it so much the ran around and crapped all over it. I'd like to say that's high praise, but chicken poo just comes with the territory. Just a few more weeks before they're fully feathered and can go out into the coop!

A Sweet Mother's Day Gift

I put this together for Sister's birthday, but it would definitely work for Mother's Day!

All it takes is a nice candy dish with lid, the correct color of jelly beans, Sour Apple Straws, green apple licorice, skewers topped with luscious fresh strawberries wearing semi-sweet chocolate all tied up with ribbon . . . the memory of the chocolate/berry smell of Sister's birthday gift is making me drool.

Hey, I'm a mama! And I have leftover strawberries. And chocola

Tide Pools

I count myself one of the luckiest of folks because we live so near the coast. A few weeks ago there was an extremely low tide in the middle of the day and we took full advantage to explore one of our favorite tidal spots.

 True's never actually caught a crab, but she keeps trying.

Those anemones spit if you touch them!

This crescent of rock and water is surrounded by a crescent of smooth gray sand. The beach is located in a small inlet in a bay and even when the tide is full the water is smooth and calm and the kids can swim as long as it's warm enough. It must be a marine nursery, because there are tiny shells . . . sand dollars no bigger than your pinkie-nail, thumb-nail sized clams, spiraling shells no longer than the shaved point of your Ticonderoga. The whole inlet is just big enough - five or six acres.

This is a young pirate's paradise. All the kids in our family and extended family know this as Pirate's Cove. 

In keeping with the pirate theme, a few years ago Hubby arranged a playdate for the Grands and Great-Nieces and -Nephews. He filled an old chest with pennies and "jewels" and swords and wooden muskets, eye-patches and tricorn hats. He half-buried the chest in a dune and allowed the kids to find it. Some are still convinced to this day they found real treasure. After all the play and swimming and sword-fights and poking around in the rocks, was a barbecue. It was one of the best days ever. But then, any day on the beach is a very good day. And a day in Pirate's Cove with children you love surpasses "very good" by a gazillion nautical miles.

The Happy End of a Colored Love Affair

Having grown up in rentals, I got used to walls painted apartment white. Used to it, but also heartily sick of it.

When Hubby and I moved into our little house, I figured, "It's ours, so I'm gonna go color crazy". And, boy howdy, did I! Each room was a different color of the rainbow. Over the years, the bathroom was Sea Green (complete with fishing net, glass floats, and shells), the living room was Desert Canyon (peach), the bedroom was Jersey Cream (bright yellow), and the kitchen . . . oh, the kitchen. Remember in the '80s when the Gingham Goose was popular? Well, I stenciled a veritable shooting gallery of geese all around the top of the kitchen walls - on purpose. Which was bad enough, but it took three coats of the next paint color when it came time to cover it up.

One of the bad things about color for us is the mountain o' paint cans in the shed with dribs and drabs of this and that color. Or not having a drib or drab to do a touch-up. Another is trying to match discontinued paint colors.

So this time, when we had to cover that oh-so-trendy paint color known as Brown Paper Bag, I came to a shocking realization. White is good. White is awesome.

The best painting tips I have to give are these:  remove all switch plate covers, heat register covers, closet doors, wood molding that you can before you even start. And always use semi-gloss paint for interiors. I don't care who says what. You can wash semi-gloss. Flat - not so much. Then wash the walls - or, at the very least, the walls around the kitchen stove. There. Those are my tips.

Rolling is much faster and easier than brushing, so you want to eliminate any rolling barriers that you can! Plus, if you remove them, you won't get this:

So now, after several 6-to-8-hour days of painting, the whole interior of our house is sporting at least two coats of 186A310 Ultra White. And it looks so clean and pretty. As does the butt of my painting buddy. :(

Time for a touch-up.

Holy Cow . . . I'm On Pinterest!

For my DIY Dry Cream of Mushroom Soup Mix. AND it's been pinned three times! Now I have five readers and I might as well be famous! So excited!

I realize it's been a long dry spell (again) but (again) I have a good excuse. Our renters moved out and we've been painting, painting, painting.  Remember when you were a kid how it still felt like you were roller-skating several minutes after you took your skates off? That's how my poor, paint-speckled, fingers-frozen-around-the-paintbrush hands feel.

I'll do a real post soon. For real!

Alrighty Then . . .

Methinks my little Buff Orpington, Flower Belle, is telling me it's time to rig up a screen for the top of the brooder.

I think she's a few days older than the other girls. She's more robust, definitely more adventurous, and she's taken up residence on top of the feeder. The other little gals are still hanging out under the light.

Chickens make me smile.

My Little Chickadee

We ate the last of our old non-laying stewing hens last spring. We recently had someone else's chickens on the property, but they were moved out last weekend. Who's gonna turn the compost pile? Who do I feed the icky bugs to that I find in the garden? Who's gonna eat the stale cereal and the leftovers we no longer want? And more importantly, how much longer are we going to be able to stand these anemic, tasteless, store-bought eggs?

I'm bemoaning these things to Hubby and what does he do?

Gets me a little cheeping box, and inside - four chicks! I carefully checked them over for pasty butt or splay leg or other defects. They look healthy. And so cute! I got a Rhode Island Red, a Buff Orpington, an Isa Brown Sex Link, and a Plymouth Barred Rock. All standard-sized breeds with good egg-laying/meat crossover.

My brooder this time is a smallish-but-deep plastic bin - maybe 20 gallon? I put straw in the bottom, got out the heat lamp, washed up the chick feeder and waterer, and we're in business!

I'm glad we got four distinctly different types. My very first flock was eight Plymouth Barred Rocks. They were awesome. I got eight because I really wanted six and all my research told me there would be  a certain percentage of loss. Not necessarily so. I couldn't tell them apart, so I called them The Collective from Star Trek. I loved that flock. They layed and foraged well. But when they got older - 3 and 4 years old - the eggs dwindled sharply and I couldn't tell who was and wasn't laying. I began butchering 1 or 2 per weekend and started over - with different breeds! One of my favorites was an Easter Egger (Americauna). I couldn't get over those green eggshells.

So, for the next four or five weeks, we're brooding. I'll have to rig up a screen for the top of the bin for when they begin trying out their wings, but for now, chick starter, water, warmth is all they really need.

I've decided to name them from the old Mae West, W.C. Fields movie, My Little Chickadee. The Buff is Flower Belle, the Isa Brown is Aunt Lou, the Rhode Island Red is Twillie, and the Barred Rock is Badger.

True approves.