And Now, A Recipe

Spring means I don't come inside too often, and any large scale cooking is not right on the menu.  However, yesterday we got a new stove, so I wanted to make something nice to christen it.  I decided on strawberry pie, which is fantastic.  I thought I'd share the recipe with you. 

Strawberry Pie

1 recipe for a 9-inch single crust pie

Find yourself a nice crust recipe. It makes all the difference, and it's so easy to make!

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup flour

6 tablespoons butter

1 pinch ground nutmeg

4 cups fresh strawberries, hulled

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup flour

1 tbsp cornstarch





1.  Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
2.  Make the topping:  In a bowl, mix until fluffy 3/4 cup sugar, 3/4 cup flour, 6 tbsp butter, and nutmeg.
3.  Place strawberries in a large bowl.  In a separate bowl, mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup flour, and cornstarch.  Pour this on top of the strawberries and mix gently to coat them.

4.  Pour berries into pie crust, mounding them in the center.  Cover berries with crumb topping and top the crumbs with some pea sized blobs of butter.  Wrap edges of pie crust to prevent burning.

5.  Put a pan in under the pie to catch the drips.  Bake pie in 400 degree oven for 20 minutes, and then reduce heat to 375 and bake for an additional 40 minutes.
6.  Take out and let cool.

The new oven did a lovely job!!

This pie is best eaten cold, to tell the truth.  If you let it set, the flavors all gel together, and it is FABULOUS!!!

Drippy, gooey, strawberry yumminess!!

I love pie.  There's another confession for you.  I have a chicken addiction, I love and eat too much bread, and I love, love, love, pie.  This one is one of my favorites. 

Strawberry deliciousness! 

Facelift

When we started with our livestock last year, we had two small houses for them to live in.  Ten chickens fit into a small coop, and two geese fit into a small house (yes, I house my geese and ducks).  This was plenty.  However, we were increasing the flock, and therefore needed to increase the housing.  The first house to build was a goose house.  It needed to be bigger to accommodate the increased number of geese, and then the smaller house could be used for the ducks, which are a smaller flock (both in size and number). 

I got to work on the goose house, and I learned from my many mistakes building the first small shelter last year.  This one turned out significantly better.  Sturdy, level, better planned out.  After fussing with it and painting it an outrageous color, it was done and I was very happy with it.

Don't mind the empty windowboxes--I'm not allowed to plant anything in them, even fake flowers.  The geese are offended by all that stuff, apparently, and they rip it all out with gusto.

Though I do not enjoy building things (oooh--that admission will probably get me disowned--sorry mom), I like making them look nice, and since I have to look at this house every day and I can see it from many places in the backyard, I want to look at something pretty.  So it's pretty.  But it made the other, older house look much, much worse.

To be fair, I had NO idea what I was doing when I built that other house--I hardly know what I'm doing now.  And I re-used a lot of things, including the plywood on the outside.  The house had a patched look from where all the plywood met (or didn't quite meet) up, and the roof went like this: / and the door went like that: \.  So no, none of it was level and it was really sad looking.  I have avoided taking pictures of it at all costs, and that's why you don't see any here today.

The house went on being sad looking, but I ignored it because it worked.  Ducks were housed, ducks were safe and dry, and that was all I needed.  I would have liked to have knocked it down and started over again, but that gets expensive and I still have more housing to build.  Yes, I knew how crappy it looked-it would be hard to miss.  And yes, it did bother me.  So yesterday I decided finally do something (reasonable) about it.  I decided to paint it and freshen it up.  Then I decided to try to hide the roof line that does this: /.  Then I got on a roll and went all crazy with a paint brush and some left over plywood and glass and a couple of tools and came up with this:

You can still see the sloping roofline if you look above the trim, but don't tell anyone I told you so.

It'll never grace the cover of a magazine, but it's definitely better.  Most importantly, though I do like things to look nice, they have to function, and this baby still functions beautifully.

Yeay for leftover supplies! 

Linking to:

Bees!!

Best told in pictures.

Bunch o' bees coated in sugar syrup

Opening the package

Removing the feeder can and queen

Shaking the ladies out

Persistent little buggers

Running for deal life.  ---Just kidding.  Closing up shop.

Feeder installed

Second brood box added

Checking out my handiwork

Trying to get those last ladies out of the box

Mostly done.  The other girls will need to find their way.

On My Day Off

It rained, and I had a chance to get into my sewing room.

It doesn't happen often.  I enjoyed it, after I took my mind off all the work I should have been doing outside.

It's sunny today, though, so no more playtime for me.

Back to work I go!

Yes, Yes I Did.

I tilled a 2000 square foot garden.  With a Mantis.



You know the Mantis, right??  That little tiny, rototiller?  The one with the 12" swath?

From Mantis' site

Yeah, that one.  So small you can't really see it in the garden.  Wait, let me help you out.

Yeah, I'm crazy.  Check number 22 off the list.

Man, I'm tired.

I Have a Chicken Addiction and Other Stupid Facts

Hi, My name is Jocelyn and I am absolutely addicted to chickens.

Do you think there is a 12 step program for this?  There should be. Chickens are the gateway livestock, and it is way too easy to become addicted.  I have geese because I had chickens.  I have ducks because I had geese.  I will have guinea fowl, because what the hell and why not.  You see the slippery slope?  Chickens are cute, small, portable, cheap, and very useful.  There are always tons of them at the feed store and online, and they are so tempting, especially after a long, cold winter.

These are our layers right now.  Hermione, the Barred Rock, is in the front here.

We started with 10 chickens here at Chicken Scratch.  10.  We had more eggs than we could eat, and were selling the extras.  It was going well, so the plan was to add 10 more this spring, for an even 20.  When chick ordering time came around, the 10 turned to 15.  Up to 25 now.  Then we lost one of our laying hens.  So we were down to 24.

A Sicilian Buttercup chick

24 is a nice even number, so we'd stop there.  But then there was the Emmet/Arthur problem of too many ganders and not enough geese (poor Ginger).  Thought I'd alleviate that by a trip to the feed store to order a goose for each of them.  But here in NY, you can't just order 2 of anything, when it comes to fowl, 6 is the minimum.  So, I added 3 Ameraucanas and 2 guineas to my order, and had 7 and was good to go.  3 more chickens would bring us up to 27, an odd number, but it would be OK.

A Black Copper Maran chick.

Chick time came in the feed store, and I got the Ameraucanas.  I knocked together a quick (read: badly put together) brooder box for them (the other two were filled with geese), and off we went.  Went back to the feed store for wood chips.  They had Silkies.  Thought of my mom, who wants to start with chickens this year.  She had wanted a Silkie.  So I asked for one, and Katie, who works in the feed store, asked if I could take the two she had left instead.  One Silkie for me, one for mom.  Ok.  Up to 28 now.

My mother's silkie chick.  Mine was still in the brooder.

Fast forward a couple of weeks and the mail order chicks finally arrive.  One Ameraucana is DOA.  Another, the Ancona, dies that day.  I have no idea why, but there you have it.  We are down to 26.  26 is a nice, even number of chickens.  Good.  Done.

A Salmon Faverolle chick.

5 toes!!

Go back to the feed store yesterday.  Buy some more wood chips and look at the chicks.  Yeah....do you know where this is going?  Casually mention to Katie that there are a few chicks in the box that seem to be getting a little long in the tooth--just making conversation.  So many tiny ones, and there are these Barred Rocks that are a lot bigger, you know?  So she asks if I want them, and that she'll give them to me for a discount.  I agree, because I thought there were two.  Two can't hurt, right?  There were four.  Can't back out now, so I took them home.

New Barred Rocks.  We call them The Hermiones.

The count is now 30.  We went from 9 chickens to 30 chickens.  It's obvious an intervention needs to take place sometime soon.  And I need to find an outlet for all the eggs.  Oh boy.

Either a Speckled Sussex, or a Welsummer.  They both look the same to me.

So what did we learn here?

1. I am a chicken addict.
2. Chickens are the gateway livestock and lead to other types of livestock.
3. I single-handedly increased our chicken flock over 3 fold in a month's time.
4. I like even numbers when it comes to my livestock.
5. I should not go to the feed store and look in the chick room.
6. I will have WAY too many eggs later this year, and will be giving them to anyone who rings the doorbell or walks past the house (or drives past, or looks in my direction).
7. The eggs will be pretty.  Just think of all the colors we'll get.
8. If there are roosters in this batch (beyond what I planned for), then we'll have chicken to eat.
9. I will never remember all the names of the chickens, even though my children will name every one of them. I will call them all "Chicken".
10. I will not be placing a chick order next year (or the year after that).
11. My husband is a saint and deserves a shrine to be built to him.

One of the Ameraucanas from the feed store.  My daughter says her name is Molly.

Don't do what I've done, everyone.  Learn from me.  Stay off the slippery chicken slope!
Linking to:

The Continuing Adventures of Ginger

The count, when I last counted, was seven. 

She doesn't get up anymore now, unless she really needs a stretch.  Then she only does it for a short time, and it's back on the nest.  I've been feeding her and giving her water right there, since she won't get up.  It'd be better for her if she did, but she's determined.  She's been breaking twigs off the nearby bushes to make her nest nicer, and she's pulled out a considerable amount of her down to line the nest.  She spends the entire night in the bushes, with Ferdi and Arthur guarding her.  It's only right since one (or both) of them are the father. 

I am truly impressed with her fortitude.  She's not even a year old, and there she is, mommy material already.  It remains to be seen if anything will hatch--there are lots of variables, not the least of which is her young age.  If they do hatch, we should start to see some babies around the 26th of May. I would love to see her get at least one to hatch.  Just one, so she has something to show for all her work.  I'd hate to think she might be sitting on a nest of duds.  How heartbreaking.

What would I not like?  All seven to hatch.  Though I know she'd be thrilled, and I'd be thrilled for her, what am I going to do with seven BuffX geese?  I'd be going the Craigslist route, for sure, and putting a flyer in the feed store, that's what I'd do.  But I'll cross that bridge when and if I come to it.  For now, I'll be making sure she has what she needs, and that the dippy boys are doing their duty by her. 

I will keep you posted.  Cross your fingers for her!