Why Miss Jones, you are beautiful...

Boys don't make passes at girls who wear glasses, but do girls who wear glasses make passes at boys?... HELL NO !! Not if it is my daughter.

 Yes, we have surpassed the braces and retainer stage and reached the "Madam, your daughter needs glasses"  To which my daughter replied, "Oh no, mommy, I'll be so ugly"

So there we were at the Optical Center. "What about these? or these? how about this one? Okay, this is the one. How much will that be? $400 DOLLARS!  = thud=   Okay I didn't actually faint, but apparently I grew pale. My daughter then said she wanted to look some more. What do you do in this situation? She is my daughter; she is a teenager; she is very concerned with fitting in and looking good. Gulp.

"Hey, Mom, I think these are better on me. What do you think?"

I look over at my baby. What I see is a two year old girl, wearing my high heels. A table cloth wrapped around her and fake pearls around her neck. She turns from the mirror and looks at me. My breath catches in my throat, she looks at me and I see an accomplished young reporter preparing for a high stakes interview. Her eyes flashing behind the frames of her glasses as she smiles ready to ask  the killer question. I see the young bride looking up shyly at me as if to ask, is this okay? I see the young woman shaking her head at her brother coming to the dinner table in his underwear.

"They are perfect, even better than the first one, baby" She smiles her killer smile and says, rather loudly,

"And they are half priced!"  I haven't done a cartwheel in so many years... I wanted to, but I restrained myself. Good job sweetie, now, off to Sizzler for lunch.

Peace and love to you all...

And the silence was deafening...

The big girls...and Buster are gone. (sigh) I told the crew that we needed to keep things calm and quiet. Everything was set up. We had ice in the tubs and the table was prepared. The water was at temp for the scalding and the cone was in place. My son told everyone that he would do the deed and we had a volunteer plucker. My husband was standing by to do any chore required. I placed the first chicken in the cone, my son walked up and pulled out his knife, paused, handed the knife to me and said,

"It's really sharp, don't cut yourself"

What!!?? So, my husband stepped in and took over. The boy was demoted to plucker.

It wasn't that bad, really. Now that we have done it, we know what we would do differently. The way we did it was very labor intensive. I did all of the butchering, not a big deal, but I could not make a fist for all of Sunday and Monday. Nor could I walk because the table was too low for me and my back and hip are now protesting.

We iced them down and brought them in to the house for packaging and freezing. I had only five more to go and I needed a break. So, I ran to the store for some dinner fixings. No body wanted chicken that night for some reason. When I got back....there were only four chickens in the ice tub, and there was a wet trail of crushed ice across the kitchen floor and down the hall. That was were I found Yogi. He had a chicken hanging from his jaws. I told him he was a Bad Dog, and he winced at me and hung his head as if to say,

"I was weak, so, so weak. I don't deserve you"

Then he sulked away (shoop, shoop) and curled up in a corner. I'm not buying it you brat! No treats for you!! Incidentally, dogs love the chicken feet. However, when you give them the feet, be prepared to experience the shocking scene of what looks like a chicken trying to escape from your dog's mouth.

So, there is no more cheerful crowing at 6:30am, no more busy sounds of clucking. There are no more little dust clouds as someone finds a delicious bug and gets chased around the chicken run. All is quiet in the coop...

Did you want white meat or dark ?.....

Peace and love to you all......

Tech SUCKS !! I mean HI from the chicken ranch....

I have been trying to get online since yesterday...really....no REALLY! I had a lot to do and I put off my BLOG RESPONSIBILITIES until later in the day...okay much later in the day. But when I tried to get on line; I was unsuccessful. We had a power failure and then a broadband failure..so...while I am a lazy slug, this time it wasn't just my sluggishness. First of all, I had medical responsibilities. I had to take a test, perform a test, well...I had to do something for my doctor. Then I had to go to the post office and mail it. I won't go into it any more than that other than that type of mail would be illegal with out a doctor's request.

Then I had a request for some photos of my blog stars, that is right...

The Chickens !!!

well, most of them... they won't stand still....







And Buster, our rock star... and lead singer...

And quite a big boy too....

So they are scheduled for the block this Saturday.

They don't know it yet,

but I think they will catch on pretty quickly.

It will be a little gruesome at first, but very tasty later.

OOPS! Well how was I supposed to know

they have wifi in the coop ?

But. then I will be able to focus on the layers...

Or as my daughter and

chicken wrangler calls them,

"Fluffy butts..."



"Are you talkin' to me? Well, you must be talkin' to me,

'cause I'm standin' right here...punk "

All chicken processing will be inspected by our FDA chicken inspector

   ( FDA- Family Dog Advisor )

   I am Yogi and I approved this blog

"Shhh, If you know of a good lawyer, or a bad politician....

HELP !!!"

Labor Day...

When I was growing up I learned about Labor Day. I learned that it was a day set aside to celebrate the worker. Now I've learned what it really means... I'll explain, my daughter has decided that she would go blind and die a long and tortured death if her room was not painted a more inspiring color. This was the same thing she said when I last painted her room. I told her she would have to paint it herself. "FINE", she said, "but I need help to do it right otherwise it will be your fault that my room looks like crap". So, after months of color selection I went to buy the paint, one gallon.

"That will be $ $42.00 please".

"WHAT! Forty two.. are you talking pesos? What do you mean $42, are you kidding?"
I couldn't believe it, the young lady then offered me a deal. I could save 10% if I bought the 5 gallon bucket, regularly $200 and I got the bucket for free...

Yikes! Nope. I'll just take the one gallon, thank you.
I came home and got my daughter started on painting her room, how to paint the corners, removing the outlet face plates, open a window so you don't die of the Eco-friendly, lead-free fumes etc.

"Mom, I can't reach! "

"Mom, it looks blotchy!"

"Mom, how come when you do it, it looks better? "

All shouted down the hall at me and making me scamper back to help....

So there I was, standing on a ladder at 10:30pm trying to finish the room so she could go to bed. Now I really know what Labor Day means... when you go into labor and deliver one of these priceless little beings, your real labor has just begun. In case you forget, we have a day put aside each year to remind you. Thanks Mom, some how you get smarter as I get older.

Peace and love to you all.....