On Monday, the 2nd day of October, the wind was pretty gusty. We were standing outside visiting with Ameryeth, when Rain was looking towards the front she noticed that the apple tree looked funny. That's when we went to take a closer look, and here's what we saw
After looking quite a bit closer, it looks as though the wind caught it just right and caused a twist of the branch while falling
As you can guess, we're going to need to cut that branch off, drag it to the wood shed and turn it into firewood/logs. Probably do that tomorrow.
Rain was reading on one of her homesteading lists that a good way to feed your chickens, especially if you've got some kind of liquid to give them, like spoiled milk or something, is to cut tires in half and lay them on the ground. That makes chicken feeders that won't move around, and are low enough even for the littler chicks to eat out of. We thought that was a great idea, so we've now got a tire made into two feeders. Seems to work pretty well.
The reason we decided to try it is because the last time we bought chicken feed, the feed store didn't have any chopped corn. They only had whole corn, or ground corn, so we got ground corn. That the white powdery stuff you see in the tires. Guess the chickens and ducks don't like it this way, but they're going to have to eat it for a few days until we can get back to the feed store and get them their chopped corn. Maybe if we make it more paste-like they'll actually eat it. Whattaya think?
As I said at the beginning, we had visitors on Monday. One of our best friends brought her four kids from 2 hours away. The kids played on the trampoline most of the day. When it got really hot, they begged us to let them swim in the pool. We didn't let them because the pool has been shutdown for a few weeks, which means the water isn't as clean as it used to be, because we haven't run it through the filter cause we lowered the water temperature to prevent freezing of the hoses come this Winter (if we have a Winter that is). Eventually we talked them into turning the sprinkler on once it was under the trampoline, and that cooled them off, and they had fun getting absolutely soaked. *smile* As always, the kids had a blast playing together, and us adults had a great time talking with each other and watching the kids. Not to mention we had chips, cola, and pizza for when we got the munchies. Delicious! :-)
Today, Wednesday, we went to the park and the kids played with other homeschoolers who are in our HS group. They were the same kids they played with last week. Hopefully, eventually there'll be even more kids for them to play with. It would be great if my daughter was able to meet another homeschooler close to her age (14).
On a bit sadder note, my father left a message on my answering machine telling me that mom is home for the nursing home after nine weeks. Since our visitors were still here, I didn't call him back right away. When I did though, I got to talk to mom for a few minutes. I found out that she has quit smoking completely, which is great. However, since they had to put the feeding tube in, she hasn't eaten anything via her mouth. Will eat *only* what's put in the tube. I asked her why she wasn't eating anything and she said, "Don't want to" and "nothing tastes good, so why bother?" Needless to say, that kind of worries me. I know she was already close to 100 pounds a few weeks ago. Can't imagine she's gained any weight since, so is probably *really* thin. She has NO energy, probably because she's not eating anything, and has only drank a little Ginger ale :-( Hopefully dad can get her to start eating, because the feeding tube is only supposed to be used as a supplement, not as a way of eating all the time. She can put weight on her hip, although she still needs a walker. Plus she and dad are both on oxygen now. But if she continues to not eat, I can't imagine she'll be around very much longer. Sad but true. She's lived a hard, hard life, and I believe she has just given up and is now just going through the motions.
Tags: apple. apple tree, tree, branch, broken branch, broken limb, apples, trees, branches, limbs, walker, walkers, chicken, chickens, feeders Tags: home, homeschool, home school, homeschoolers, home schoolers, education, kids, teens, park, family, learning, socialization
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