A Nasty Winter So Far

Heavens!  Well, we haven't gotten all that ice and nastiness here, but we did get a dusting of snow a couple of days ago.   This is day 3 of me having the stomach flu (yeaaa...) and, with the temps dipping down to the low teens for over a week, I had to run out and check today to make sure Henrietta was doing OK out there all by herself.  The cold air hit me like a chair in the face.  Wow, is it cold!

J. set her up with a new "furnace" in her coop and we had wrapped most of the chain link with tarps, so she seems to be nice and toasty so far despite the weather.  Now if we could just get her to actually go in the coop by herself rather than roosting on top of it!  Poor J. has been reduced to duck-walking under the roof of the pen, grabbing her, and stuffing her, amid much protest and squawking, into the coop.  She must agree that it's nice in there, because she doesn't come out until morning.

As if having a patient to take care of wasn't enough, J. also has had to deal with the fact that our on-demand hot water heater blew its control board and it's not under warranty.  So we've been without hot water upstairs since yesterday.  I couldn't stand it any more and washed my hair in the kitchen sink downstairs.  That's something I haven't done in a loooonnnngggg time.  The new board should be here tomorrow and, hopefully, I will be back at work and come home to a nice hot shower.  *sigh*

Also, hopefully, I'll feel much better tomorrow and can get back on track with posting because I've got a ton to share about what we've been up to.  In the meantime, I did come across a funny photo on ICanHazCheezburger that I thought I would share.  I couldn't help but giggle when I saw this.

 What do you think?  Photoshop or not?

Way Over the Top

Hi, all-

My apologies for having been offline for the last 2 weeks, but I've got some crazy stories to catch everyone up on.  Alas, I won't have time until this weekend when things finally quiet down a bit.  In the meantime, I just HAVE to post something that J. found on the Neiman-Marcus website.  We went a little over the top in building our chicken coop, but this so-called Beau Coop is WAYYYYY over the top. Don'tcha think?

Photo by Neiman Marcus

 
I wonder how many people will be whipping out the credit card for this baby at $100,000?

Now, granted, it includes a consultation, grounds survey and two additional onsite visits from an "expert".  And it does have a chandelier (every well-heeled chook should have one of those, right?)  But I'm pretty sure my hens are quite happy and my raised garden beds have done quite well for well under that budget. Her coop doesn't even have a trellis over the door or a fancy mural on the wall like ours!

Tell you what....if you're reading this and you've got the money to burn on this thing, give me a ring.  I'm willing to help build you a similar chicken palace and FOUR raised beds for the paltry sum of $75.000.  It's a bargain!