Survivalist blog

Ok, so my husband saw a blog the other day that was giving away some things. Looks good to me.

M.D. Creekmore over at the The Survivalist Blog – a survival blog dedicated to helping others prepare for and survive disaster – is giving away a Go Berkey Water Filter System (a $139.00 value)! To enter, you just have to post about it on your blog. This is my entry. Visit The Survivalist Blog for the details.

The blog looks pretty interesting. I haven't visited it much yet, but I plan on correcting that situation. It's always good to be prepared and it looks like this blog might help in my endeavors to become so.

My house is turning into a zoo

When my youngest turned four in January, she announced that she wanted a snake for her birthday. Well, being the open-minded mom that I am, I said ok. We took her to the pet store and she picked out her snake. A lovely red and white corn snake. She was happy. Her brothers, not to be outdone, cleaned out their piggy banks. We came home with a red-eared slider and an anole. Then the daughter decided she wanted a bird. She still had the money her grandmothers gave her for her birthday, so back to the pet store we went. She now has a zebra finch in her room. And a small catfish. Let's see, that means that in the house we have a fire-belly toad, a leopard gecko, a corn snake, a finch, a fish, a red-eared slider and an anole. That's enough for me. Add that to the two dogs, five rabbits and thirty or so chickens outside, and I'm beginning to think I live at the zoo. The good news is that the kids are out of money now, so the zoo isn't going to be expanding any time soon.

I'm sure that when the kids are in college, I'll look back on this time and chuckle, but for now, I'm tired of running to the pet store and feed store every week!

Ahhh, isn't life an adventure!

A good day for the boys

Along with all the other things the kids do around here, the oldest three take piano lessons. Their teach offered to prepare them for a competition this year. You're essentially competing against yourself. The child must preform an age appropriate piece in front of the judges. Any child who plays their song correctly (or at least close enough) wins a medal. Well, today all three of our boys went to the competition and came home with gold medals. Good going boys!

We rushed right from there over to their soccer game and let them go to it. The older two play and are on the same team. They usually play defense, but the coach saw the opportunity to let some of the kids play offense that usually don't get the chance. Son #2 got his chance and scored his first goal! As this is his fourth season to play on the same team, this was quite an accomplishment.

We got home very content with the way the turned out and also very tired. I guess that's a fair enough end to a great day!

I'm out of shape!

Can I blame it on the cold weather that I am so out of shape? I don't think so, as this is Texas and the weather really doesn't get all that cold here. I might try it anyway.

My husband and I went traipsing around the back acres yesterday in search of firewood. Mind you, the whole property is only 18 acres, so we didn't have miles to hike. We found several fallen logs, one standing dead tree, and one great big tree that the power company cut down a couple of years ago when they were clearing the lines. A few minutes with the chainsaw and we had a nice pile of wood to drag back up to the house. That's where the trouble began. A garden wagon load of wood is heavy, and the trail was muddy. I would say steep too, but that would be a bit of an exaggeration. It was uphill though and we had to make several trips (read that with a bit of a whine). Talk about getting tired! I had to rest time and time again pushing that stinkin' wagon back up to the house. My husband was pulling, and had the harder job. My eight year old son proved to be more help than I was! The good news is that we did get the job done, and now have a nice stack of wood on the back porch, as well as a dandy fire. The bad news is that I'm obviously somewhat of a wimp.

I've got to start getting more exercise.

Winter time fun

Four kids and lousy weather. What to do, what to do. Why, how about letting them play with their food! We sliced and diced a slew of fruits and vegtables the other day and got busy with the toothpicks. They had a fine time, and ate their creations when they were done. It was a healthy, happy winter afternoon...

I love the fall!

Stinky chickens and all, fall is my favorite time of the year. It's another beautiful day here, and I'm glad to be able to enjoy it. Thank you, dear husband, for working all day so that I can stay home with the kids, and thank you to all my friends for putting up with my moods, and thank you my sweet children for sharing this day with me!!

Wohoo, if we could have more days like this, I might actually be a pleasant person! (Just kidding, even when it's nasty, I'm still quite nice).

Have a great day everyone!

Stink, stank, stunk

It is sunny today, but we've had rain at least half of the days in the last two weeks. Chickens stink big time when their pens get wet. Oh dear. I'm ready to give them all to Colonel Sanders. We've been letting the ones we hatched earlier this year free range most of the time and they seem to like roosting on the porch railings. Now our porch stinks like chicken too. Their feeders are all caked with mud, and their pens are nasty. I know these aren't ideal conditions to keep the chickens in, but I don't know what to do about it. We can add hay, but other than that, I'm at a loss. Things are usually fine, it's just been an unusually wet couple of weeks. The hens are showing their dismay by not laying many eggs. So now I'm buying a ton of food, putting up with mud and stink and getting nothing in return.

On the other hand, our rabbits are now all in the little hutches we (mostly my husband) made and are happy. The weather is cooler now, they have a roof over their heads to keep out the rain, and as they're not on the ground, they aren't having to deal with any mud. At least someone is happy.

Enough grumping though. It's a beautiful, sunny fall day and we're all happy and healthy. That's good enough for me!