~ Retired and Starting My Future In The Foothills ~

[HenCrazyMom]

Linda
This is one of my all time favorite threads. Because of you and your stories, my DS and I are getting ducks this spring. We have talked the Dad into it. HEEEE HEEEE!!! We are so excited and we look so forward to checking on your progress. DS is age 9 and has a disability. CHickens are his therapy and mine too quite frankly. Just took the girls and boys (have 2 of the sweetest roos) some meal worms. DH is going to expand the coop the allow DS to get some Barred Rock hens in the spring too. We have hatched some eggs and are looking forward to giving some eggs to a friend to experience the hatching in the spring knowing that we will get the chicks eventually.
I love reading your stories and adventures. I can't wait to learn more from your experiences. Keep on posting>

 

[gryeyes]

Thank you very much, HenCrazyMom! That makes me blush. Garsch!

The last two chicks (which were badly shrink-wrapped) are now in the brooder and one of them has got quite a set of lungs! Whoa! Hush, little baby! I keep putting my hand in there to cup it and it will settle down. I don't think I can do that all night... or call in sick any more this month unless I'm really, really sick. Please, baby, it's going to be okay, I promise.

I put it back into the incubator. I think it still needs to be kept VERY warm. It doesn't want to stand up straight, which is probably due to having been curled up, shrink-wrapped, so long in the egg.

Ahhhh... silence. Sort of. There's a lot of happy chipping coming from the brooder. But Lungs has stopped screaming.

I moved one of the smaller kit coops today (from where it was "staged" after HH and FL brought it up from the rental last Thursday). Also found 3 eggs in it... not pullet eggs, either. So 3 hens found it good in its temporary spot. It's always been a good coop for a couple of ducks, as it's not raised. It's been placed on the same terrace as the apple tree, where the ducks like to nap. Hopefully the duck ladies will find it handy when they are ready to lay.

John had submitted his latest invoice yesterday but I couldn't find my checkbook then. Found it about 10 minutes after he left and called him to say so. He came by today to pick it up and check out the waterer he repaired and set up. Had I hooked up the security cameras yet? No, not yet. I have chicks to adore, right now.

He was ruminating on how easy it will be to replace the roof on my house, given the placement of one half of my driveway and the side of the house. After all, he measured the roof yesterday and provided a rough estimate of the cost to do it.

As nice as the weather has been, that major project still needs to be put off for a while just in case Wet Winter Weather decides to show up soon. I decided to redirect his interest to the Side Deck Project, which can be handled any time of the year.

Oh, he LIKES building decks and putting in doors very much. "Those are fun to build," he said, quite obviously perked up about it. We discussed dimensions, type of railing, kind of door into the guest bedroom/office/Incubator & Nursery Room, and other aspects of such a project.

The deck will be 8 X 12 feet, and finished pretty much the same as the grape holder,

but I haven't quite decided if I want a covering over it yet. Whatever covering will be open, similar to that of the pergola but NOT just like it, as I don't want to take the interest away from that structure.

Because the land is sloped, the steps up to the deck will be on the "high" side, out of sight from visitors approaching the house. I was informed "Nobody uses the front doors around here, they all come to side or kitchen doors first." Well, I don't want visitors to approach the house from the deck. So the steps will be obscured by the deck itself. The old crappy guest room window on that side of the house will be removed and a single French door will replace it. I'll have to re-organize the furniture inside the room....

We discussed methods of hanging my pretties (hummingbird feeders, wind chimes) from the new board he used for the gutter replacement project along the front of the house, because I said I was resistant to screening in the porch. But I might "allow" it if I had a deck where the chickens could visit me. Then I wouldn't feel so bad about excluding the flock from the porch. (Yes, I am insane. I LIKE their presence there. )

He's going shopping for the materials this week.

Yesterday I offered him a chick-holding opportunity but he declined it. Humph. I guess he had plenty of chick-holding experiences when he was growing up on a chicken farm in the Santa Cruz Mountains. However, every visit, he casually attempts to pick up a chicken as they mill about us. He was successful in picking up Bertha yesterday, cuddling her until she calmed down. Today, he sidled up to Carl, who was perched on the porch railing. Carl gave him a look of disbelief and launched himself off the railing onto the front driveway. John remarked on the number of chickens dust-bathing in the concrete planter along the front of the porch; he agreed with me there would be no use attempting to plant anything there. It's simply the Chicken Dust Bathing Spa.

And another week begins during which I will have little or no flock interaction. I can hardly wait for the days to lengthen!

 

[HHandbasket]

Yes, but the countdown to your retirement where you can enjoy All Day Flock Parties is at hand!

 

[ChicknThief]

I vote that we throw a BYC Block party to celebrate Linda's retirement!!!!

 

[Buugette]

I just love this thread... love reading about your adventures... now, when are you and your adorable handy man gonna go on a date?

 

[gryeyes]

Quote:
Oh, I am all for that! Keep this in mind for some time in September!

Quote:
Thank you so much, Buugette. (I'm ignoring the second part of your post... )

I stopped at my favorite feed store on the way home, to buy more feed, a bale of pine shavings, another cage bottle waterer for the chicks, some Timothy hay, a hay holder and a salt lick for Simba, and chatted with Amy for a while. I showed her photos of the NYD Hatch chicks. She has a flock of 40 or so chickens and hardly any are laying right now. A customer had some questions about the LG incubators in stock and Amy deferred to ME to answer his questions. Oh my. She also referred to me as "Incubator Queen."

She's never heard of Brinsea.....

John had told me the location of a couple of his other customers, for whom he's built decks and both interior and exterior staircases. In case I wanted to check out those things. I'll have to wait until the weekend and make a special trip, as I pass the roads to those locations on my commute in the dark, both morning and evening.

When I got home this evening, I had to make two trips from the car. I turned on the porch light to illuminate my way for the second trip. The two chairs against the house wall were suddenly visible, set against the porch railing. Huh?

OH!! There is a GORGEOUS, single French door leaning up against the wall! Guess John has been here! There's also trim wood and threshold material set on the porch by that door.

After I brought the rest of the stuff from the car that needed to come into the house, checked on the chicks and refilled their feeder, survived the mad rush of hungry chicks from underneath the EcoGlow, loved the dogs, cat and Simba a bit, I called John's house. His dad answered (as is usual) and told John "It's a lady for you;" in the background, I could hear the television set and John's voice saying, "Move, kitty!"

I told John the door was beautiful. He said he was glad I called - he had planned to call me when he thought I would be home from work, but he had a cat on his lap and you know you can't just get up and move any old time to do something else.

He is ready to put that door in TOMORROW. What?!??! GACK! I have to move furniture from that wall, first! And I thought the deck would be built first, then the door put in.

"No," he said in his slow, "let's edumacate Linda" tone, "If you can't get the door in, why put a deck out there?" I think that's supposed to make sense, yet it doesn't. But apparently the sequence IS put in door, then build deck.

I explained I would have to do some complicated re-arranging of furniture and stacked boxes and stuff in order to move that daybed. I doubted I could manage it in only one night. We agreed he could wait a day and put in the door on Wednesday. (He has had a key to the house for some months, on his "customer" key ring.)

This is gonna cut into my chick adoration time.

 

[Buugette]

Perhaps he can help you move the furniture and boxes around...

 

[gryeyes]

No door installed today; John left a message on my voice mail whilst I was in a meeting at work. When I called him back, he said he thought it would be better to take care of the door when I was present, so was Saturday okay? Yup. Good, because he had laundry to do.

And I could help him on Saturday if I wanted to do so. Another Yup. Although I did complain that I'd moved the stuff out of the way and broke all my fingernails. He suggested I start taking biotin. Construction people need strong nails and he keeps his cut short so he doesn't snag one on anything.

It's just as well I've got until Saturday, because anybody with a key to my house who doesn't love me does not need to see all the clutter and absolutely filthy floors. Gives me more time to tidy up SOME around here, first.

Here's the door, propped against the house on the porch. Pretty, isn't it!! Unfortunately, I'm not home during daylight hours, so that's the view even *I* have had of it so far....



When I got home tonight, I could hear the chicks in the brooder from out on the porch. What the heck? OH! The little goobers had knocked over their waterer... since they're now in a Rubbermain brooder, I don't have cage bottle or poultry nipples set up for them. And they knocked that traditional waterer over. Poor babies. That was the first thing I corrected.

And then I started moving the incubator table across the room. There are three working incubators so I had to make that move in careful stages, moving each incubator from the table to my computer desk, then to the table in its new location. With live eggs in them.

Now I'm pooped, so I'll move the daybed over to the wall where the incubator USED to be.... It's sort of in the middle of the room right now. But I've got time. Whew!

 

[redhen]

Perhaps he can help you move the furniture and boxes around...

During the night, after you all have a nice candle lit dinner...

Or in the morning...

 

[gryeyes]

During the night, after you all have a nice candle lit dinner...

Or in the morning...

Okay, where's the blushing smiley fanning herself? Oh my. Oh MY.

Oh, LOOK - there's a ladder, Red! Go getcherself a sammich.