Robin's Nest

As the nights cool down and the crickets get louder it is obvious that summer is coming to an end. The garden was not as successful as it could have been but lessons were learned. Sometimes, no most of the time I feel as though I am just going through the motions of life. I am not sad, it is more like existing. There are things I want to do but probably won't get to do. Mostly because interest is not there like it used to be. That and there are so many things I want to do. Today the wind is blowing pretty good. I miss living where there are four distinct seasons, but three seasons with a bonus season whenever all four show up, will have to do. There are at least 5 dozen eggs on hand today, got to find homes for them. I can use 2 dozen in egg bites for the week. And the neighbor might take 2 dozen if they are white... Yesterday there was a rare swim no fighting or arguing occurred! Today after all the eggs are sorted and packed, I will have to go to town I think. I need a zipper for...

Today is the first Friday of the school year. While I believe strongly  in homeschooling, this year I cannot do it. We found a nice school that goes to 8th grade and hopefully we can stick it out for the full year. Of course who knows what will happen with the virus and all. I am just tired right now. My commitment level to homeschooling has fallen off this past 9 months. Not that I do not feel it is best, I do. But my patience with the youngest is thin and frankly at the end of the day I am done. Sometimes way before the end of the day. Wait till you see what is under her! Some birds cannot wait to be served With that I justify my decision to put them back in the care of others. In fact as I type this the two were fighting in the pool. 24foot around and 4.5ft deep and they have to be right next to each other picking. The same thing in the house the first floor is easily 1800 square feet and they must be within 1.5 feet of each other, picking. The tormenting became too much, they a...

  It is the end of the first week of August and the weather is changing. The nights are quite cool and the days are enough to singe your skin. The urgent things on my to do list are not all the way completed but getting there. Still 3 trees to go and I am making those my mandatory for this weekend. The smoke in the air from distant fires makes it difficult to breathe at times. I can only imagine how difficult it is for those closer to the actual fires. There has been some work on the henhouse and we have added an entry fence that helps tremendously!  DH widened the fence line for the turkeys too. He also made a north entry opening so when we separate the genders the girls can get out of the house without joining the males. When we slapped the bottom boards on last spring we knew we were creating work for later. The boards were overlapping the other boards and siding the building would not be right without trimming them. DH worked hard and got the turkey side trimmed and also w...

Today started out the first of our many appointments for August for the kiddos. I don't tally the adults that often as one would wonder how anything gets done. Oh wait not much does... No bother on to today. The youngest had an appointment at 0940 this morning so I made a deal with my daughter to keep the other one until we were done and then swap out the older for the younger so I could attempt to find school clothes. When that was finished I loaded up my two and her oldest and headed over to the older kiddo's friend to give a very belated birthday gift. I almost forgot that the day started out with an almost flat tire... yep same tire different day. So I left that car at home and took the party van. Once at the friend's house the oldest gets invited to play for a bit. Friend's house but Party van is to hard to maneuver into driveway for four houses... Protests from the youngest were loud and long. Nonetheless the oldest stayed behind with the friend. We three noisy tr...

Good morning! Earlier, in another post I referenced and four page rant of things that needed to be done around here. One of those things was to clean out the chicken coop. Well that includes the duck side and the turkey side. The inside cleaning is my job. It includes taking out all unnecessary items and removing all of the straw bedding. I am happy to report that at least the turkey side is complete.  Lots of straw to move making progress! Almost finished! With that said walls need to be built and nest boxes put in place. Also the whole house will be wrapped in Tyvek to prepare it for winter. I joked with DH that I needed at least a 2 day break before I attempt the chicken or duck area. I hate to say it but it wasn't really a joke. This morning brought a continuation of a lack of service on my cell phone. Frustration is elevated today and I get my two day break from straw removal but the work is replaced by children. The grandkids are here for two days. There are only 8 days left ...

August is here and things have not changed around here very much at all. That could be considered good and then again maybe not so much. We have been able to get 4 out of 8 trees planted. One shed emptied, but the contents are still to be dealt with. Over half of the contents went into the dumpster. All that is left are some things that are still useful... to someone. The challenge is how to get them to that destination. The above picture is a "Pomato" plant. Yes it is a real thing. No I didn't buy it, at least not on purpose. It came mixed in with a bunch of seed potatoes that I bought from Walmart. It grows cherry tomatoes above ground and white potatoes below. I wish I could tell you how it tasted but the planted withered before the tomato ripened and produced only one potato. A morning egg gather My chicken chasing kiddo The variety of potatoes harvested The potato bag dumped The potato bag before dumping Not many chickens can avoid her This one is her favorite School...