The Jumbo Double Yolker!

Next to a regular size L egg

Joy Joy came earlier all excited because one of her chickens laid a giant egg!
It was too big to put away so she cooked it up, and it was a double yolker!  She was kind enough to share with her mommy. I tasted really good!

Couldn't fit it in the carton.

It was a 2 person egg. Two Large Yolks in it. Yummy!

Homesteading, Survival, Homemaking, Back to Basics...Blog Hop

My wonderful husband found this great article and I have to share it with you! grow-an-organic-chicken-garden I learned a lot reading this and wish I had know about chickens loving soured milk a few days ago.
Since my yard is more weeds than grass it is very chicken friendly! I really don't need to plant them their own garden. (For one thing, they will be able to have free range in ours this fall!)

Our back yard has; dandelion, clover, violets, wild strawberries and Plantain. There is more but those are the main ones and the ones I know what they are. The chickens love these, not to mention the bugs they catch. They really are fun to watch when one gets hold of a bug and goes on a chase to keep her treasure from the others.

I want to try something new. Something fun! Over at Raising Homemakers they are having a homemaking link up. It inspired me to do one for anything homesteading, homemaking, Prepping or survival, old fashioned skills... you get the idea! I would love to find some more interesting blogs and link up with them.

I may be doing this all wrong and not even know it. But I can always remove this post in a week if it's a bust!

If you have a blog or a post that has something to do with any of these, use the linky below and be sure to link back to me so others can join!

Gardening, Chickens, & Strawberries

It was a beautiful day today and I spent a large part of it in the garden. I LOVE being in my garden even if I'm not being terribly productive in it. I also love volunteers. Volunteers, as in plants that reseeded and are coming up in odd places as little surprises for me. I have a tomato plant coming up in the middle of one my  lettuce patches, marigolds coming up everywhere, and bean plants that I have been digging up and replanting over by the fence. OH! and a left over potato!

Does it look like a rooster?

 We hopefully be able to tell who are roosters and who are hens soon! The pen is okay right now because they are not full size yet, but we need to thin the flock, the sooner the better.

Lettuce Mix!

 We had a thunderstorm soon after I planted my lettuce seeds and I was sure they were washed away, but thankfully they just washed together in a smaller space. So it is a little crowded, but I picked my first salad with some fresh picked strawberries today....YUM!

Mint my friend gave me last fall.

 My friend Michelle gave me a part of her mint last fall and said it will grow anywhere and will take over. So I planted it in a space between my driveway and my porch where I hope it does take over. I was sure it had died but it has popped up in three spots!

Yellow Jacket was snooping around.
 I hope it does not make a home in my strawberries!

 I hope this was not a queen looking for a place to build a nest. I wish now I had smashed it with a shovel. Frank and Thomas have been attacked by these mean things.

YUMMY!

Bug-A-Boo picking strawberries, and my sign post waiting for a name.

Okay! So my wonderful hubby built me this really cool post over my garden where I could paint it and put a name on it. I was thinking of Serenity, I really like that but it also makes me think of the show by the same name. I enjoyed the show but its not what I think of in my garden. Selah is over used. Peace is too... well, plain. I was weeding to day and thought of The Garden of Weeden! I was told that was really cheesy, but that is what I do most of all in there. I also found out that it is the name of a popular marijuana game. Yikes! I don't want to give the wrong impression of what I am growing.  I am thinking of finding a part of a Bible verse about gardens.
So what do you think I should name it?

All but one went up when it was time for bed.

We are having a major thunder, lightning and hail storm right now. I am praying for my garden and my cat Scallywag who didn't come in before the storm hit. I last saw him running in a panic through the neighbors yard, away from us and safety!
Till next time! Be safe and dry. :-)

Our Chicks!

In the light of rising gas and food prices we have been looking for ways to become a little more self reliant. I have had a garden for several years now and am getting so most everything I plant grows.

Last year my husband found out about Amaranth, a grain that is gluten free and very healthy. He planted a bunch of it and it did pretty well. He will be planting more of it this year.

(I will have my husband do some posts about this grain soon.)

We have a done rain barrels, mulch piles, gardening classes and getting books to learn how to be as self reliant as we can on our small piece of land in a sub-division.

For a long time now I have wanted to have just a few hens in the back yard for fresh eggs and manure. Not to mention the fun and pleasure. It is also a great project for my children. (This will be a 4-H project for my 10 yr old.)

Everything started to come together for us to be able to do so. My friend John had been looking at port-a-coops/chicken tractors and really didn't like what he found and started studying different types and the pros and cons and designed his own. We are building the prototype and making changes as we go. My 10 year old told us she wanted an incubator for her birthday and a friend gave her a dozen fertile eggs and after carefully turning them every day and watching the temp. The eggs started hatching Saturday morning and we have 8 chicks hatched and 3 eggs to go! We will keep only 4 or 5 hens and sell or give away the rest.

I will post more later but I need to rub some coconut oil on my shoulders. I got a little sun burnt adding compost and rock dust to my soil this afternoon.

I will do some gardening posts soon.