Letting Go Is So Hard To Do

Yesterday I took a deep breath, and let the guineas out of the coop to free range.  They didn't come out for over a half hour.  I think they kept looking out the door, thinking "oh my, this just doesn't look right, where is our run???".  They are so afraid of new things sometimes!  But once I went in the coop and gently shoo'd them outside, they were ecstatic and took to their freedom quite well. 

Too well, I thought.  At one point, they went into the horse pasture, then headed due north along the fence, in front of the house, and when they got to the next corner, they headed due west.  I feared they would never find their way back home!  

I watched them from the kitchen window, and it appeared they were running away from home.... so I went outside, to the front of the house, and lo and behold, here they were, running quickly back towards the house!  They must have realized, oh my goodness, we are awfully far from home, aren't we?!

 the sky might be falling??

At any rate, I faced my fears as much as they probably faced theirs -- it's so hard to let go sometimes.  I fear they might not come back to the coop at night, or that one of our cats will get one of them, or a stray dog might get them, etc., etc.  I have to continually remind myself, these are not pets per se.... no, I got them for the main purpose of keeping our yard free of ticks and other yucky bugs.  So now is definitely the season to introduce them to their new job.  I must steel myself to the very real possibility that we could lose some of them to predators -- but it won't be because I didn't do everything possible to protect them, of course.

our lonely gal - the male is always chasing her away!

They are not free-ranging today, for three reasons -- I have to leave for work shortly, we have wind in the 35-40 mph range today, along with the threat of very severe storms this evening.  I don't want to fuss with trying to get them indoors if the weather takes a drastic change at the last minute!

our male - showing off as males like to do!

Our First Chicks... Finally!!!!

8 chicks in all -- 2 Rhode Island Reds, 3 Barred Plymouth Rocks,

2 Buff Orpingtons and 1 Ameraucana.

Let the fun begin!!

Rural Life Still Suits Me {Random Ramblings)

Even with a portion of the road closed leading to our house, even though FedEx, after 5 attempts, still can't figure out how to get to our house (yeah, it's a real head-scratcher -- our UPS driver figured it out ALL ON HER OWN.... FedEx even has the advantage of our given directions, twice now ... DUH) ... and yes, even though I am still working two jobs..... I STILL LOVE OUR RURAL EXISTENCE!

Obviously though, my two jobs do not suit my blog.  :-\  I can't believe I have not posted during the month of March at all.  Terrible, huh?

So what's new with Oz Girl?  

Well, I did manage to take some well-deserved time off work and go to Ohio to visit family.  Leah is growing by leaps and bounds - her little 9-month old self is sure different from last September when I visited and she was only 3 months old! It was so much fun to spend the time with her, my son and my daughter-in-law.  It would be grand if they would move to Kansas, but I know that will probably never happen.  :-(

I was very fortunate to have great driving weather to and from Ohio... sunny days.  Hallelujah!  The drive back was a bit windy and tossed the car around, but I really cannot complain - at least it wasn't snowing!

The guineas are now up to 2 eggs a day, almost every day.  We still haven't added chickens to the coop, but plan to get some chicks in the coming weeks.  Honestly, with only 2 guinea eggs daily, which are smaller than chicken eggs, I'm having a hard time using them.  

This morning I searched for a good egg souffle recipe.  I ended up adjusting a recipe I found by adding asiago cheese, a bit of cheddar and some canadian bacon.  I was pleasantly surprised when my individual souffles (4) turned out scrumptious.  Perhaps the next time I make them I will take piccies and include my recipe in a blog post.

I guess I'll be searching for more ways to use eggs, aside from just selling them at some point.  I remember seeing an email from Community Chickens several months ago which had an article on how to use up surplus eggs -- I'll have to dig into my email and find that one.

Our garden is doubling in size this year and we will triple it next year.  Hubby has already tilled a new plot in addition to last year's plot - our tax refund money bought us a rototiller this year.  Woohoo!  In our old plot, I planted lettuce and spinach last week - as soon as our cold snap passes (hi's in the 30s today), I'm going to plant a row of green onions.  Today I'm going to start some spearmint seeds on our enclosed back porch. 

I have big plans this year -- lavender plants are already on order and scheduled to arrive end of April.  I'm going to plant more roma tomato plants - those roma tomatoes provided us with some delicious tomato sauce last year.

We're going to start a small orchard by buying two apple trees this year.  Each year we will add approximately two more trees.

I've been reading more about beekeeping - ever since I moved out here in 2008, I've been interested in having our own beehives.  I'm thinking maybe next spring we will start our first hive.

The last few weeks my sleep continues to be interrupted at night - it seems my brain is always thinking up new ideas for our small plot of land here.  I did manage to come up with a new name that I like a lot -- Flyspeck Farm.  So appropriate, given our 27 acres!  I've already bought the domain name and hope to use the new name by next year.  If I ever have the opportunity to start a small CSA (community supported agriculture), this will be the name of our farm.

So much for my random ramblings which I'm sure appear to have no sense of direction.  I just wanted to drop a post here so everyone knows that Oz Girl is still alive and kicking, even if she is tired and harried....  my blog will never go away.  I may be absent much of 2011, but I aim to be back in full force by 2012.  :-)

Let me close with a photo of a storm we had last Thursday night, my first full day back in Kansas upon returning from Ohio.  After 3 years of Kansas skies, I'm amazed when I still see something new above me that I've never witnessed before!  This storm was characterized by bizarre skies, wind, lightning, and hail.  Luckily, no tornado warnings this time.

Straight out of the camera.  No manipulation, I swear!