The Adventures Of Snail Boy

Ok, so the picture is out of focus but you get the idea.

We had a nice little rain shower yesterday afternoon, and being summer my kids hit the dirt ( or mud) afterwards looking for fun stuff. What they found were tons of snails. They spent a good hour out there catching them. Now I am not the biggest fan of the snail. I can handle most bugs, but snails = yuck. I insisted that they at least put them in buckets when they came in the house for bed time. You can imagine my surprise when my youngest even pulled a few out of his pants ! Needless to say I tucked in 2 happy boys with a bucket brimming with snails which were released as soon as the boys were happily sleeping.

Go Organic

Have a look at this !

Organic fresh produce delivered to my door. I usually try to buy my produce and meat locally, but living in the mountains there is really only 3 months out of the year produce is available. Our only other choice is Walmart. I hate buying produce at walmart. They do have a nice little line of organics now, but their selection is so limited and I have to drive all the way down a mountain to get it. The other day I ran across a lovely web site that ships fresh organic foods right to your door. More food miles than local, yes, but in the end it is better than food shipped in from some far off country. Both better for you and better for our planet, I believe. We decided to give it a whirl, and boy howdy am I pleased. It was easy, fast, and my kids love it. The box arrived and they tore it open and started shoving food in their tiny little faces. I sort of like the variety aspect of it. Some of it I don't think I would buy normally but I sure will try it now that it is in my house. Here is a list of what I got delivered right to my door for $82.00 and that included shipping.

3 apples
3 citrus fruits
1 pear
2 kiwi
4 peaches
1 bunch of red grapes
1 bunch of green grapes
3 red potatoes

1 small package of cherries

1 head of garlic
one box of cherry tomatoes
1 bunch of green beans
4 zucchini
2 bunches of cooking greens
1 package of mesclun salad mix
1 bunch green onions
one head of leaf lettuce
1 bunch of spinach
1 bunch of parsley
1 bunch of basil

They also included a recipe sheet to tell me how to cook some of it. The selection will change seasonally , of course, but I am pleased and we will do this again for sure. In fact next time I think I will get the larger size box, as my kids have already dug in to the shipment and show no signs of coming up for air.

Respect the Bird

Things here at Skunky Acre have been a bit crazy but I do have a lot of new stories to tell, so here they are.

Have a look at Kung Foo Pee Pee. I guess that is what happens when you let a 3 year old child name a turkey. The elementary school my oldest attends tried to hatch some of our eggs for a science project. Something went terribly wrong and what few eggs that hatched were deformed. I had been expecting 8 more chickens for our flock. When the news that we would not be getting any more chickens came my lovely husband and crazy children immediately ( as in I had to turn the stove off to leave ) hopped into the car and ran down to the closing feed store to snatch up this lovely bird. Gee, do you think they had a plan there ! We are unsure of his breed, but know he is a heritage breed turkey that will be white. Oh, and here is my favorite , he has to be walked and he does not get along well with others. Other birds that is, he LOVES people. We purchased him as Thanksgiving dinner, but I am sure that plan will be revised.

On another note we had to off a few of our bantam roosters. We accidentally ended up with 3 of them and they were really hard on our hens. Now nothing, and I mean nothing, messes with our laying hens. They are our money makers and food supply. We had been putting it off for a good while and it was just time for them to go. In fact, I do believe that their soup was what had to be turned off to go and get a turkey. The soup was good, but we were all a little sad. They were good little guys and really pretty. Such is life.......

The black broilers are growing by leaps and bounds. I am sure they will be in the freezer in 3 or 4 more weeks. The hurt ones have started regrowing toes and feet. Yes, you read correctly, they are regrowing body parts. I would post a picture, but it all looks pretty gross.

Next week is the first week of summer around here. The boys are enjoying the end of school and all the cupcakes and fun that come with it. As a matter of fact, I can't get my oldest to stay home and in bed with his sore throat and low grade fever. He was going to school this morning if he had to walk there.

The Mad Hatter and The Case of the Missing Feet

First off I want you to meet the best Mad Hatter ever ! Yes, my sweet darling little boy played the Mad Hatter in a elementary school rendition of Alice in wonderland. Might I say he wowed the audience with his talent and was the hit of the show. I think we may have had a glance at a future profession.

Now for The Case of The Missing Feet. Today we discovered that something ate the feet off of some of our meat birds. We have put the wounded ones in a nice little hospital ward and are treating their wounds with antibiotics. The poor little guys, but there is hope for them. They are healing very well and learning to limp. We spent the afternoon placing chicken wire around the base of the chicken tractor hoping to stop what ever little hands are reaching under there and getting a nice chicken dinner. I will have to keep you posted on this one.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy mother's day to all of the mothers out there. I, myself, have had a whirl wind weekend of mother's day fun.

The weekend started off on Friday night with a wonderful promotion ceremony for my youngest son. He is moving from the 3 year old room to the 4 year old room. I got all teary eyed when I saw the cute little 5 year olds in their cap and gowns graduating to kindergarden. That will be us next year and I just can't stand the thought. We both won awards this year. My boy won the best backwards clothes model award since he always loves to wear his pants backwards. He just can't understand why anyone would want their pockets in the back. I won the best mom award for letting him wear his clothes any way he wants as long as he is dressed for the season at hand.

Then ( after a big breakfast on Saturday morning) I was presented with lots of jewelery, both the kind kids make and the kind husbands buy. I was also treated to an actual movie theater movie ( a first for at least 3 years). There was even popcorn and candy a plenty to go around. I just love Speed Racer and so do my boys. Then we loaded up the truck with enough mulch to almost finish off my garden. I was also the recipient of a cake decorated in my honor at dinner time.

Who knows what today holds, I am sure my boys have big plans. All I know is I am the luckiest woman in the world and I am sure it will be a wonderful day.

Hen Pecked

I have been hen pecked in two different ways..well maybe three.

1) Apparently I did not tag someone else in the fun little blog game, so I am going to tag Tara and Jerry. They are over at wheresyourline.blogspot.com and I know they will love me for the invitation to play. Oh, and I plan on adding their blog site to my list just as soon as I get the time to edit it. What can I say I am super slow and my husband does most of that stuff.

2) The chickens got in my garden the other day. I am just now able to talk about it with out steam coming out of my head. Someone ( not me) left the gate open and the little boogers took their chance. My garden went from almost ready to produce, to completely gone. The good news is I caught them before they dug up the roots so I am counting on the plants coming back.

3) Our food has begun to bite ! Those sweet but a little wild Black Broilers have gone off the deep end. They now eye ball you when you go in the pen to feed them and run over to bite you. They will even try it through the chicken wire. Crazy little animals no wonder people eat them.

Tagged

Ok, I have been tagged. I am not really one for games, but I am also not one to ruin a good time.
As usual I have adapted the game to my needs so here are 5 random things about me.

1) I can't wear a watch. That is right I can't wear one. Not for any personal reason, but because after a few weeks the batteries stop working and then after a few weeks the batteries stop working and then after a few weeks the batteries stop working. Yes, I some how drain the batteries with my body. Watch people have informed me that while unusual there are some people who have to wear a wind up watch because of the electromagnetic energy their bodies do or do not give off. Even stranger is I think my grandma is the same way, but I could be remembering it wrong.

2) I like to chop wood. There I said it. I love the feeling of doing something so usefull, and to see the big neatly stacked pile when I am done. I can stand out there all day chopping and enjoy it

3) I can sing all the songs in the movie Cinderella. The Disney version of course. She is after all the coolest of the princesses.

4) I once caught my husband in the head with a fishing lure while we were chest deep in the ocean and he had a giant salmon on his line. We are still married so it must be love.

5) I am addicted to the documentary channel. I can watch it all day long. I just love spending a whole hour learning about the electric car, blood diamonds, or peak oil.

We're Serious About Our Meat!

We drove through this to get it...
What a strange trip it turned out to be. We drove right through the fire lines with flames on both sides of the car and smoke so thick you could barely see. But we got our meat by gosh!

Burning Down The House

It seems as if there is a 5,000 acre forest fire not to far from our lovely little patch of heaven. Alarming , a little, but there is a small town between us and the fire that as not been evacuated. When that happens I will really get worried. We are however reviewing our fire emergency plan and making sure our plants around the house are not to dry.

Our biggest problem at the moment is the fire is between us and our destination for the day. We are headed to Smokey Bear days, old Lincoln, and the farm for some fresh meat. I am looking forward to a good old fashioned family adventure, even if I have to drive around a fire to get to it.

Moving on up

Yesterday was a good old fashioned farm day around Skunky Acre.

The Black Broilers were moved out of the brooder and into a pen. They really enjoyed the dirt under their feet and spent part of the day taking dirt baths. Then the little roosters found a new love of arguing with one another, and everyone attempted to eat any thing they could find be it food or not. We also discovered that they had already gone through their 50 pound bag of chick start, boy are they hungry fellows. It is getting them nice and plump and juicy though.

So we made a quick run down to the feed store and resupplied all the animals. Feed has really gone through the roof around here. It is now costing me $25 for 3 weeks worth of feed. I am really glad we pasture our chickens at this point, all though, I have no idea what I am going to do this winter when the chickens don't find as much food out there. This lead us to come to a very hard decision, we are going to have to raise our egg prices. I really hate to do it. I love the thought of undercutting Walmart, and supplying a better product at the same time. The big problem is now that I am losing money if I don't raise my prices, in fact at $3 a dozen I am still only making twenty five cents a dozen.

Hummm, maybe growing corn in the garden and fighting the raccoons off it is not so bad an idea. I might have to think about that one.