First Eggs

At last.

 

Crazy Hearts

 

 

Before It All Turns to Slush

It was a gray, cloudy day, and warm enough that much of the snow was melting, but with 2 feet of snow on the ground, there was still plenty left for sledding.

 

 

Chicken Check In

Possibly their best feast ever:  leftover beef borguignon and salad and peppers and radishes and apple cores. Plus, Max hand-fed them some sunflower seeds. We think they are getting close to laying age, and we want to make sure they are well fed.

 

A slight warm up in temperatures (note the thermometer only reads about 25, but that was feeling downright toasty after the last week). We took advantage of the heat and cleaned the coop. The girls chose to remain on the roost so they could stay out of our way.

 

 

I think this photo is hilarious. It looks to me like Topsy Turvy (right) is leaning in to be sure she is in frame.

Handmade

Room for Three

If you don't count Martin's feet.

The Story of an Igloo

Over a week ago, I was totally inspired by the igloo my friend and fellow blogger Anna made in their Ohio front yard. But we simply didn't have the snowfall to make it possible to build one of our own. And then came the Blizzard of 2011. (It just sounds so dramatic to say it that way.)

 

 

Skittle came to check out the progress.

 

She decided she liked the coop, or more specifically the top of the run, better.

 

 

 

It was getting roomier, but we realized the advantage of already having 20 inches of snow on the ground was that you could also dig down to give it more height on the interior. I used a hoe to scrape away at the inside: the ceilings, the walls and the floor, and we hollowed out a pretty nice little spot, big enough for all three of us to sit in. And it has the added bonus of a slide-in entry.

 

End of day one.

 

 

The boys wanted to get back to work on our igloo the next morning. Today's task: decoration!

We  made some dragon eggs, water balloons filled with food coloring and water. We took them outside to the freezer that is our back yard.

 

 

We had made a couple of larger ones that didn't totally freeze, but they  made really great bowls. We eventually decorated the edge of the igloo with them.

 

Our finished, bedazzled igloo in our growing little village of a back yard.

 

The Great Blizzard, aka Martin's Birthday

Martin's 48th birthday got a bit buried in the news of another historic event: the great blizzard of 2011. Martin had the day off work, thankfully, so we all got to enjoy the amazing day together. 

Last week, the boys and I got the idea to take Martin sledding at the Dunes. But since that was a two hour drive, and the forecast was for a giant snowstorm, we revised our plans to going ice skating and then sledding at a local park. But even that was wishful thinking once the real snowstorm arrived. There was thunder and lightning and hail and about 20" of snow. All of our big plans were thwarted, and also nixed were the most modest of them, or so we thought, to take Martin to Lula. But they closed shop entirely. And we couldn't blame them. 

Luckily, I had prepared for a snow-in and had plenty of food on hand. We made waffles and berry compote and bacon and mimosas. I think it was a pretty festive breakfast. And then there were presents! Max shows Martin his card, which features a guy wearing a watch, looking at a Viking calendar, listening to music and drinking beer. All not so subtle hints as to what was in the Phineas and Ferb bag.

We spent the morning in the back yard, shoveling a path to the chickens, shoveling the snow out of the coop and run, and playing with them in the snow. (For a full account of our chickens and the big blizzard, see our chicken-centric blog, City Chicks, Country Boys.)

 

 

 

  

Trickster thinks she is a parrot. Or Otto thinks Trickster is a parrot. Or both.

We joined in with the rest of the neighborhood in shoveling our front walk, although we left the car buried for another day.

Then we went to Revolution Brewery for lunch.

Otto lost his tooth just before we left the house, so he had a new smile for us. We realized he looked a bit vampire-y when biting into his pretzel, and everyone wanted in on the action.

On the walk home from Revolution, Martin kept pushing the boys over in the snow. They finally got to push him down too. 

My former boss Cindy used to make this cake. I always think of her when I make it. It's chocolate hazelnut. And it's really yummy.

 

Happy birthday, Martin!