Juliana Rancic is echoing my past, (Or, A Blessing in Disguise)

She has been trying to get pregnant for a few years.  She's tried IVF and it hasn't worked.  This last time, her doctor sent her to have further testing and they discovered she has breast cancer.  She has to have surgery and chemotherapy.  Then, she can try IVF again.

It's like my life 7 years ago.  I couldn't get pregnant.  My doctor sent me for further testing.  They found atypical cancerous cells.  I had a year of treatment.  Then, after IVF I got pregnant.

She said what I've been saying for years.

I love my babies.  If I didn't have infertility which led to the testing, who knows how sick I would be now?  I believe my babies saved my life.

Raising Meat Chickens - 3 Weeks old

The meaties are 3 weeks old this week, their birthday was yesterday.  They've done well transitioning to the tractor outside, even though it's been dropping into the 40's at night.  They have their heat lamp in the covered portion of the tractor and they huddle together under it at night.

During the day, they love to run around and forage a little bit in the grass.  I feed them 12 hours on mostly, now.  Really, I just feed them in the morning and make sure they have food throughout the day.  Then, when I tell them goodnight, I make sure they are out of food for the night.

We did lose one the first night out, or the second.  I think it just got too cold for her?  Maybe she ate too much.

They're feathering out nicely.  They come running when they see me, and attack my hand when I put their food trays in the tractor.  We are steadily moving them closer to the garden, where they'll spend their older days creating lovely compost for me.

We had an escapee.  My run isn't covered, but has 5-6' sides.  She took a running start and leaped the fence.  I let her wander alone for a couple of hours.  Some of the others tried to copy her, and Brady tried to go right through the fence, but no one else succeeded.

This post is linked to Simple Lives Thursday Blog Hop.

Raising Meat Chickens Post 1

I have laying hens.  They're wonderful, I love having them.  I raised them from a day old.  They lived in my kitchen for a few weeks, then the garage until they were about 5 weeks old, then moved outside to their coop.

After many months of pondering, I took the plunge and ordered meat chickens.  Cornish cross.  I had many hesitations, the main one being, who's going to process them for me?  I've never killed anything before, not even a fish while I've been fishing.

I asked for some help on Craigslist and had a couple of offers to teach me and do the actual processing.  So, that was what I needed to convince me to order them.

I ordered 38, received 39.  They came in a week ago this past Friday.  I'm thinking they were hatched that Wednesday, so they are now 12 days old.  I was shocked about their growth.  They eat like they're starving whenever I put the food in their brooder.  They climb over each other and stand on each other in order to eat.  They sleep in the food dish.

They are growing so fast.  Here's what they look like today compared to my hand.

I am too grossed out by their dirtiness to pick them up and hold them, so I'm just putting my hand next to them.  If any of you know chickens, you will realize that this is not typical for a 12 day old chick.  These guys are huge!  And hot.  That's really why I can't hold them, without the typical feathers of a chick, I can feel their body heat.  It's awful.

Their legs are huge too, they have thunder thighs and really large feet.  They're just all over giants.

I'm trying to raise them humanely.  I have them in a good sized brooder, they're not overcrowded nor do they have too much room to move around an hurt themselves.  (being so large, they can injure their legs with their weight.)  I'm feeding them starter/grower feed.  They have water available to them constantly and I am adding vitamins to it.  I have a heat lamp on the brooder, but I only turn it on at night and it's angled out the corner now, just to make sure they don't get chilled overnight.

Speaking of heat...I made a bad discovery yesterday.  It's been raining for a few days, and I didn't realize it, but the chicks tend to freak when it rains.  They piled into a corner of the brooder and smashed some of them under the pile.  They were fine one minute, then gone the next.  I'm glad Troy was with me when I discovered them.  He helped me with the "burial".

So, now we are down to 30.

I have plans to build their tractor early this week and get them outside permanently.  They've been out a couple of times when I've been cleaning the brooder, but they don't seem to enjoy it like the other chicks.  I hope once they're out all the time they'll have more fun.

Here's a pic of them hanging out in the brooder.

You have to admit, they have the potential to be cute.  See the little guy with the "toy" in his mouth.  He's going to be my class clown, I think.

Keep checking back for updates.

I shared this post at the Homestead Barn Hop on Prairie Homestead.

How the chickens are faring

It's September.  I have 5 hens who are 27 weeks old and 7 hens and a roo who are 22 weeks old.  The 5 hens have been laying for almost 3 months now.  Today, we got our first egg from the younger girls!  I believe it was one of my Barred Rocks, she looks really red in the face.

Here are a few pics of them.

This is Brady, he's our roo.  He only has one waddle, the girls think it's cute.

My red stars are the girls who have been laying for a while now.  

My 2 Eaaster Eggers, (one is sun bathing), one of the BR girls, and a Buff peeking out from under the tree.  I don't think this is the BR who is laying, but, I have trouble telling them apart.

And, my little helper.  She loves to stick her fingers through the fence, until the hens get curious to see what treat she's offering and give her a peck.

I have almost 40 meat chicks arriving later this week, and another 10 laying chicks next week.  Then, we should be set for the winter, no brooding chicks when it's cold...

After Hurricane Irene

We made it through with minimal damage.  Some large tree limbs, and we are going to have to take down the rest of the tree.  Some shingles.  That's about it.  No flood damage.  No windows or siding.  We didn't lose power.  We sure were protected!  Thank you, Jesus.

Hurricane Preparedness

So, after I remodeled my kitchen, we had a catastrophe. No, not the earthquake, it didn't cause any damage. No, not the hurricane, yet. We had a bad leak, caused by one of my wonderful, new LG appliances.  More on that later.

Meanwhile, pictures of the prep we are doing for Hurricane Irene.  (we are supposed to get hit starting tomorrow at noon.)

We started on the deck.  Cleared off all the plants, the table and chairs, the grill and toys.

Moved on to the hot tub.  We have a strap system set up, attached to the stakes you see.  We just took it apart so it can be used tonight before the storm.

See all the stuff in the garage?

We had to come up with a good plan for the chicken coop.  It's just a shed set on cinder blocks, a flying kite.  We didn't want to have to try to drag it and my chickens from the field on Sunday, so we anchored it.  Steel cable and huge spikes.  It's pretty strong, we hope.

My husband is so smart, look at the system he designed to tighten the straps.

We cleaned the gutters, yucky.  There were a few crepe myrtle branches hanging over the front, trimmed them off.

And, we removed all the hanging plants, potted plants, bird feeders and bird baths.

I picked all the ripe tomatoes and hope to either can or freeze them tomorrow.  And, I dug a few potatoes to have fried up for breakfast or something else delish.

So, we seem to be prepared.  What I'm mostly concerned about is the chickens, never had to protect something living outside in a storm before.  And, I'm pretty sure we will lose power.  Not too bad, except it's hot and muggy and my family is spoiled by AC.  And...I have a freezer full of stuff like blueberries, corn, venison and I would cry if it spoiled.  I plan to plug it into the car periodically if I have to.

(Is it too hokey to say, "Come On, Irene"?)

A Quick Kitchen Remodel

Well, it happened quickly.  But, I've been planning it for a couple of years now.  Started back when we owned land and planned to build a house.  I've been saving ideas in my red 3-ring binder for a long time.  I finally got to put them all to use!

Just a note, we are not done completely.  We still need to add things like trim , cabinet backs, etc.  But, it's functional and T needed to get back to work, so, it'll do for a little while.

Here's the before pic.

Our house is a pre-fab built in 1981.  Pretty sure the kitchen hadn't seen any updating since then.  except the removal of some pretty swell wallpaper and addition of some pretty awful laminate floor.  (I despise laminate floor.)  Please ignore the new white cabinets as you drool over my former kitchen.

Day 1
Tear out.  Completed while I took the girls off to buy flooring, I think.  I went somewhere, anyhow, and came home to see it all done.  Whew.  Although it's hard to tell, got the floor, walls and ceiling patched.  Didn't get the popcorn down, that's a winter project.

Day 2
Final coat of mud.  Most of the flooring down, (just doing stick-down tiles for now.  Couldn't make up my mind on what I wanted permanently, so we went for the cheap but nice in the meantime.)  Plumbing and electrical also done.  Mostly...

Day 3
Wall painted.  We are tiling the window wall, so it's going to be ugly for a while.  Wall cabinets hung.  The others aren't attached, just set into place.  Flooring nearly done, all except for under the fridge.  More electrical done, had to move it quite a bit.

Day 4
Base cabinets attached.  Floor finished.  It took a long time for those base cabinets.  Our house is really crooked.  Yes, that's a level in the floor.  I insist on perfection.  Do you believe me?

Day 5
This day, I had to make the trek to Ikea.  All the cabinets, the sink and countertops are from there.  But, the store is nearly 2.5 hours away.  So, it truly does take a day.  Especially when you have to stand in line for an hour for returns, then stand in line for an hour just to get started with  kitchen designer who is necessary to use to purchase your cabinet products.  Then, another hour or so with him turning down his up-sells.  Oh, and 15 minutes waiting for the guy in product pick-up to acknowledge you and give you your cart of stuff.  I'm so glad my friend went with me to help out!
Anyway, gas was run today, so we have a stove!  No oven, er, actually, no oven racks.  So, if I want to bake, have to use one of the burner grates until we can find someone to fabricate a track for the racks.  This stove came all the way from Michigan.
Plumber hooked up the sink and dishwasher.  Unfortunately, the drain line leaks, so we have to run it pulled out with a bucket underneath.  LG is sending a new one.  Seems this is a common problem.

Day 6
Nearly done.  Have to add the sides and bottoms to the wall cabinets and the sides and back to the base cabinets.  We have hung the sink light since this pic.  Have to change the fan out for something else.  Have to find a hood.  Have to tile.  Add kickplates.  Probably going to do these things in the winter.

So, there you have it.  I'm using Ikea Akurum cabinets with Stat doors for the base and Lidi white doors for the walls.  Pragel black stone effect countertops.  My stove is a very old Viking 48" with 6 burners and a griddle, (which I love!).  Sink is from Ikea, Domsjo farmhouse - very nice.  The faucet is by Koehler.