The Great Pumpkin Hunt

Finding Pumpkins!!!!

Bringing Pumpkin Home

Chicken Update

The chickens are all doing well.... The big girls boycotted when the little girls were let out of their cage, free to run through the coop and they stopped laying eggs. That was painful. Of course they couldn't hold out forever, so we're back to a good breakfast! Here are the big ones: Fat & Sassy, just kidding - Petunia y Gabriela.

Aaah, the new arrivals. Goldbug is on the left. Shy is on the right. Hmmm, they look kind of mean here, don't they?

Now Shy is on the left and Goldbug is on the right.

And one more time....

The Scobie-Kombucha Adventure

September chronicles of Kombucha harvesting take 1. I would love to take this time to talk about the benefits and joys of kombucha as a drink, as a practice, harvesting, and more. That will have to happen in a little while after I pull together some research and you will find it on my nutrition blog: http://treenips.blogspot.com For now, I just want to mention the adventures that transpired. Michael and I decided to harvest our scobie today and make more kombucha. It had been quite some time since we'd harvested last and the scobie was so huge it wouldn't fit through the mouth of the jar!!!! This scobie just continued to grow. We tried folding it, bending it, squishing it, and eventually Michael started stabbing it. While I'm well aware that it is a living organism, it had to be done.

It didn't look possible... what were we going to do?

And before I forget to mention it.... we have a few more jars to harvest still:

Continued

We persevered! That's teamwork! This is a giant scobie!!!! Check it out from this angle: So, here's the problem. I always date the kombucha when we put it in the pantry to ferment for approximately four weeks.... See? May 8th. That means we should have harvested around June 8th. Course there was graduation... And family was in town... Then we went on vacation... Then um.... well.... SEPTEMBER???? Seriously. I know. Some people might frown on our excessively long fermentation time... does this means there's more alcohol? I'm not quite sure... Check back to the nutrition blog to find out the important details. This site's just for fun! Ta-Daaaaa!

New Arrivals....

Here they are.... and we love them. Shy and Goldbug....

'Kota & the Clippers

We got our first set of doggie clippers.... please note the before, the after, the pile of evidence.... Well, I had fun anyway!!!! Okay, Michael had fun too.... isn't he handsome?

New Chicks part 2

New Chicks!

I'm excited to report the adoption of two new chicks. Three days old yesterday (June 28, 2008) they are Goldbug and Shy... I don't know if you can tell - Goldbug is yellow with black and white spots on her back, while Shy is brown with deep, sensitive eyes and beautiful markings. Goldbug is a daredevil already - I tried to take a picture of her in my open hand and she nose-dived about 4 1/2 feet... hope her brain is okay - that couldn't have been healthy. Shy is... as her name implies, shy. And the other girls? They won't be meeting face to face without the protection of a cage for a very long time. Too dangerous right now - there is some jealousy happening and these girls deserve a fighting chance!!!!