Hatching Chicken #3

Embryology is fascinating.  How quickly the chicks begin to develop is absolutely astounding.
Of course, they only have an incubation period of 21 days, so they had better grow rapidly!

This egg was placed in the incubator last Friday.  It is scheduled to hatch April 13th.
The dark spot in the middle is the chick.  We could see it wiggling today too, unless that was just Joshie's hand shaking!
The air bubble that you can see at the end of the shell should get larger as they get closer to hatching.
Drew, you and Isabelle should take a few of the chicks home!  If you started now you could build a chicken coop with your new saw!  Certainly your father has a hammer and some nails lying around.

The Best Day ~

Joshie informed me first thing the other morning, "Today is going to be the best day of your life, Mom!"

I couldn't wait to find out what was going to happen!

It was a typical day, absolutely nothing extraordinary.  It crossed my mind throughout the day what Joshie had meant.  The day was filled with schoolwork, visiting the neighbor's farm, cuddling a new baby lamb, discussing names for the lamb, climbing rocks, discussing names for the lamb, piano lessons, discussing names for the lamb, choir practice....did I mention discussing names for the lamb?

As I was tucking Josh into bed at night he sighed, "Wasn't that the best day ever?"

And indeed it was, I need to see every day in that light.  Every day is a precious gift from our Creator.  The schoolwork, the craziness, the muddy footprints...they are all good.  We are alive and witnessing such beauty around us, but our vision can be clouded by our day-to-day struggles.

Spring ~

It is officially springtime in the mountains.
The weather cannot decide whether to rain or snow, often doing both simultaneously, my boys are frantic to escape outdoors every day, Shannon is itching to burn piles of brush, and I am dreaming (quite literally) of a new landscape project.
Last night's dream is way beyond our scope this year, but it sure looked good ~ in my dreams anyway ~:o)
Maybe I will just have to settle for a new sandbox.  Of course that will be for the kids, not me!

Yesterday Shannon decided to burn.  Nothing sings spring quite like burning ~ I am not sure why, it just does.  Robins were chirping away, boys were having sword fights, the girls were poking absentmindedly at the coals, Shannon was envisioning all the new wildlife that would be on our property this year since we were clearing feeding space for them.  I thought he was cleaning brush up just for me, but alas, he had an ulterior motive.

Mmmm, new willows will bring in more moose ~

That's the idea anyway ~

If I hide behind this willow, Mom won't notice me drinking her hot chocolate ~

Hot dogs only taste good outside !

Nicholas just jammed his fourth dog in his mouth.....yyyyuck.

Hatching Chickens #2

Sooo ~ we candled the eggs Wednesday evening and they all looked empty to my hurried and unrefined eye. We placed them back in the incubator to deal with the following morning.
Joshie & I decided it would be good to crack one open to see if it was even fertilized, thus indicating whether we had a rooster issue or an incubator issue.  As soon as the egg broke I knew we had made a mistake.  In the middle of the container was the smallest of chics with its' heart beating rapidly away.
This sight cued an immediate response from Josh, "You killed the baby chicken, Mom!"
The thought briefly crossed my mind to open another egg so the other kiddos could see what a miracle LIFE is, (any life, even a little ole chicken)  but decided against it.
I could only handle playing the villain once and besides it seemed a bit, well, just wrong.

This is a not-so-good picture of an egg ~ The chic is the dark spot in the egg.

We could see the veins growing along the interior of the shell but they didn't photo well.

Kath thinks she saw the chic wiggling a little bit.  

Celebrate ~ Use That China!

We were eating dinner with my bro-in-law, John, (Theresa's husband)  last week.  I was setting the table, but was not sure which dishes to use.  He was showing me this set of silverware and that set of ordinary plates.

He mentioned their "good" dishes that they never used in an off-hand manner, then mumbled, "A lot of good that did....saving them."

Yesterday was the Feast of Saint Joseph, so it seemed appropriate to celebrate ~ not just with a nice dinner, but with the china.  Annika and Dom were ecstatic when I told them to use the china.  They didn't even mind setting the table.  Then, they whisked out the name tags to complete the setting!

Now I have another resolution to live life better ~
Use the china ~ go ahead, drag it out, dust it off.
Make life elegant.
And if a piece breaks know that there are many replacements on eBay!

Hatching Chicken Eggs #1

We are hatching chicken eggs for Easter.
Ideally, the little peeps will poke out of their shells on Easter Sunday but since things rarely happen quite as planned in this household, we may be a day or so off.

The topic of whether we should hatch more chickens has been the topic of conversation for many a night 'round the dinner table.  Now that we are committed to more chickens we must begin building a larger and better chicken coop.

Heck, we should hatch a few dozen more and build a barn!

We think the large egg may be a "double yolker" which would mean twin chicks. 

We have read that the success rate of hatching these is pretty low, 

so we shall see what happens.  

Midweek we are going to candle the eggs to see which ones are developing.  We will post pictures of that soon after.

My Cute Ski Tech

This kid thinks he can tune skis ~ 

Really, what does a guy need? 

Apparently only skis, a table knife, and a scuba mask. 

I wouldn't trust him. 

Maybe he should be building surfboards.