Category Archives: Comments by Frankie

My New Blog: mychickentales.com

My son, Brian gave me a new blog for my birthday in November.   I kept saying I wanted to write about my experiences with my chickens.   I am so excited.   I have already started writing on the blog.  I still don’t have the format of the blog right yet.  My daughter, Bonnie is suppose to help me with that and now that Christmas is over, she can probably get on it. I want some chickens and barns on the background.  I will definitely have to get my digital camera skills working.   I will be staying with my daughter, Amber after the birth of her first child in January so she can help me with that between changing diapers.  lol

Chicken Addiction

I am sure my NC family thinks I am crazy.  I am spending about two months there caring for my mom and her broken hip so we have plenty of conversations involving my chickens.

Two chicks hatched out the day before I left for NC and I was so excited.  They are Silkie chicks mixed with an Aracuana daddy.  I didn’t get to see them grow because I was gone three weeks and they are much bigger now.  Boo hoo

I have found some interesting websites where other people are raising chickens and writing about their experiences.  A woman who sells eggs and chicks lives close to me and has a website named chickenzoo.com.  She has all kinds of animals and lives on two acres like me.

My chickens give me a lot of joy.  It is fun to see what the baby chicks will look like.  I now have 33 chickens including the babies.  One of my Aracuanas just laid it’s first green egg.  I have an incubator so I will be hatching out some baby chicks in the spring.  So eggciting.

I think I may start a chicken blog….it would a diary of my ideas and happenings while raising my chickens.  I have designed a chicken house and found some cheap shortcuts for caring for unexpected situations.  I am looking forward to finding a name for my blog. 

Horse Manure – making my life easier

I mentioned before my neighbor, Gail gives me her horse manure over the fence….into a wheel barrow/wagon.   I found another purpose for the manure.  She has two large horses now so there is an abundance of manure being thrown over the fence.  lol

We live on two acres that use to have over three hundred pine trees planted on it.  We had the trees cut down and were paid for the timber which was great.  Unfortunately, the roots are composting/rotting away under the soil.  Thus, we have low spots in our yard.

We started filling the holes with the horse manure and now after more than a year, we have great grass growing in those low spots.   The horse manure Gail gives to me has a lot of wood chips and straw in it from the barn area.

The reason it makes my life easier is I can now walk outside and not fall into low spots in my yard and it sure makes it easier to mow the lawn when the yard is level.

We still have a lot of low spots to fill but Gail assures me that as long as she keeps feeding those horses, the manure will continue.

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…

Feel better about high gas prices

While everyone is complaining as gas prices rise to $4.00 a gallon, my husband put a different perspective on the situation.

Our Corolla gets about 35 miles to the gallon. He asked me if I would walk 35 miles for $4.00. I said, “No, of course not.” He said, “then its a pretty good deal to only pay $4.00 to travel 35 miles.”

My husband is the kind of guy who sees the cup half full.

Just another day in paradise

No matter how hectic life gets to be sometime, you should wake up early and enjoy a few minutes alone just admiring the Lord’s handiwork. With my coffee in hand, I am off to the back porch to enjoy watching my chickens scratching for food and my dogs running from tree to tree following the squirrel as he jumps from branch to branch. And the wild birds are entertaining, too. Yesterday I watched a Woodpecker and some Blue Jays sweep down to steal a bite out of the dog’s dishes.

The lawn is freshly mowed and everything looks so green and manicured. There is still work to be done in the yard but I will think about that later. Enjoy…relax, now.

My daughter helped mow the lawn last night and it really tickled me to see her on the riding lawnmower going around in circles and zig zagging to make sure she didn’t  miss  a blade of grass. Not exactly what she did on Friday night in Raleigh. Then we raked the grass in the thick part of the yard and feed it to the two horses and the goat next door.

I guess I am particularly thinking about “another day in my paradise” because I am missing my Dad so much and he is in the REAL paradise now. I think I will just try to enjoy the time I have on this earth with all the Lord’s many beautiful wonders and make myself more available to the people who mean so much to me. My son lives in Raleigh and my daughter lives in Atlanta and I don’t always make the time to call like I should. Emailing is so much easier. I do speak with my Mom almost every day. Everyone just seems so busy…don’t they? I was hoping at 57 I wouldn’t be so busy myself. lol

Well, I am going to grab another cup of coffee and get back out on the porch before it starts getting too hot. Have a great day folks. Take the time to enjoy a few moments outside in the refreshing morning air. You won’t regret it. Unless you live next to a couple horses, like I do and sometimes the air…not so fresh.

Spring is here….

The trees are getting their leaves again and blossoms are back. Wow. What a difference a matter of weeks makes to nature.

Lake Tahoe was beautiful. Snow-covered mountains and a lake that defies description. The color is amazing. We went up the side of the mountain in a Heavenly Gondala and the view was even better. When you get to the top, there is a “playground” and I couldn’t help but think about my granddaughter enjoying the area. Small kids were learning to ski and there were inner-tubes that teenagers and adults were sliding down the a circular slide. then there were lifts to the top of the mountain for skiers, snow bikes, snow mobiles with a sled behind it for tourists and a place to eat.

A limo met us at the airport and drove us from Reno to Lake Tahoe which was about an hour. I don’t remember being in a limo before so it was definitely a treat.

Only downside to the vacation, Calvin and I both got a head cold and it lasted for a week. It snowed while we were there and we were outside in sweaters and jeans. I would love to go back there in the summer and enjoy the lake.

Back to the Spring stuff….Calvin has already mowed the lawn. No rain here in Florida so I guess we won’t have to mow as often. I am going to need to water the plants outside until we get some rain. That takes about an hour a day…who has the time?????

Remember the crepe myrtles I dug up out of the ditch? Well, they are growing again this year. Thank goodness. Free plants are the best.

My goal for my yard this year is to get some bushes/larger plants planted. My trees are all growing well. Getting them planted earlier was a great plan because they take so long to grow. The grass growing in my sandy yard is a big problem. Especially with two acres.

I hope everyone is enjoying the Spring…new life..new growth…new hope.

March Update

Hello family and friends…

Sorry I have neglected my blog. Just been so busy with my new job…assistant manager, International House of Pancakes. Training was six days a week and now I am managing shifts so I am down to five days a week. I have to remember how to manage my time in order to have meals cooked ahead of time for my husband as well as keep the house clean, grocery shopping done and laundry caught up.

I did take time to read my newest copy of Mother Earth News and saw a lot of stuff about chickens/eggs/coops. I have been wanting to build a new chicken house for some time now and I think I can either use some of the info from Mother Earth News or maybe even modify one of the ideas.

My garden area is looking really good with all the horse manure my neighbor has provided. I have raked it and my chickens have scratched it down to minute pieces of matter. I need to get something in the ground very soon. I was going to plant seeds since they are cheaper but I am thinking young plants may be a better idea this year.

Calvin and I are going to Lake Tahoe in April to celebrate our (May) anniversary. Free airline tickets and hotel for four days. I just started a new job so I was thinking I wouldn’t be able to take advantage of the great offer but my boss said “time with family is important.” I can’t wait to spend time alone with my husband with nothing on our plate except enjoying each other’s company and sightseeing in a totally new environment. He has been working 30 hours every two weeks (for months) of overtime so he is needing a vacation very badly. Good news is his hard work has paid off because he is getting a promotion and he has gotten two bonuses.

I guess this is all for now.

Frankie’s schedule…or overscheduled

Wow, so much going on. It is hard to find the time to post my thoughts or new ideas.

I started a full time job a couple weeks ago. At 57, it is difficult to get back into the routine of working full time plus still having time to take care of the house, laundry and grocery shopping. We are working on paying off bills and getting a larger nest egg for retirement. Plus, there is so much I would like to do to fix up my home. New flooring for my house would be so great. My brother-in-law offered to help me redo my kitchen but I need to buy all the supplies first.

I am feeling very sentimental this morning…thinking about my Dad’s passing on. I know he is in a better place but it is so hard to believe he is gone. I pray every day that my Mom continues to have the desire to live without him. Fifty-eight years of marriage is a very long time and I can’t imagine how difficult it is to get up every morning and he isn’t there beside her in bed. I try to call Mom every day (or two) and see how she is doing. Some days, she sounds like it is such an effort to even speak. She seems to be doing okay on the days when she has things to do to occupy her time. My sisters are really taking good care of her and I sure wish I could be there in NC to help.

My kids seem to be as busy as I am…Brian just got back from a cruise with his wife, Jen. I think it is great how they find time to do things together. Sometimes, you just have to make time for each other. So you don’t drift apart and go your separate ways.

My youngest daughter, Amber is finalizing paperwork for a new job, too. Go Amber. Nice pay increase and lots of benefits….like traveling. I did get to see Amber for about 20 minutes on Sunday. Long story but it has to do with not enough time.

Bonnie and I are spending a lot of Mother/Daughter time getting things done around my property and keeping each other motivated to lose the weight. We both lost another two pounds on our weigh-in last Friday.

I sure wish I could squeeze some time in to go visit my granddaughter, Madison. Every time I see her, she has grown so much. She is beautiful…not just from a grandmother’s point of view either.

Well, it is 6am now and I still need to get the laundry out of the dryer and make my bed before I start getting ready for work. Better run.

Take time to enjoy life folks. Being busy feels good in one sense….but it sure wears an ole body out.