Monthly Archives: December 2008

Tips for long distance Grandmothers

I only see my grand daughter two or three times a year.  She is now 7 years old.

This year when I went to my son’s house for Thanksgiving I took a few craft items to share with Madison.   We had so much fun.  It also helped me to stay focused on her.  Making memories !!!!!

I bought a artificial wreath to decorate.  We went to the park and collected tiny pine cones and some of the Sycamore balls.  We painted them with glitter paint and let them dry.   We attached them with green pipe cleaners.    I also bought some very small red jingle bells that I attached together in bundles of three with the green pipe cleaners and attached to the wreath.  Then we added some candy canes for some extra color.

I also bought a pottery kit which was $20 on sale.  It was great.   We made one large and two small bowls…cups???  They air dry and then you paint them.  Great for sitting on your dresser and putting hair accessories or change, etc.   My daughter had taken a pottery class so she was a lot of help and enjoyed the time with her niece also.  Now I am thinking I want my own real pottery wheel.   Retirement is right around the corner…plenty of time for that stuff.

I also bought a few of the foam Christmas ornaments to put together, with glue.   Also, we painted some sun catchers.

My grand daughter cried when I left and it broke my heart.   It also made me feel good that she didn’t want us to leave.   I am looking forward to retiring and being able to go visit more often.

I love you, Madison.   I am very blessed to have such an intelligent, beautiful grand daughter and three great kids and an exceptional daughter-in-law and son-in-law.

Tax time coming up

Just a reminder to get your tax deductible items to the Goodwill and Salvation Army.

If you need to do any repair jobs or additions to rental properties, you can purchase the items before the end of the year and do the work in 2009.

It’s a good idea to get medical receipts and charity receipts together now, too.  I can’t tell you how many times I find receipts after I do my taxes.

I am looking forward to a NICE tax refund.  Woo Hoo

Baby Chicks

I was thinking about buying an incubator because I keep paying for new chickens as the older ones die.  But fortunately, I have a hen that sat on the eggs long enough to hatch five of them.

A few tips for anyone wanting to let a hen hatch eggs….

If you have more hens laying in the same nest, make sure you mark an X on the eggs you want to hatch out and remove the other eggs.  It takes 21 days for the eggs to hatch so I kept removing the eggs after there were eight eggs for her to hatch.   The eggs hatched out every other day.

Our hen would help peck the shell once the chick broke thru the shell.  The sixth chick pecked it’s way thru and then died. My husband and I had helped one other chick out of the shell by breaking part of the shell away to make it easier for it to get out.  Unfortunately, we didn’t help the sixth one because we were on our way to work.  Darn it.

We actually used a large plastic kid’s toy box without the top when it got closer to the 21 days.  We made a nice nest with hay and transferred the eggs while the mom had a fit.   We needed something large enough so the chicks could get out and walk around and have enough room for the food and water, too.  It was perfect.

We also made a rain cover which was a 4×4 board with four legs which were about 4 feet tall.   It kept the rain off the box and allowed the mom room to jump out and  get food and water with the other chickens.

We later transferred the chicks and mom into a 4×8 chain link cage with a heat lamp.  We live in the country and the danger of some animal preying on the baby chicks is very likely.

The chicks are a couple weeks old now and really growing fast.  I wanted to put the mom back in with the other chickens but my husband insist that we leave the mom with the chicks.   Sweet, huh?

Now I will put a perch in the cage so the chicks can start perching at night.

Just hope they aren’t all roosters…