Paige came to visit over Thanksgiving which was swell. She loves the dogs and it was very mellow and low key.
Zsa Zsa and Cici have taken turns being broody. I was thinking it was all 3 of the young ones, but Rob pointed out it was just the two of them, but the thing is it FEELS like all three! After weeks and weeks of this then….Zsa Zsa is broody again! So it just goes round and round. There was a brief time when all three were laying, but it didn’t last long (the 3 older hens seem to be done laying for life). I decided the one silver lining of having to yank them out of the coop all the time is that it’s a fine opportunity for a selfie together.
Zsa Zsa is so fluffy
I was noticing that the coop was littered with feathers as many of the hens were molting this fall. So I gathered up a bunch of them and glued them to make a wreath. It came out OK- it actually looked best early on with just the fluffy feathers so I was thinking maybe next year I’d try again and just use those. We were both kind of thinking the feathers may be kind a gross/bug infested so anyhow we ended up hanging it in the chicken coop!
I was in California for Christmas so Rob held the fort while I was gone, about a week. For a few days we were concerned that Pangea hadn’t pooped in her daily soak like she usually does. We decided that maybe she just wasn’t used to Rob yet being the main caretaker. Sure enough, she finally pooped which caused minor celebration.
This blog is about our life in Austin, so not gonna talk about my trip but I will include a picture of the amazing squid earrings that Raine made for me!
By the time I returned, we were realizing how omicron was everywhere and we really don’t want to get it (I’m really concerned about long covid) so anyway we’ve basically been hunkering down ever since. We hope to resume sort of normal once omicron fades, maybe in a couple weeks from now.
Oh and in December I got in the pool and swam 4 times! It was cold, but I just kept moving. Now I’m afraid it’s too cold for me until Spring.
I guess sometime before omicron kept us from doing anything, we had dinner over at Susan & David’s place along with Karen & Doug Murray who were visiting Austin that weekend (from Minneapolis). So it was really fun to see their place and get to hang out with Karen & Doug again.
I was noticing recently that the little air plant that I stuck into a large-ish hole in our front stonework is actually still alive! I hope it makes it through the winter—I can’t recall for sure if it survived last winter or not but that seems hardly possible with the prolonged extra cold weather we had.
IT’S ALIVE!
Occasionally Nessa puts up her back feathers which looks really weird. Not clear why. Hard to catch her in those moments but I finally did the other day.
Most recently I used eggshell pieces and assembled them to make the United States (representing how fragile it is right now). I did Alaska and Hawaii too but the pic looked better just with continental U.S. They are just laying on posterboard so I will just wipe them away soon. But maybe I’ll do another thing like that and see if I can glue them down somehow? It will be hard as they are teeny weeny and fragile. Perhaps.
Gallery of more pics below. There’s been a lot of fun cooking that you’ll notice.
