sew fun

In yet another step to officially becoming a domestic goddess, I recently came into possession of a sewing machine. The only time that I have ever used a sewing machine was in my high school home ec class when we all had to sew a pillow shaped like the first letter of our names. Now, you may be thinking that an L would be pretty easy to sew compared to other letters, but it was still pretty darn difficult and my L came out lopsided and I received a B, which I think was the lowest grade our home ec teacher ever gave out. But that was just fine; I didn't need or want to know how to sew because this gal was going to marry a millionaire anyhow and it would be the House of Versace sewing my clothes...

Well, I never married that millionaire and I have yet to own anything Versace. And though I wasn't outfitting myself in all these designer duds, I still never, ever gave any thought to sewing. Not until recently, that is, when I decided that our new couch needed some new throw pillows and being outraged at the cost of the things.

It was in conversation with my mother-in-law when I mentioned briefly that I might try to make pillows instead of buying them, never imagining that I just started a snowball effect that would bring an actual sewing machine into my house.

I thought about sewing pillows by hand. After all, how hard is it to cut out a square and pull some needle and thread. Then something more brilliant came to mind; I would bring the material to my mother (who has been sewing all her life) and get her to actually sew the pillow for me. Genius.

But remember that brief mention to my mother-in-law about the pillows? Well, she took that seriously. A few days later I was invited to go with her to a sewing convention (yes, those exist and are exactly what you imagine them to be like) and the next thing you know my in-laws got me an early birthday present...a sewing machine.

Yay?!?

My Sew Fun

Now I had a sewing machine. And to be honest, it was intimidating. I had no clue how to use it and well, all my other attempts at being Martha Stewartlike pretty much failed. Also, I have this tendency to give up easily when things don't work out on my first attempts. Now, however, I had something that cost a good deal of money and was proudly given to me as a gift, so just giving up was not really an option. I had to show something for it.

I did get some sewing tips from my mother-in-law and the instruction manual for the machine was a god send (could it be any more complicated to thread these things?). And after heading on over to Jo-Ann's (very first time in that store), I picked out a sewing blog -  i heart nap time, which I highly recommend for any newbie sewers like me -  for easy instructions on how to sew an envelope pillow cover and decided to give the whole thing a go.

Most people would recommend practicing on the machine a bit, but I decided that practicing was for chumps and just got started. I measured (with a tape measure because I don't have one of those fabric measuring tape things), cut out my fabric and took it to the machine. During the whole process, I was on the verge of giving up several times and it took me waaaaaay longer than 20 minutes and forget about keeping a straight line but....

TA-DA

It looks like a pillow, y'all!

The thing turned out all right, and I was pleasantly surprised. When I showed it to Sean, he too seemed very surprised and the first thing he said was "I didn't think it would come close to actually looking like a pillow." Yay for me! It's a pillow that looks like a pillow!

Now, if you look closely at it, the work is shoddy and it doesn't quite fit because I measured wrong, but it's a pillow and I'm quite proud to have it on my couch.

Doesn't quite fit...

so we keep the back hidden.

And I am very excited to sew more on my new machine. I doubt I'll be sewing up anything truly remarkable, but pillows...there will be a lot of pillows.

playing with dead things

So, it's a little disconcerting to walk outside and find your dog running around with an animal carcass in its mouth. I shouldn't be surprised since she now has a lot of land to explore and was bound to find some poor thing's mutilated body. I just don't like the thought of my dog playing with it.

It was a beautiful, sunny spring afternoon when I walked outside to see Althea (our dog) running around gleefully with what kind of looked like a rag in her mouth. I immediately knew it was something she shouldn't have, and as I got closer, I saw that it was definitely the shriveled up body of some animal. After frantically ordering her to drop it, I studied the creature and thought that this thing was a mongoose - and I was like, cool a mongoose! - but that thought was quickly dispelled by my husband who informed me that mongooses do not actually live in this part of the world.

Turns out the poor animal was just a boring ole squirrel.

 

  

In my defense, this thing is way past looking like a squirrel. 

I have no clue how long it had been dead or by what means it met its end, but I am pretty sure that Althea did not actually kill it. So far, she has not had the best of luck in catching any animals, especially squirrels. Plus - and I may be naive here about my dog's killer instinct - Althea would never actually kill an animal.

Why would I think that, you ask?

Here is proof:

Once, while at my parent's house, my father noticed that she was carrying around something in her mouth. After opening her mouth, he discovered she was carrying around a little, newborn bunny that she had found in their backyard. The bunny was perfectly safe and my father was able to put the unharmed bunny back in its hole, which he had no idea was there in the middle of their backyard, and put up a little makeshift fence to keep Althea out of it (and getting her little baby bunny back).

And there you go...my dog is the absolute sweetest thing!

Does this look like the face of a killer...

It is more likely that something else killed this squirrel (right?!) and unfortunately left the carcass in a place that Althea could find it and enjoy it. It could have been our cat Hank or a number of other animals that wander around out there.

Even if she did not kill the thing, Althea still enjoyed running around with it, so I had to discard the carcass (on my own!) with a very long stick. And I guess I need to resign myself to the fact that there may be many more dead animals brought to us by our own animals.

I just hope and pray I never see them in the actual act of killing...

everyone poops

It's Spring time, which means warmer weather and baby chicks!

We have just added a brood of adorable little chicks to our farm; right now twelve in all - four New Hampshire Reds, four Partridge Rocks, and four Brown Leghorns.

The Partridge Rocks and Brown Leghorns

Close up of the New Hampshire Red

Since they are still very small and it still gets pretty cold at night, we are currently keeping the chicks inside a large bin in one of our spare bedrooms. I have been keeping the room locked up like Fort Knox so that they are safe from our dog and cats (especially our cat Dennis who is pretty clever and has a knack for opening doors). I've become somewhat of a mother hen, checking up on them several times a day and constantly making sure that the door to the room is securely locked so that anything nonhuman (looking at you Dennis) cannot get in. All of this has made me aware of the fact that I may have a little touch of the OCD.

The chicks have also forced me to confront my fear of poop...one-on-one and on a daily basis, mind you. And well, a big step in the world of farming is conquering any fear of poop.

I still hate it but I no longer fear it.

Chicks poop and when you have twelve chicks, there is going to be a lot of it. Now, it is not as often as you may be thinking (at least I thought it would be way more) but it is still quite frequent and it just drops wherever they see fit (even in their water!). The odor is not really an issue because of cedar chips and changing the chips on a regular basis, but still, I have touched chicken poop way more than I would like to. Although, I have previous experience in the poop area; I have two cats after all, and I actually think that cleaning out a litter box is much, MUCH worse. Also, my husband and I were once the proud owners of a couple of ducks - which is a tragic story for perhaps another time - and well, as anyone that has ever had ducks can tell you, they poop nonstop.

I'm sure dealing with a little chick poop is nothing to all you veteran farmers but it's baby steps people.

And I do love having chicks! They are not at all hard to take care of and are very fun to watch (and so darn CUTE!). We've previously owned chickens but it was my husband who had them and I didn't enter the picture until they were full grown. I loved having the chickens and was sad when we had to send them to a friends (who also had chickens) in the process of trying to sell our house and moving. For anyone with the ability to have chickens, I give them a high recommendation. Not only will you have free eggs, but chickens also love munching on mosquitos, fleas, spiders, ticks, and other pests (what's not to love about that).

You just have to deal with a little chicken poop...

If you ever want to see a whole lot of cuteness, travel to a feed and seed store to check out their stock of chicks. Maybe they will also have some ducklings, which may just be the cutest thing I have ever seen.

Chicks follow the light.