Finch Watcher

Lisa was cleaning the bird cages. She sets the bottomless cages on the grass while she does it. Piper found this fascinating. She sat there for a long time.

Other dogs come and go but the watcher is vigilant.

I finished the laying boxes. They’ll detach easily when the permanent hen house is finished.

They seem to like it. We got three eggs today.

The garden is coming along. I planted onion and carrot seeds today.

Rhode Island Reds

We picked up three Rhode Island Reds in Lexington yesterday. It was the same guy from whom Lisa got the New Zealand rabbit.

I got a load of gravel for the tractor port the other day. It can still use a couple of more loads but it’s a little more stable now.

Daniel bringing out the chickens. They are quite tame.

Daniel has a cool rabbit cage system. It has automatic water and waste disposal.

The chickens are staying in Ivy’s stall for now.

One of them laid a nice big brown egg.

I had it for lunch.

Malinda and Zoe meet the chickens. They came with Davina and Mindy for a cookout. David and Loretta were here too. We had fun showing the kids around. Zoe helped me feed Ivy and the ewes. The Larrys had to stay in their containment areas.

Flowers and Fruit

We went to the Montgomery County Nursery to get replacement cucumbers. Some of our original ones froze.

They have a nice variety.

I like these purple and white ones.

All I want is this chair. All I want is this chair and this plant. All I want is this chair and this plant and this door.

Vicious pit bull. She's a sweetie really.

Dad between the green houses. The hanging CDs and pie pans are to scare away the birds.

Mom and Dad waiting by the flowers.

St. Bernard pup. The first strawberries from our garden. These are gone now and the second batch was even bigger.

Ivy is a Big Girl Now

We took Ivy down to the sheep pasture yesterday. She didn’t know she was adopted so it was a shock to find out Lisa isn’t her birth mom. She cried for a while but by today she was walking around with the ewes.

Ivy caged for the ride down the hill. We could have led her down easily but the big horses were in the field. Heidi prefers her sheep on the other side of the fence.

We loaded everyone into the holding pens.

Ivy doesn’t mind being carried.

Louie was watching over the proceedings.

Daffy, meet Ivy.

Herd? What’s a herd? Ivy doesn’t know.

Claudia

We went to the Claudia Sanders Dinner House in Shelbyville yesterday for lunch. We met my cousins Gerri and Davina and Dad’s brother David with his friend Loretta. We had a good time and good food. After lunch we went over to Louisville to see the Flame Run glass studio and hot house.

Colonel and Claudia Sanders lived in this house.

Me, Davina, David, Mom, Lisa and Loretta before lunch.

Mom and Lisa before lunch.

Mom and Dad before lunch.

Lisa and Gerri at lunch. They had hot browns.

David and Loretta at lunch. They had chicken.

Davina and me at lunch. I was imitating David’s “smile”.

Gerri and me out front after lunch.

David and Davina after lunch.

Mom, Gerri, Davina, Loretta, David, Jim, Lisa. (after)

Flame Run studios.

Artists at work. Hot hard work.

The gallery. It’s all for sale. The plates here were around $2000. They were real works of art.

Glass balls.

The cold studio where they do piecing and polishing.

More of the gallery.

Mom looking at the jewelry.

Dad liked this plate.

I liked this bowl.

More gallery offerings.

We stopped at DQ on the way home for refreshments.

The Flying Lamb

We went down to Berea yesterday. It is a small college town with a large art community. If you recall, last summer we went to the Berea Art and Craft Festival. It was fun seeing all the art shops and local exhibits.

We saw these hand sculptures all over town. They were all decorated differently. They reminded us of the Hattiesburg Swans. I went in the tourist center and asked “what’s the story on the hands”. The curator had a well rehearsed answer. Obviously being asked the same question many times. The story is similar to the swans. There aren’t as many hands as there are swans but Berea is nowhere near the size of Hattiesburg.

 http://www.bereaartscouncil.org/special/hands.htm 

  

The real reason we went to Berea.

  This is a big metal toothy sculpture thing hanging on the wall in the alley next to the fudge factory.

Artists are so creative. We liked the purple steps.

Lisa and I saw the Glass Studio down the road and went to see.

The glass was beautiful. Michelle Weston is the artist but they were having electrical issues so she wasn’t working. There is a big glass window to the left in this picture. You can view the artist at work.

Dad was taking a lot of pictures of Ivy in hopes of getting one of her in mid-air.

Most of the pictures of Ivy had her in mid-air.

The robin eggs hatched.

I cooked lamb chops on the grill. Don’t tell Ivy.

I got two of the lateral braces on the carport.