2009 January | Chickens in the Road Page 2

Every once in a while I like to run a post that helps new readers find their way around my site. And so here is a Chickens in the Road Sampler platter for your browsing pleasure. If you’re new here, please enjoy all the fun and nonsense–and stick around! If you’ve been here for awhile, maybe you’ll find something you missed. And you don’t want to miss a thing!

You might want to start your sampling with The Slanted Little House–the story of how we left the padded comfort of suburbia to live in the wild and wonderful boonies of West Virginia in a 100-year-old farmhouse. And don’t miss What Nobody Tells You about Living in a 100-Year-Old Farmhouse Before You Move In.

Then read The Farmhouse Year in Review 2008, highlighting all our nonsense, mishaps, and occasional accomplishments in our first year on our own farm in our new farmhouse. (Updated to add: New! Read The Farmhouse Year in Review 2009.)

Get a taste of my wacky farm animal stories with Bedtime Story. See me read a very special recipe from a cookbook to my chickens. Did they ever start laying eggs then!

Find the full archive of all my ridiculous animal stories here. Goats who don’t want to be milked, attacking hummingbirds, lazy cats, shy ducks, adorable sheep, and a Giant Puppy! (Be sure to Meet Annabelle! Baby sheep in diapers!)

Next sink into my weird compulsion to track down, photograph, and make up stories about abandoned outhouses in the country. Start with On the 8th Day the Lord Said, Let There Be Separate Outhouses.

Read more outhouse stories as well as stories about our farm, the old farmhouse, people, and places in the full archive of my country living section.

Learn all about Making a Grapevine Wreath after that. (I shouldn’t even be allowed to attempt to make crafts.)

Check out my archive of country style stories here.

I love to bake! I especially love old-fashioned cooking. Try my Burnt Sugar Cake!

And see all my recipes here. I am an avid bread baker! Fall in love with homemade bread with my heritage recipe, Grandmother Bread.

I love gardening, too, but mostly as a spectator sport. See what happens when Obstacle Gardening includes hoeing….. I can’t hoe! I’m not worthy of the hoe!

Read all my garden nonsense here.

There’s also a very active community on the Chickens in the Road forum, packed full with welcoming, warm, funny people. C’mon! We’d love to see you there!

And if you got this far and still want to know more about me, check out this page for all the dirt.

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Posted by Suzanne McMinn | Permalink

More posts you might enjoy:

We woke to five inches of snow yesterday.

It snows here. Pretty regularly, all winter, but not in huge quantities. But in boonies territory, it doesn’t take a lot of snow to shut you down.

We haven’t had school here all week.

We live on a farm.

The children only have each other.

I hope they don’t hurt each other too much.

I’m pretty sure they were scaring the chickens.

The chickens would never behave like that.

The chickens make good use of cold weather by burrowing into their nesting boxes and laying eggs for me.

Birds eat their homemade suet.

The Giant Puppy romps.

Goats learn to walk in snow that covers half their legs.

And people shovel.

You know, people who aren’t me. As with the hoe, I’m not worthy of the shovel!!!

People also worry about cleaning the snow out of the satellite dish so they can get a proper internet connection.

(See how tiny our goats really are? Clover comes up to Weston’s knee.)

People also get bored, if they’re 13, and make a snowman as big as themselves.

Morgan: “He’s dressed for work.” (He looks naked as the snow he was born in to me, but okay.)

Me, I was taking stock. I’ve been to the store exactly one time in the past two weeks. I’ve only been able to leave the farm once in the past two weeks. Normally, I fantasize about only having to leave the farm once every few weeks. I’m a homebody. I love to stay home. I’m always busy, never bored, and completely content at home. The only way that could happen, though, would be if either I had no children, homeschooled my children, or waited till my children grew up. Winter on the farm blew right past those usual prerequisites.

This is hardly my first winter in West Virginia. I lived in the old farmhouse for three winters before moving to our new farm. But the old farmhouse was a far different story. In the country as it is (in fact, only a few miles from here), it’s on a “hard road”–practically a major thoroughfare by rural standards. (If you can call a one-lane country road a major thoroughfare. And, well, around here, sometimes we do….) The road our new farm is on is something else. It’s a “rock-based” road. It is actually county-maintained, but I think the county mostly forgets about that. There are far more travelled roads to be concerned with first. Snowy weather–icy weather–or flooding–gets us stuck here, stuck in a way that was unimaginable at the old farmhouse.

I keep a good stock of food onhand at all times. I like having food onhand. I like food. We have plenty to eat. Really, there’s just one thing bothering me. I’m almost out of aluminum foil. Do I need aluminum foil? Really? YES. YES, I DO. I’M ADDICTED TO ALUMINUM FOIL. I’ve been rationing aluminum foil. We are on an aluminum foil conservation plan. No one can use aluminum foil without running it past the committee (me) and getting permission. And certainly if aluminum foil is used, it must be used twice if not three times. We don’t know when we can get aluminum foil again. Next time I can get near a store, like in March, I’m going to buy 50 rolls of aluminum foil. In fact, I might be a little obsessed with aluminum foil right now. What is life without aluminum foil?

Yesterday, we worried about snow. Last night, we worried about ice. Today, we’re worried about flooding. One way or another, we may lose electricity. We’re already so snowed under, iced under, and flooded under, we have no idea when we’ll get out.

Send aluminum foil.

Clover: “SEND COOKIES!!!”