The Garden - July 31

When I took these photo, I didn't realize the flash was on, so they look a little weird.




The corn has really taken off and is starting to get it's tassels. We should have some sweet corn pretty soon.



The pumpkin growing amongst the corn is a Rouge Vif d' Etampes.



Italian plums are starting to ripen. This is the first year that I really have a crop. They don't get as purple as I thought they would when ripe. They are almost too sweet when soft. I've been picking and eating them when they are pretty hard. It only takes two bites to eat one and the pit comes out clean.



Chrissie hanging out under the tangerine tree.



Sid made two new bee blocks this spring, that's five blocks in total now and they are almost completely full. The population in our garden has grown a lot over the past 4 years. Now I hope we can find someone who wants to rent the house and garden, so those bees have something to eat.

June 2011
Snapping turtle mother at my parent's home.


She traveled from the ponds near my parent's home and laid her eggs under a bush in their yard. Looks like there are going to be a lot of snapping turtles in the area in a few months. Make sure you wear shoes in the yard!

"Females travel over land to find sandy soil in which to lay their eggs, often some distance from the water. After digging a hole, the female typically deposits 25 to 80 eggs each year, guiding them into the nest with her hind feet and covering them with sand for incubation and protection. Incubation time is temperature-dependent, ranging from 9 to 18 weeks. In cooler climates, hatchlings overwinter in the nest." - wikipedia.org

New Chicken videos


This video is pretty long, but the chickens are extra cute.



Preening under the lilac tree.



More of the same, but different




Eating scratch.


Chrissie making some noise.



Chrissie checking out Lu.

More eggs...

Blondie's first egg was this Thursday, Feb. 10th. It had some little dark specks on the larger end. We only got 2 eggs from her, so far. 2/10 & 2/11. She is already taking a break. I think I know who the slacker is.


Chrissie's first egg was today, Sunday, Feb. 12. It's lighter in color from Blondie's eggs, kind of pinkish. You can really see the color difference below.


Here is a sampling of eggs. Besides colors, you can really see a difference in shapes and sizes. If you look at the detail of this photo, you can see some weights that we wrote on them in grams. Biggest so far is 46 grams from Siouxsie. She as laid everyday so far, eight! Such a good girl.

Week 24 - We have an egg! - February, 5th 2011 - 7:30am PT


The tiny blue egg is from Siouxsie. The brown one is just a dummy egg, so they understood where to lay their eggs, but it is also a good comparison of the size. Because she is new at this whole egg laying thing, it will take awhile for her eggs to get bigger. It's a pretty grayish, blue.



This photo isn't very good, but I wanted to weight it. 1 3/8 ounces. We were expecting Blondie to be the first one to lay, because she is so much bigger than the other two. Siouxsie is actually the bottom of the pecking order and the smallest. YAY!

Heidi's Birthday Present from The Bleuler's


Sid's parents sent me this great painting that Hugo painted in 2009. I love his work. When we visited during the summer, this was one of my favorites.

Our gallery is getting big thanks to them. Well maybe not big, but it's three more than we had a year ago. Sid also has a couple of Hugo's abstract paintings. I'll post those at another time.

Thanks Karla and Hugo!

New Videos for the New Year

There are 3 videos here, but I uploaded more to YouTube. Out Of Order Acres YouTube


Chrissie really likes Lu. He doesn't really know what to do when she chases him. I still need to get a really good video of her chasing him.



Eating yogurt with their regular feed. They love it.



Checking out the cat door. I'm waiting for one of them to figure out how to get in the house.