a convergence of tea time thoughts for ladies

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The Pullets- now 5 months old

pullets by straw good one april 12 2013

Some of them have their combs and waddles and are ready to lay eggs; any day now!

pullets by tire rooster too  april 12 2013

I have one rooster in the flock- there he is hovering above the hens.  One of his toes are broken, so he hobbles around kind of funny.  Below:  This little hen hiding behind an old burn barrel puffed out as I took her photo.

pullet hiding april 12 2013

 

Cloudy Jewel

Cloudy-Jewel-Lutz-ur

I enjoyed this book by Grace Livingston Hill;  this is early 1900’s Christian fiction.  Cloudy Jewel is in her 50’s or 60’s, never married, and her invalid mother that she cared for in the home she grew up in  just died.  Jewel’s sister wants her for free maid help and invites Jewel to live with herself, husband and four children.

God rescues Jewel with another proposition that gives her independence, self worth and dignity.  She got her nickname “Cloudy Jewel” from a niece and nephew- her brothers children.    Keep in mind that back then in the 1920’s through the 1930’s,   choices for women were much different in the workforce than today.   Cloudy Jewel is a beautiful Christian lady.

The photo above picturing the  cover of the book is Leslie and her brother, Allison.   He is about 18 and she is  16 or 17 years old.   The photo of Allison  doesn’t look like an 18 or 19 yr. old of today in any way!

 

Australorp Pullets getting bigger

pullets feb 5 2013  close ups good  for  blog

Here are just a few pics of the pullets I took this evening. Just for review, this breed was developed in Australia from the Black Orpington breed and my flock was born Nov 16th 2012, so that makes them almost 3 months old.

pullets feb 5 2013  good one doorway

I have been keeping the doorway open during the day, but only a few venture out.  (above photo) The red  you see is the heat lamp in the coop.

pullets feb 5 2013 012 very good

Ruth Fielding at College/In the Saddle

Ruth and her friends are on the freshman  rowing team at Ardmore college; somewhere around the outskirts of New York  next to beautiful wooded acres.  These two photos are around that time period of 1917 when the book was written.

This is the 11th one in the series.  Of course there’s a mystery- stolen answer keys to test papers… but the next book was even better.

Ruth Fielding in the Saddle

1st year of college is over with, now on to the summer!   Off to Arizona where Ruth and Company will spend the summer on an abandoned gold mine for a picture shoot for Hollywood although the word “Hollywood” is not mentioned.

Below is a real ghost town.   The mining ghost town of Goldfield, Arizona.  It lays to the NE of Phoenix and in the 1890’s while Phoenix had a population of around 1700, Goldfield was home to 5000+ miners.

Below- Here is a different mining ghost town in Arizona.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3408/3524725668_002e0c32ae_b.jpg

Min and her Dad found a little gold too which gave Min the opportunity  to buy some dresses since she was always dressed like a boy on account of all the hard work she had to do in Arizona.  She also gets the guy; at least they are having Sunday dinners together for starters.

I love Ruth Fielding books, especially when  life is overwhelming   with situations that I don’t have control over and when  everything disappointing happens all at once.  Sometimes  a Ruth Fielding book  is just the happy thing I need.  This particular one was a good one.

Now they are pullets

I’d like to open their pathway out to the  fenced in courtyard, but the 5 other big hens out there would not let them come out.  I was surprised at how hostile the big hens are to these pullets. 

The five big ones won’t be there for long and it’s very cold outside, so for now they can stay in the coop.  I wonder if these two on the roost are roosters.  I’ll find out soon enough when they start their baby crows.  

Even though they should be all females, you always get at least one or two little roosters in the group.  I plan on fatting them up and eating them.

Our heart and mind

Happy new Year.  What will keep our heart and mind  in this new year?  The answer is the peace of God which passeth all understanding.

   Let your moderation be known to all men.  The Lord is at hand.  Be careful for nothing; but in everything  by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be make known unto God.  And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

Philippians 4:5-7

Our heart and our  mind  have to be kept from the wrong things such as  concepts and beliefs that are against God.   The peace of God goes beyond understanding… thank God we can have it!   When I pray  with supplication and have thanks to  God, then  good things happen- the peace of God  will keep my heart and mind through  Jesus Christ my one and only Lord.    That’s a good way to start off the new year!

Christmas Day 2012

Careful out there  with  slick roads and bad weather.    Hope everyone is having a great day.

   Thank  God for  a special  day to thank Jesus our wonderful Saviour who was born in a stable and died on a cross for our sins; our only way to heaven.  Thank God for the King James Bible too!

The Vanishing Shadow

This is the first Judy Bolton book I have ever read and it is the first one of the series which is written by Margret Sutton who I haven’t looked up yet, but I notice her style of writing and I like it.    Judy is a different character in personality than Ruth Fielding; the series that started 15 years prior to Judy Bolton and she is different from Cherry Aimes and Nancy Drew who are two other main characters in girl mystery series.

Judy solves a mystery that affects the whole town.  She’s 15 yrs. old and her Dad is the local family physician.  The time period is 1932 (publishing date) in the middle of the depression although in this book  the depression era is not talked about. 

In the book it is obvious that a physician in 1932 did not make a huge salary as doctors do today; some clues are as follows: Grandma was given  money for Judy and her brother for the summer, but it was only enough to buy Horace a suit for his job as a reporter for the small local paper.  At the end of the book the family has to move  and they are wondering if they can make it…

I don’t have access to  more of her books, but I will check out the library. .  This series  sounds adventurous.

Improvements

chicken nipple waterier roped up 001

This seems to  hold the chicken nipple waterier.  I used  the poly rope to wind it and tie knots to the lowest roost and it is holding.  This thing of 50 ft.  poly cord can hold up to 70 pounds and  when the chicks grow I can unwind and unknot it and hang it on a higher roost. 

below- This is what the poly rope looked like that I bought at Wal-Mart for 6.00.

chicken nipple waterier roped up 002

Here they are after I hung it, but I got to tell you that for 2 days  before I got the poly rope, I tried the electric heater waterier. (photo below)   It kept the water from freezing and I put it on a 4 inch cement block for the right height for the chicks, but there were still some droppings in the water… ick.

When I first set it up and  turned it over with the white part filled with water to sit on the red part, about 2 quarts spilled all over the floor of spine shavings in the coop… messy messy messy!!

 

So glad I found a way to hang the chicken nipple waterier with red poly rope!  I stored the electric waterier (like one in photo) in the garage now that I have the nipple waterier hung properly.  The chicks are happier too.  They just about attacked the nipple waterier as I was setting it up, so I think they like it better than the regular waterier that  I had for them these last 2 days.

5 week old chicks

chicks almost 5 weeks old close up on roost

They’ll be 5 weeks old in 2 days.     I put this one in the photo up there on the roost, but they don’t want to fly up there yet.  My flock of Rhode Island Reds  from a few years back were much more flighty and at 5 weeks old they’d fly to the 4 and 5 ft. roosts.   Bigger breeds are not big flyers as the forging breeds.

Below -  Aerial view of their feeder; they are done with the chick feeder with separate holes in it and now using this feeder which holds more and  hangs from a pulley.  Every few days I sprinkle flax meal around their feeder instead of baby grit.

chicks almost 5 weeks old 007

Below: They all ran when they saw that camera come down into their box.

chicks almost 5 weeks old scared of camera

Below :  They started coming out of the two boxes today and walked around the coop exploring ;many were curious about my boots and I snapped this picture of two of them.

chicks almost 5 weeks old 008

chicks almost 5 weeks old  at shoe

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