Black Cat seed bead earrings with free chart

little ones

We have wanted Jersey Giants from the start of our chicken keeping...

 

a few weeks ago hubby sent the guys and I to get layer feed thinking it was safe as they haven't had any chicks for awhile now...
well he would have been right if someone hadn't placed a special order that the owner added a few extra to just in case..
         we were at the right place at the right time :D





meet our new pullets :D







Just before this happened two of our hens went broody
our game hen and one of our production reds
after fighting them for a few days I gave up thinking they would give up themselves as they have before
not this time...the game hen was clearly stealing eggs from some of the other hens.. we found brown and green eggs under her ....still not sure how she pulled that off....lol

After a few days with less eggs in the other nesting area we went looking under the red...some of the other reds were laying along side of her and she just took care of them....we found 41 eggs in the nest with her...we pulled 31 and marked the ones we left thinking we could tell the new ones from the old...all the other eggs we placed in the incubator...I couldn't just leave them to die..it worked for a few days...but the markings came off...at about this time we found a chick by the game hen...she wanted nothing to do with it...into another brooder area for it as it was too small to go in with the others...the next day one hatched in the incubator...cool it wasn't alone.. such a sweetie needed a friend...while we were working inside with that one another was hatched in the coop...well almost hatched...the game hen sat on it poor little guy...at this point I got tired of not getting any eggs to eat ( what can I say I'm hooked ) we pulled all of the eggs under both of them...the red had managed to get another 20 or so eggs under her.. plus the 10 we left...
We removed the rooster weeks before this as he was getting really ugly...thinking it was a pure waste of eggs we wanted it over with....not knowing what ones were old or new coupled with being out of time and no batteries for the flashlight we just put all of them in the incubator.....without candling them

these 2 hatched earlier today  

 

these two are now out of the shell drying

 

 

 

soon to be put in by these guys

so far we have 16 not counting the two who didn't make it out of the shell....with more peeping going on...they are so cute and sweet even though daddy was mean. They look like him he was an australorp although some have red around their combs....

free seed bead earring charts 7 across brick stitch

earring charts for 9 across brick stitch

 

 

Jorden's garden

Jorden has made a lot of changes to the garden this year, some due to our pets...like the repurposed wood fence to keep our doggie from eating all the chili and tomatoes lol

 


We saw a post on FaceBook where they were using their empty feed bags as planters...we needed to give that a try...works great...he wanted some onion seeds so we let a few flower :D

The garlic chives, parsley, catnip and oregano are coming along nicely

Our white sage is doing great

The red sunflowers came up on their own this year...the grapes are doing better than ever thanks to the chicken droppings :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

common sage is flowering again

 

 

 

 

 

The only issue right now is this little guys they are so small they can get through the fence right into the garden...so we need to replant a lot of the greens...at least they had a good meal if it lol

 

Seed bead earrings with chart ( 9 across )

Seed bead Butterfly earrings with chart # 2

Seed bead butterfly earrings with chart # 1

Seed bead earrings

I have always loved playing with beads, long before I started to knit I had a stash of beads....in so many shapes and sizes, I can get lost for hours looking through them lol

 

I saw a pair of earrings one of our friends had on ( thanks Kamy ) and needed to try my hand at making a pair or two ;)

you can use so many different kinds of beads, the possibilities are endless, they are quickly made and best of all FUN to make

 

 

I started out small

 

           
                                        I love fire polished glass beads so....

 

 

even beads that have a less then uniform sizing can be used

 

with as many colors as you like

 

Snake in my coop

Last week my father saw a snake in his kitchen.....after searching for over 24 hours we found where it had come in ( a loose floor board, now fixed ) but no snake....

A few days later I see this hole in the ground in my chicken coop...

Thinking it maybe another mouse hole, there are a lot of mice in this desert, it's been a on going issue every spring for the last 20 years we've lived here, I flooded it with water

hoping to drive them out....nothing

I did the same thing the next day...this has worked in the past...still nothing

all the while I'm thinking it could be a snake, I've heard there a few living in the desert too lol....although I've only seen 3 the whole time here ( on our land )...I will point out I DO NOT go looking for them ;)

 

Our hens had gone broody for about six weeks but had started to lay again....our egg count dropped by 4 to 6 a day

so by this point it is clearly not mice as I was hoping lol

the 3rd day proved it to be a snake :(

 

luckily my son was right there on the other side of the coop to see it come out...while I have nothing against snakes......eating my eggs is out of the question ( one of our hatchlings disappeared as well, it was just starting to pop out next day it was gone )....

 

we did get it....still not knowing what kind it was we weren't going to take the chance....after it was no longer a threat we were able to get a better look 

 

                                          it didn't have rattles thankfully

at this point it's colors had faded quite a bit, was brighter green and yellow...
still don't know for sure, but think it was a bull snake...

My sister was at my parent's place...oh yeah they live next door to us, so it wasn't a stretch to think the snake could have moved to our place.....at least I'm hoping it's the same one.....Dad said it was about the right size, just over 3 feet....how he could tell in the dark with it moving that fast....I have no clue lol ....I went over to get dad to see if it was the same kind, when my sister Nancie said she wanted to see it...and asked if we wanted to be shown how to skin it....cool....

                                     it's now pinned to some cardboard drying....not sure what we will be using it for yet
 
                     Hubby was so surprised that we took care of the matter without
                                              even calling him at work......
                    hey man nothing messes around with our chickens....
we didn't even think about getting help we were not going to let it get away and come back again.....
it clearly had been eating mice, babies....thinking that many eggs to be disappearing most likely means more around....more work needs to be done on the coops....