Lisa is amazing

So Lisa came to visit us. She really is an amazing talented photographer. I almost don't feel like i can say that though. I don't really think of her as a photographer anymore. She is truly an artist. An amazing artist.
She took these pictures with my camera with her flash. Anyone want to buy me a flash:)
My little Gwen and a pear. That is the other thing. She is not just an artist, she engages these kids and talks to them and gets them to make these faces. That cannot be an easy thing to do sometimes. I saw her do it with Layla outside once. She got Layla to somehow make like every Layla face there is.

Oh and these are totally unedited, they aren't even cropped. I have a bit to do today and well, I am lazy.

Dooooonuuutttsssssss

You know I would feel bad about it I really really would if it isn't for that we like never get donuts. AND there is like tons more protien/fiber and good stuff in my flour mix than any other wheat flour you could buy, me sticking my tongue out now. When I was looking for recipes Natalie looked at my screen and saw the picture of the donut, I used this recipe http://www.gluten.net/recipes/index.php?cmd=6&recid=79 and she asked, "is that wheat?" It turned into little birds all around me chirping "Is that wheat?" "Is that wheat?"
"Nope girls, gluten free."
Natalie had tears in her eyes. How could I not make them then?
The problem? Natalie likes chocolate donuts, but her favorite? maple. So I tried to make a maple frosting also. I love my girls I so love them. The donuts turned out a bit dense, filling really filling. So we have a lot of leftovers. I didn't frost all of them and they like them plain too. Really that is my favorite. That may surprise some people. I love nothing more than a really good plain buttermilk donut.
Okay chocolate eclairs come next :)

And why why why is blogger changing the order of my pics? They are now in reverse order. Oh I used Jack's shot thing to cut out the holes. I was searching through all the drawers and finally pulled it out and was like AH HAH!!! It worked perfect.

Trying again

Okay google damn google messed with the order of my pictures. I am way too lazy to try to fix this now and Gwen just woke up from a nap, so live with it:)

First we got our first Lady egg. We got yet another chicken from Ms. Kelly, and she has given us a few eggs, but this is the first egg that we have gotten from our ladies. It is the small one. We think we have 2 laying right now, we occasionally get 2 eggs in one day. They are getting bigger. We have lost two though so far. One was smashed. The other was just slightly smashed but then, this is embarrassing, I smashed it walking into the house. Yes, my fault.
It is really neat getting eggs now and I do really like having chickens.





My girls having fun. They are silly sometimes. But sweet. They were playing on trying to get closer which eventually led to them falling over. I am really really glad that they get along. In fact I am just going to say that I am amazed and insanely happy at how wonderful my children are. We were at the feed store yesterday and a woman mentioned that I have my hands full. I do get this a lot. But I had to tell her that my girls were amazing and helpful and I rarely feel like my hands are full. Oh sure there are moments when I feel like my head is going to explode, but my hands? :) not so much. Really, if they were any more better behaved I would feel like something is wrong. Jack and I talked about that a bit afterwards and he agreed. Most of the time when we start to feel overwhelmed it isn't because of the girls, it is actually because there is something else that has our attention. It does happen, we do have to deal with life. But they are also, okay not Gwen so much, really understanding when we say something like "Hey girls, we have to do this right now, can you go and do something else right now?" We are an amazingly lucky family.





And I am taking a vacation right now. It is much needed. I feel like I need to refocus on what I am trying to do. I feel very jumbled and need awhile to figure things out. I think I got sidetracked awhile ago. Took a wrong turn and had my eyes closed for awhile. I opened my eyes and really had to say wtf! where the hell am I now? I am hoping some positive changes come out of this. It is hard to take a vacation with your children though. Wish me luck.
And we are really getting on planning/starting our garden now. I will try to take some pictures soon. We have seeds coming up!!! YAY! I have to admit that this is scary for me. I really really want this to work. Our garden in Georgia didn't work, but then we couldn't keep Bubba out of it. Our garden here didn't work, but I had tried to tell Jack that we really don't get much light in our backyard, most things molded back there. This time we will be putting it in our front yard. I am excited yet scared. We are putting a lot of work in this. So send good growing green thoughts to our front yard, we are going to need them :)

Stolen

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!

What I create will be just for you.

It’ll be done this calendar year.

You have no clue what it’s going to be. It may be a story. It may be poetry. I may draw or paint something. I may bake you something and mail it to you. Who knows? Not you, that’s for sure! However, I *do* promise that it will be more than just a handmade card!

I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.

The catch: You have to put this in your journal as well. We all can make stuff!

Yes, I stole this. It does sound like fun, and I like the idea behind it. I rarely get to make stuff for people other than my family. Right now Layla has two things she is bugging me for. So maybe it would be good for me to try making something for someone else

babies!!!

So we ordered some day old chicks. We only ordered 10 pullets, or females, but since it is a small order and it is cold, they send packing peanuts. Packing peanuts are roosters. No one really wants roosters so they kinda throw them away. We got 8 roosters, packing peanuts, but one did die on the way here. We got the call from the post office at 7:30 the day before thanksgiving. That was really kinda cool. We have names for some of them.
Owl is the one with three stripes down her back, Natalie named her.
Vivienne is the red one with a V on her head. I named her. She is my special chick. I love her so much.
Ewok is the one who has kinda squirrel markings
Aiddie Michelle is the other red one, Natalie named her.
Oh and there are 7 named Duck, those are the roosters. We are not to get attached to those as we will most likely be eating them :)
Kali is totally interested in the chicks. We only let her smell and love on the roosters though. Huck doesn't care. Though he does occasionally chase the ladies outside. I actually think he is kinda scared of them though.

Oh and the first picture is actually the Ladies outside. They seems to be pretty happy out there. We have chickens! I am sure that i will post when we get our first egg.

grrr!!!

the reason I haven't blogged in awhile, frustrating putting pictures up!!!!
you will have to deal with cut pictures cuz i really have no patience to fix it. deep breath i will try to do better on the next post.

going to play a game

and try to win. Wanna know what game I am going to try and play? Catch up. I have let this go for way too long. I really do need to catch up. So the most exciting and life changing thing that has happened recently is our addition of chickens. I know you want to see pictures of these girls...

Layla calling them




yes bad picture, one we don't have very good light in our garage and two try taking a picture with wire in between you and your subject.
They were in the garage until Jack could make sure that he liked his tractor.



jack working on it more. Does anyone else find it funny that the chickens are out and the human is inside? I did, but then, well, me and my humor...


Look at those wings!! Layla was giving our birds rides on her, actually Gwen's bike


These girls we got on November 1st. They are red sex links. They are currently 12 weeks old. They have been outside for a little over a week now because we have new residents in our garage. But our Ladies names are Ellie Belon, that is Layla, she thinks it is the most beautiful name like ever. So she named her Ellie Belon. Natalie named one Cheera. And Liz, Aunt Liz, my brother's wife, named one Bertha. I do have to tell you that Bertha is the biggest of them all now. i will do a separate post for the babies. But now you have met our Ladies.