Still things to be thankful for!

What a beautiful day for this time of year! Usually, we have close to a foot of snow after Thanksgiving! Today it's around 35-40 degrees F., and sunny. A regular heat wave for Northern New York :o) The girls were very happy to be able to get out and be able to take dust baths and eat what's left of the green grass. See my Miss Phoebe here enjoying herself! There's not too many days like this left in this area.

More good news to be thankful for here today... for the last 5 days I've had one of my Golden Laced Wyandottes "Big Momma" in my house in the hospital cage. For some reason she had a horribly tough molt. She lost nearly every feather. Then she lost weight when we had an early really cold snap, even though, I had heat lamps up for the girls. Then I noticed she had really watery poops & a spongy crop. She was drinking a ton of water too. In chickens, drinking a ton of water isn't a very good sign. I gave her some eggs mixed with molasses, nystatin and some Baytril. I think my Baytril is outdated. I need to get more. She ate it, then she went for 2 days not eating and I was getting real worried. I then switched her antibiotic to Terramycin, administered in her drinking water. I had some Poultry Nutri-drench left so, I mixed about 4 large drops of that in with the medicated water. Also Eric suggested giving her some sweet corn. She promptly ate that up. Within 2 days she had cleaned up her layer crumbles. Today, I notice she has more normal poops. I'm going to keep her in for another 2-3 days until I'm sure she's back to normal. The bad thing is she'll have to establish her place again in the pecking order!! Wish her luck!

Things that I'm thankful for & other ponderings

Wasn't my trumpet vine pretty this year? It was the first time in 6 years that it bloomed!

As my husband gets ready to leave for Pennsylvania this morning & I am getting ready to wake-up the girls so I can leave for work. I have time to contemplate the everyday things I am so thankful to God for. I'd like to share a quick couple with you this morning. Also I want to wish anyone reading this a Happy Thanksgiving.

1. Even though my hubbie really makes me mad at times, overall he's a good husband who does laundry, the dishes and fixes my lunch for work. He'll even pull the car out of the garage every morning before I go to work.

2. Tony cat is my little shadow. He was an abandoned cat that my mother took in and she picked him out for me. He went from hiding under the bed, to sharing my food & running the house! As I type this he's watching me... after 16 years he's still so full of life.

3. My chickens- the girls- I'd never want to be without my girls. They give me love, enjoyment and hours of funny antics. Not to mention the big brown eggs that all our friends love to eat!

4. Most of all, I'm thankful that we live in a country where we can pray to Jesus, own a Bible and gather together in Jesus' name without being tortured or arrested.

5. My family- I love them all! They're characters and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I'm off to work and will be staying with mom while Eric is at his mother's house. We plan on making marzipan, turkey, stuffing & the other usual Thanksgiving day fare. I'll make my molasses pumpkin pie and perhaps a custard pie.

God bless!

Bible verse of the day: The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me;to one who orders his way rightlyI will show the salvation of God!”
—Psalm 50:23

I've been tagged by Sharon, fun...

I've never been tagged before, so let's see if I can do this without offending the Internet Police...

Here are the rules:

Rule #1 ~ Link to the person that tagged you.

Rule #2 ~ Post the rules on your Blog.

Rule #3 ~ Write 6 random things about yourself.

Rule #4 ~ Tag 6 people at the end of your post.

Rule #5 ~ Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their Blog.

Rule #6 ~ Let the tagger know your entry is up.

Okay here it goes...

1. The person who tagged me was Sharon http://theoldoakswing.blogspot.com/ she has a great blog- check it out.

2. 6 Random things about myself...

Well, I love to bake cheesecakes- I'm always looking for a new and unusual recipe.

Was once awarded top 10 Individual in the Arkansas State Cattle Judging Contest (forgot what year this was), was awarded a belt buckle. Then someone stole it LOL

I'm a pack rat and avid collector of stickers, victorian paper, chicken items, art, stationary, books, etc, etc!

I love to play games like cards, Scrabble, Spades, Hearts, Pitch- etc. When my Grandpa See was alive, after every family dinner we'd all gather at the table and play cards or dominoes. Now that he's gone, no one ever follows through on that tradition. It makes me really sad.

By the time I was out of high school I had built up a herd of over 30 head of registered Limousin beef cattle, I sold them to pay the down payment for my first house. Wish I had them back now!

I used to show beef cattle and have won numerous showmanship awards and had many champions :) I miss those fun days. I made lots of good friends.

#3- Umm, now to tag some blogs I enjoy- I hope you haven't been tagged before! I will attempt to correctly do this.. I will tag many blogs I enjoy daily.

Tag you're it...

Tagging...

Amy at Twelve Acres http://twelveacres.blogspot.com/

my friend, Darlene at Maid in Montana http://maidinmontana.blogspot.com/

Natalie at Chicken Blog http://www.chickenblog.com/

Anita at http://prairiedreams.blogspot.com/

Susan at http://bearswampreflections.blogspot.com/

Laura at http://www.urbanchickens.net/

Whew...hard work... time for bed!

Of chickens, aprons, love & to better days to come

Well, I must say that today is a better day. After much Bible study, prayer, prayer and more prayer everything with my marriage is going better already. I've apologize for my earlier "rant"! At times it truly helps to get it off your chest, so to speak. I promise to try to be more positive in the future and read my Bible first! Today I will close with one of my favorite Bible verses to ponder.

Okay, on to better things. See these gorgeous aprons to the right? I ordered a set for my niece Madison and one for her mother and grandmother. I found them online made by Stitch Thru Time their site is http://www.stitchthrutime.com/ check it out. They have a ton of pretty fabrics. I've got patterns for a few retro aprons, but, I haven't the time or energy this time of year (USPS busy season!). My meager apron collection only has 3 vintage aprons. I have a BBQ style apron with chickens on it, my favorite to wear while cooking. Then one is a half apron made of yellow gingham with a colorful rooster, which was a gift from one of my favorite girlfriends Darlene from Montana. It's too nice to wear!!! The other is a blue and white striped apron that my Auntie JoAnn sent me for my wedding. Madison will love these aprons I suspect. She's at the age that she wants to cook with grandma and mom.

Have you gotten your Christmas shopping done? I have most of mine done. Just a few little items yet to pick up for some random friends I've made talking about our pet chickens! I sent one regional 1000 Islands gift basket to New Zealand today. I hand-picked some of our favorite made in New York cheeses, NY wines, NY jams, canned goods and you name it. Eric already opened his gifts. New LaCrosse boots and some Cabela's Elk skin mittens.

On the chicken front, I have 3 ceramic heat lamps running above their perches at night and then during the day I have 2 infrared lamps and I leave one of the ceramic lamps running in their upper coop where the roost is. It stays fairly warm really. This year I'd like to add a warm air humidifier, remote lighting and fire alarm. The girls are still laying fairly well. Big Momma is having a hard time coming back from this horribly hard molt. Her crop felt a bit soft the other day so I scrambled her a couple of eggs. Then I added 2ml of Nystatin, about 1/4 tsp of molasses, 1/2 tsp of ProBios and 1.4 ml of Baytril. She looked better the next day. Her crop feels better now. I gave her some plain scrambled eggs yesterday. She makes sure she gets right under the ceramic heat lamp with Tina Weena & Bevin. Weezy, Sylvia and Old Meanie hog the lamp on the other side of the roosts. Scroungey and Phoebe roost in another house and they have their own ceramic heat lamp.

Closing Bible verse for thought for today:

Proverbs 30:18-19

"There are three things that amaze me— no, four things that I don’t understand: how an eagle glides through the sky, how a snake slithers on a rock, how a ship navigates the ocean, how a man loves a woman. "

Usually, I like to keep my blog about the things that make me happy in life. Today, I just cannot write happy things. I'm sure that there are times in every woman's life where she just wonders if she has made a mistake marrying the man she did. Well, today is one of those days for me. At the beginning of October my grandmother who raised me had a mild heart attack and I believe a stroke. I applied for annual leave at my job 2 weeks after her attack after she was home. I asked for 3 weeks off. So we could have a week and a half there and a week and a half back home. Well, unknown to me my mother-in-law decided in this time that we were coming there (Pennsylvania) to stay with them for 3-4 days over Thanksgiving. Of course she didn't tell us that until my trip to my grandmother's was already planned and we were 2 days from leaving. To make a long story short, we offered to visit my mother-in-law for 3 days when we got back home (when I had a week off of work) because, I couldn't get off work during Thanksgiving. Because, I had already took my time earlier.

At first she was mad, but grudgingly said okay. Then after a night of sulking, she called and told us, that she and my father-in-law had "other plans". While she is on the phone I can hear her talking crap about me. She's saying how I never have trouble getting off work for 3 weeks to visit my family. This is the same woman who didn't want us parking our "old truck" by her home for fear it would "embrass them in front of their neighbors". These are people who live in a gated country club community, they are retired, they have plenty of money, they drive to Florida every winter and stay for 4-5 months and they get mad because, oh my goodness, I have a job! What can I do but, tell my husband it would be okay with me if him and his son drive down there to placate his mother. So, instead of standing up for me and telling her that if she won't see us when I can go, he's going down with his son. He's too big a wussy to stand up to the woman. But, he sure as heck can take it out on me. All I've heard from these people when I was unemployed for 5 months, was when are you going to work, etc, etc. They're always so darn worried about my employment and I've worked since before I was 16! My husband, his daughter, her husband, their room mate and his son and other daughter none of them work! My husband is truly disabled, his daughter is "bi-polar" HA, her hubby is an alcoholic and so is their room mate, his son..who knows, he works when he's out of drugs!Perhaps they should worry about their own darn unemployment record. My hubbie has always wanted me to work, but then gets mad at me when there are times that I haven't been able to get off work. Now, he was of course drinking today. Then when I get home, he's being overtly rude. Then the one thing that really set me off- I've asked him repeatedly, NOT to let my chickens out in the backyard when I'm not here. What does he do but, let Phoebe & Scroungey out, he closed their pen door and left to go drink with his son and daughter and her husband. I've told him not to let them out for safety sake. A loose dog or any predator could come around and kill them. Phoebe is limping and she'd be easy prey. If he lets them out and she gets hurt, I don't think I could stay with him. To be so darn selfish and disrespectful...I'm darn sick of it.

I'm too old for these little sulky & childish games. I'm about ready to walk. But, the one thing that keeps me here- is that those little jerks (my step kids and in-laws) who have treated me so terribly for 12 years and have back stabbed me after I was kind to them every chance they got... they're not going to make out on my hard work on this place, after how they have treated me all these years.

My husband wants thanked for everything he does for me and I honestly am very appreciative of any sacrifice he has made. Though, he doesn't seem to think that I've made any sacrifices at all. There are times when I don't believe that he appreciates anything I've done or that I do around here. I really feel taken for granted and hurt. Anytime he doesn't get his way, he punishes me. He'll get drunk (tho of course to hear him tell it he's not 'drunk'), start on the self-pity & sulking mode, then be passive-aggressive saying little barbs to get my goat, then he'll blow up, then go off downstairs to sulk like a little biotch. I tell you it's so predictable, I'm very bored and sick of it.

If it wasn't for my cat and chickens I'd of probably been gone long ago. It will go great for a month or so, when he doesn't drink. Then he'll go a month or so drinking at his daughters, until I'm ready to take off. Any more, I truly, just don't have the energy, the strength or the desire to ride this roller coaster. My mind is so tired of the mind freak. He'll tell me he wants to move to Arkansas, then when I get excited, he'll start something and say "well, if you're going to be mean, I'm not moving to Arkansas". It's like I'm the jackass that he's holding the carrot in front of and he moves it just about when I have it. He doesn't want to grow in Christ and in his walk with the Lord. I really feel that I need to get out of this rut for my own spiritual walk with God.

I have an adrenal tumor and I'm not getting any medical care for it. I honestly am not in the health to deal with this crap. I've got calcification on my left lung from pneumonia and I've always got some sort of asthma or sinus or lung infection. It's from stressing over this crap all the time. There's no normalcy. I'm sick of it.

I'm praying that God will give me a way out if that is his desire for my life. I've never wanted to have a marriage that ended in divorce. I'm a fighter, I'm going to try and pray to make it through this. I pray God will give me the strength to do it. Sometimes I think perhaps when we're not spiritually mature and not living for the Lord (like me when I met my husband), perhaps we yoke ourselves with people that the Lord never meant for us to begin with. I love my husband and I know I'm what stands between him and Satan taking him. Before I met him he was a total drunk all the time. He wasn't baptised and he didn't believe in Jesus or have any relationship with him. I know if I left Eric, he'd be right back to the drunk lifestyle and he'd be bitter. Who knows maybe he'd be happy as a lark.

Okay, I'm done whining. It's nice to have this blog to gripe to-

Back to life...back to reality...

Well, we're back home. All the chickens are doing well and Tony cat is very happy that we are back. The photo you see to the left is of one of the numerous Maple trees in my grandma's yard. The weather in Arkansas while we visited was gorgeous! We missed the big 12" snow in Northern NY...yeah!!!!

We had great time. I met my nephew Hayden for the first time. He's a cutie pie. He's 4 and quite a loving child. He threw his arms around me and grandma when we went to visit him. I wish I lived closer so I could see him often. Also I saw my niece Madison who's almost 4. She such a sweetheart and very bossy! It's a family trait- so my hubby says! Grandma is doing pretty well. We've decided to move down there. I hate to quit my job but, it's getting to where she really needs us to help her out. Lots of prayers and planning will have to be done before we pack up. We'll probably have to leave the house vacant while trying to sell it. It probably will be easier to sell then anyway.

On the chicken front Phoebe is limping a bit. I let the girls out today for awhile after it rained and Cluckster and Girl were picking on Phoebe and I think she must have hurt her leg. So I put her and Scroungey back in the chicken tractor for the day. She seemed to be walking a bit better tonight on the way to the roost.

When Eric went to pick-up our mail that was being held at the post office it was in a big box. I still haven't gone through it all! I've read all the letters, opened the bills, etc. I still have the magazines to go through tomorrow. Well, I'm off for the night.