Snapshot Saturday

The weather's gorgeous and we're doing the last minute touches on Puppy-proofing the house- so enjoy a few snap shots taken while on watering patrol.

Snapshot Sat-er Monday!

Happy belated Saturday! The weather is fine and our schedules are opening up a bit more, so we'll be back (again) to weekly posting pronto.

Here's a view from the barn up the hill to the pasture. There's no way our walking lawnmower could even dent the mass of foliage up there. Right now, it's waiting for a riding lawnmower but until that happens it looks like something out of a Miyazaki movie!

View from the barn down towards the house. The fenced structure in the bottom left is the new dog kennel. The green house and raised veggie garden are off screen to the right. 

The other side, you can't quite make it out on this image but there's fencing in the woods in the top left. The wood frames in the center are the remains of the previous tenants' grape vines. It's so totally overgrown and rotted that you can't get access to anything. Sounds like a future project to me!

This guy has been lurking around the property, I want to clean and paint him eventually as decoration for my apartment, but I can't decide on a design.  The spiky plant of pain to the right is one of the prolific raspberries that torments- I mean resides on the property. They are everywhere!!

 We have so many ferns in the recesses of our property that some areas seem like it's Jurassic!

Where's Jeff Goldblum when you need him? 

 We currently have mountain strawberries, wild raspberries and wild blackberries blooming around the property. We will even have some blueberries, as the barrels mum planted last year have finally matured!

A better view of the dog kennel (complete with dog house and dog deck!) as well as the garden shed.

I spy with my big hetero-chromatic eyes... a tiny bench and a summer project! The house is set up with little sprinkling systems, but there's a fault in the line somewhere so they just make a mess. Mum plans on fixing them, but wants to do some research first. 

Big bowl o' chives! It needs to be split and r-epotted, but in the meantime it smells divine!

Everything is in bloom now- these rhododendrons are especially volumous outside the game room window

Close up of a blossom- so pretty!

We hired a survey company to reassess the far edge of the property last week. Our neighbor made a bunch of assumptions about the line between our properties and ended up damaging the treehouse in his attempt to "reclaim it." All is well now, but we opened up a dialog and got a legit survey crew out ASAP. We asked them to make really obvious markers of where our property ends and at this point we have to take their word for it, because their hefty 2x4 in cement markers are completely obscured by brush! One is so far down by the water, we couldn't find them even after some exploring. Up in the hinterlands of Jurassic river access, I found some really interesting remains. Completely clean, the head shape is to angular to be feline but much too large to be any rodentia we have seen around. Maybe weasel? Will research and let you know!

Snapshot Saturday

Took a minor homework break to enjoy the sunshine (90 degrees, say what now?!) and the new blooms!

What you see above is the view from the master bedroom balcony. Mum found some gorgeous cling-art mimicking stained glass at Home Depot and it works perfectly to add a little privacy to what otherwise would be a straight shot view of the bathroom. When the sun hits it just right, it just glows.

We joke about mom retiring to the "cave" to work on her National Boards, but really it has a gorgeous view!

The bleeding hearts bloomed all at once, I didn't even know we had them! But mum assures me they were planted last season, she just wasn't certain the chickens had left them alone enough to bloom.

the Sailor was able to sneak home last weekend and with the weather so good, cleared some trees. The section to the left just needs the stumps removed before it begins its new life as an herb garden.

The photos are a little blurry, but on her way back from Port Townsend Mum stopped by this nursery- Far Reaches Farm - and picked up a few new chicken approved additions to the garden.

The white flowers are the first bloom of a Rhododendron who endured a hard-core pruning, cutting back 12 years of growth to basically the ground. It was mostly trunk with little green, now reversed!
In front of it are Iris bulbs and yet more alpine strawberries (they're everywhere!!)

Ganymede taste tested the new delphiniums and opted to leave them alone. Thank goodness.
Behind the delphiniums is a new project- bishop's weed! Yeah, that's got to go...

Last year, Peter Rabbit and his hungry cohorts decimated mum's "spilled milk" flower arrangement.
This year even the chickens are leaving the sweet allysum (Lobularia maritima) alone!
The lone purple stems are a new addition to the mystery plant pile- the label's washed off!
Irises on the far right, Peonies and Purple Vinca round out the rest of the bed.

Pieris Japonica- has been blooming for several weeks now and the chickens love to siesta beneath it.

Japanese Red Maple and a Rhododendron, this one blooms pink but the petals fade to white. 

And yet more alpine strawberries!

 Another rhododendron- but you can see a snippet of the dog kennel and the garden shed!

Another view of the Japanese Red Maple and Rhododendron- the structure to the left is the bbq hut. Beyond those trees is the river!

A better view of the green house and raised garden bed- and our deathstar! It's a rolly-compost ball :)

The ladies insisted on following me around as I did my little photoshoot-  the Easter Egger is Circe, the Cochin is Artemis, and the golden-laced Wyandotte is probably Tequila  but the 'Twits are hard to tell apart.

I leave you now with the view of my homework chair- I've got two six page essays to write and two presentations to prep for, but at least I can't complain about the view!

Snap Shot Saturday! Guest Post

     Guest Author Girl-Child here with a quick update! Mom's still sequestered with her National Board projects, but most weekends (weather permitting) I've been able to get a few projects done around the homestead. I guess what that means is to expect updates from us again! At least on the weekends :)

This week's Snapshot Saturday is about the new man in my life- Voce

          

          Last October, this cat just showed up on our back porch. He was so badly emaciated he couldn't walk except hunched over and limping. He was extremely skittish but also very talkative- indeed it seemed he wouldn't stop talking! So we dubbed him "Voce" or "voice" in Italian. We put food out for him and during the winter we put a dog bed for him in the bbq/pizza hut. Over time, he became more and more friendly, sitting in our laps and chatting at us. We were hesitant to bring him inside because we had no idea where he came from, if he had any communicable issues, if he would be too aggressive with the cats we already have. 

Berlioz and  Bijoux deciding that homework is irrelevant, kittens come first

This spring, with the onset of a potential puppy, we were able to get Voce to the vet. He received a clean bill of health and weighed in at a hearty 14 lbs. A far cry from the skinny boy on our doorstep! 

Given the green light, we finally brought him inside. 

         Now he is more talkative than ever and we are privy to all his other quirks. (He drools when he's happy, being the most startling of them.) We know he's some kind of Siamese, the bulk and head shape suggest "Apple Headed" and his coloration suggests "seal" but this is all Google-search fed speculation.

 So ends our quick Snapshot Saturday! Come back tomorrow for another, more substantial, update!

Snapshot Saturday

 I have been putting the finishing touches on decor at Our Haven, a room at a time. My latest project was a wall hanging for our bedroom. I saw this knot design I really liked and my brilliant artist-daughter helped me tweak it and add the phrase I wanted.  I really love how she made it look three dimensional and yet kept the sketch aspect of it. I had it canvas printed and it is exactly what I wanted!

 It looks great on the wall above my bed. The next thing is a furniture project - a pair of twin antique wrought beds from 1920's. I'm going to refinish them in a hammered bronze and join them together for our Cal King bed. 

This is the view that makes me not want to get out of bed. 

I also have to celebrate a fabulous find - summer season clearance plus $30 off for a great bistro set (I paid $60 for a $250 set). The chairs swivel and rock and there's a cute little table, too. You can just see the edge of one of the chairs in the picture above. 

I took these pictures from my balcony vantage point enjoying my new find with a cup of homemade lemonade-tea.  

I practice breathing daily, "In. Out. Let go. Repeat" and I think it's finally starting to work. Too bad I have to return to school next week.


Thanks for stopping by!

Snapshot Saturday - FINALLY!

Finally! They finally figured it out.

The Dingle Twits have gone into the coop on their own four days in a row.  How you ask? I have NO IDEA.

In desperation and frustration, I kept them in the run for a few days, but let the Goddesses out hoping that would do it. Then I let them out too and waited. . . They waited until almost dark and perched in the tree.

I decided to try something different. I waited until they were asleep and moved them into the coop and put them on the perch. I also put the Goddesses on the perch since they were just dog-piling on the floor.

After that . . .

The funny thing is that the second night of voluntary cooping (don't know what else to call it) they reminded me of siblings in a fight that draw a line down the center of the bedroom.  The Dingle Twits were on the left, the Goddesses on the right and two feet of space was between them.


I don't care how or why they set themselves up in the coop as long as they do it and I don't have to fish anyone from trees.

Here are some of their favorite gathering place (of course, their favorites tend to be mine and I have to hose the deck or nurse potted plants but I'll take little victories).

These two do this at some point every day. It's like kids swinging at the park. 

They tend to gather here in the afternoons for a dirt bath or just to chill in the shade. 

I planted "Chicken Salad" in the boxes outside the coop: It's a seed packet from My Pet Chicken I found containing Dwarf Essex Rape, Purple Top Turnip, Bracco White Mustard, Forage Kale, and Landino Clover. We'll see what the girls think.

I've been trying to balance my To Do list for the new school year with the To Do List at Our Haven and finding balance has been difficult.  

Thanks for reading - come back soon.

Snapshot Saturday - The Goddesses are 16 weeks!

I has been a beautiful day here at Our Haven - clear blue skies and just enough of a breeze to keep thinks cool. Temps only got to the high seventies.  SO, how did I spend my day - doing curriculum work on the deck with a FABULOUS view of the  river.  Every so often the Goddesses or Dingle Twits would come by for a visit.

I'm really torn between letting them free range and having to hose down the deck every morning or afternoon before I can use it, but they seem so miserable when I don't let them out.

Today's Snapshot Saturday is in honor of the Goddesses - they're 16 weeks today and really beginning to look like grown up hens. 

Artemis at two weeks

Artemis (now) with the ladies enjoying some water and Greek Yogurt (a special treat)

at a week ish

Ariadne at 15 weeks

at two weeks

Hera at 15 weeks

We had to put Eris in "chicken jail" at least 4 times in the first few weeks.
She's finally settled down - only causes chaos for the Dingle Twits now. 

Eos, above, heading for some shade.
Persephone below, having a sit.

 You want to sit here? 

Never too far apart from eachother - 

Ganymede on the perch
 I can hardly believe I used to be worried  because she was half the size of the others.

Not anymore . . .

Now she's as big as Hera. 

I caught this one just in time: 

 "You won't BELIEVE what the Dingle Twits did next."

Did you guys say something? 

The last two photos were too good not to post. If nothing else, keeping chickens is good for lowering the blood pressure.