Busy as bees and Busy Bees!

Well, it rained all weekend, so we took advantage of being stuck in the house and worked on some projects. Got started on the builtin for the living room(no pictures of that yet, not enough progress to share) and worked on the kitchen, what a difference!
Here's the before shot...hideous isn't it? Up until Sunday, this is what it looked like, minus the pizza, and such on the counter, since this picture was taken before we closed on the house. We also replaced the stove after the infamous fireball incident.

So, on our last trip to Ohio to fetch stuff from our old place, we brought back some of the cabinets we had installed when we renovated the garage. We brought up four wall cabinets and a corner cabinet, in addition to some base cabinets for the living room built in. Two of the wall cabinets were added to either side of the microwave, resulting in this:

Much better don't you think?? We also added a 9" cabinet to the left of the fridge, and replaced the corner cabinet. The kitchen looks SO much better now, like it was unfinished before.

Busy Bees!!!

Well, our bees are just trucking! They arrive May 3rd, and this was one of the bars a week later! Amazing, isn't it?? There's a full bar before it too! It's really been neat having the bees, and knowing that they're our bees buzzing around the yard has just made me even more aware of how nature is at work.

And this is the same bar just five days later!! Can you believe the amount the got done? Granted, it's not full of honey yet, but they are just TRUCKIN' along, it's absolutely amazing. It's going to be just phenomenal come next year when we'll be harvesting honey from our own hive, and hopefully will be able to pay attention to what's blooming and label the bars so we can try honey from different flowers.

Spring is sprung....

And then some.

Yes, I know, I've been lax in my updates. I'm going to make a concerted effort to post more often, especially since things are really starting to ramp up into high gear here. So, here's a general overview of what's been going on, and then I'll try to get some detailed posts on each of the main aspects.

We're working on the garden - hoping to get seeds planted by next weekend, and we've tons of seeds that we started upstairs in the windows that'll be going in the ground in a couple of weeks.
Over the last month we put in a TON of trees on our three acres, both for lumber and for food. I need to get some photos taken as things come into leaf so I can post those.
We're going to be hatching our own chicks from eggs from our flock this year, and Mike's working on making an incubator to do that. We've added another aspect to our place to replace having to raise broiler chickens once a year - rabbits. We've a pair of does and a buck for breeding stock, and are expecting our first litter of babies the weekend of May 24th.

And, last but not least, we're entering the world of beekeeping. We got our bees last weekend, installed them in the hive that Mike built for them, and they're doing great!

So...there's a brief overview - as I said, I'll get some in depth posts going on each of those, and detail what we've done, are doing, and what we plan for the future.

Hope all's going well for everyone, and I'll post more soon!

A Week from Spring

Ahh...the calendar says Spring's a mere week away, but I have the feeling it'll be a bit more than that before we truly break free from winter here! This past weekend saw a major storm stomp its way half way across the country, dumping around 18" here between Friday morning and Sunday morning. The picture at the right was taken after it had finished, leaving us planted in a picture perfect winter playground. Shame its March and not Christmas morning though! It would fit much better :)

DJ is definitely not too keen on the snow, especially since it's taller than she is! Pollux is in heaven - boy is he ever a snow dog! He bounces around like a puppy in the fluffy white stuff, instead of a nearly ten year old dog.

But, all in all, we made it through the storm well. The drive home Friday was icky, but not dicey, and we had done all of our running around the weekend and week prior, so had no need to go any farther than the chicken coop - and yes, shoveling that path was tiring! Mike had it worse though, as he insisted on taking responsibility for the driveway!

Oh, and just to show you what happens when chickens encounter this much snow... the only thing keeping them from venturing further is Pollux, sitting in the middle of the shoveled path- he's the big black blob there :D By that afternoon, they had followed the path all the way up to the porch!

All in all we've made it through the winter so far fairly well. We definitely plan to stockpile firewood for next winter(didn't have the time to do so this past fall, really), which will make it quite a bit more comfortable! I've definitely learned the truth of Mike's insistence that I really didn't know how to drive in snow - they do take much better care of the roads up here, compared to Ohio. I've shrugged and headed off to work with hardly a worry in weather that would certainly have had me working from home in previous years!

I think this is all for this post...the next one will be an update on what we're getting into this spring...boy are we going to be busy!!

Winter's still here...

Despite the thaw and the rain, winter is still settled in up here, which means that cabin fever looms on the horizon. So, being proactive, I decided to dig one of my many abandoned projects out of the boxes in my craftroom! It'll be months before the applique-work is complete on this quilt top, but I'm hoping to have it complete for next winter!
The knot will be completely lined with gold threadwork to make it pop...so far I think it's looking great!
I have triangular triskele knots that will go in the gold corners, and a chain knot will border the areas inbetween. Once all of the embroidery stitching is done we'll tied the quilt together, then on to the fun part! We're going to do some extensive quilting in the areas surrounding the knotwork(yup, Mike's going to help me with that part), using various celtic designs, including our initials and some animorphic designs.
It's going to be alot of work, but I can't wait to see it done!

On other fronts, we've been trying new recipes, the cats have been bouncing of the walls, and Pollux has become even more of a perpetual shadow as the rains and nasty weather keeps us all housebound!


The tail is escaping!!!



Mike's pineapple upside down cake....yum!!



DJ enjoys a brief interlude of sun...what a belly!

A New Year Begins..

Yes, I know, I've been slacking and have posted for a while...work got hectic, then the holidays were upon us and next thing I knew it was 2008! So, Happy Belated Holidays, whichever ones you celebrate, and a Happy New Year, too! :D



Things are going well here, though both Mike and I are eager for Spring to arrive. The holidays were quiet for us here in Western NY, we celebrated Solstice with a lovely dinner and tried roasting chestnuts(not so successful there).

We spent Christmas Eve out at my mom's, taking along with us 8 dozen eggs! We had a nice quiet day there and came back that evening - overnight trips anywhere in the winter time are going to be nigh close to impossible, as we've no one to care for the chickens. We had a nice peaceful Christmas day wiled away by installing the new rubber bumper set that Mike's dad bought him for his pinball machine. It's amazing the difference they've made!


We've just come out of an amazing January thaw, seeing a record of 64 degrees set yesterday morning at 3am! Today we're hanging out in the mid to upper 30s...what a difference. We're hoping that the warm spell was short enough that it doesn't mess with the trees too much, though it's definitely messing with our sinuses!
We sold just about half our flock last week. :( Finally had to accept the fact that we weren't going to be able to find enough buyers for the eggs at the point in time. Seven of our Easter Egger hens went to a family that lives about ten minutes for us, seemed like good people, with two daughters who seemed to just adore chickens. So, now we have Brutus, our Buckeye rooster, six Buckeye hens, and two EE hens, Jackie and Isis. They're still settling back down from all the ruckus of splitting the flock, and from the shake up the weather's given us, so we're not getting a ton of eggs right now, but hopefully everyone will settle down soon and we'll be getting some steady production.


We've been spending some of our nights with seed and nursery catalogs spread all over the couch, trying to decide what we're going to plant this spring. We're planning on an extensive change to our landscaping..or rather, doing some landscaping! We're hoping to plant a couple of pecans, walnuts, and a pair of almonds trees, as well as a number of fruiting bushes to act as a hedge. I think we've settled on a basket willow to fill in the spot between our property and our one neighbor, giving us a nice dense screen, as well as materials for baskets and such. Our garden list is up around 30 different varieties, from tomatoes to pumpkins, cabbage to spinach. We're really looking forward to getting that in and seeing how things grow up here.

Snowing Sideways...

Here in Western NY, Mother Nature scoffs at the calendar. What do you mean winter doesn't start until December 21st? Hah, like she holds to that! The temperatures have steadily made their way into the chilly range, and we've had the furnace on since Thanksgiving(albeit set only on 55 degrees). We have certainly learned why there are 8 huge wind turbines on the shores of Lake Erie, as the winds have been whipping steadily in the 30 mph range more often than not the last week or so, with gusts up to 55 mph. The company next door to where I work replaced their flag the week before Thanksgiving - it's already been ripped in half and is deteriorating rapidly.



Sunday saw four inches of snow covering the ground, but melting rapidly as the temperatures worked their way into the upper 30s. It did stick around enough for Pollux to play in it...



... and for the majority of the chickens to make their opinions known, as they glared disdainfully at the cold white stuff covering the ground.



My drive in this morning was rather uneventful, as apparently I'm adjusting to driving with a steady press of wind off the lake. It started raining last night, melting the snow and turning the back yard into a pond, and was still drizzling this morning on my way in. The temperature has dropped far enough since that it's now snowing, and the wind is kicking off the lake, making it snow sideways. The schools along the lake have closed school, anticipating a really nasty afternoon. Hopefully it'll wait until I'm home before really cranking into high gear!

The First Thanksgiving...

In our house, at any rate, and our first hosted Thanksgiving as well. We were lucky to have four guests come to celebrate with us; Mike's dad, Rick, his fiancee, Joann, his aunt Christina, and her girlfriend, Kim. Rick and Joann arrived around noon on Wednesday in the midst of a steady rain that continued the rest of the day. We spent the rest of the day prepping for Thanksgiving, mostly.

See...here I am working on the rolls ... I swear, there are more pictures of me cooking than I've ever had taken before!


I think we got the turkey in the oven around 10:30a(after a late breafast) ...that was one BIG turkey!



After that it was final prep time - peeling potatoes, setting the table, and putting out the snacks.





Christina and Kim arrived around 1pm Thanksgiving day, and shortly thereafter a pinball tournament commenced! Christina's the one getting some hip action into her play, and Kim's watching for pointers :)



The turkey arrived fashionably late(about an hour and a half!) and we finally got to sit down to eat! It was a good thing we put our so many snacks, or else the natives would have gotten even more restless than they did. The dishes were set out on the table, the turkey carved, and then we finally got to dig in.



Wouldn't you know it but all that work just tired us all out! Just about everyone crashed fairly early, appetites sated, and all the cooking even wore out the dog ;)



Happy belated Thanksgiving, All!!