Birds

The warmer weather the last few days has brought the Goldfinches and Red-throated Finches back to the house. I wish my camera would do justice to the action going on around the feeders. Last Monday we put out one feeder and a few birds came. Thursday I added a second feeder to the apple tree. The same tree we hung them in last year and the year before. This morning it's like a bird fight out there for the eight perches. For some reason they don't share very well. It's like there is some bird etiquette in waiting until one of the birds leaves. Normally two feed when there could be four going at the same feeder. Then one of them will get impatient and try to get someone to leave the perch...and everyone in the tree gets in on the fluttering and twittering...it's a bird fight!! So I filled a third feeder, luckily I had another, and hung it in the apricot tree. As I was hanging it the apple tree got quiet. After it was hung I walked about twenty feet away, curious to see how long it would take for them to discover more food. It took five seconds - literally. I no sooner had walked the distance away, turned back to face the tree and one bird flew into the apricot tree, cocked his head a few times and twittered some little familiar sound I've heard before. And two other goldfinches flew into the tree with him, yes a him, they are brighter yellow. And boom! They swooped onto the feeder perch. The other tree still had four goldfinches in it and about three regular finches. The four took off altogether the same direction out of the yard just a singing. I think they went to spread the word!! Now if I have to come up with a fourth feeder yes I have one more simple feeder, the first feeder we hung out about three years ago.

Candy Shop

So this is the first block of 50. They are called Patience blocks....I don't know why, I think they are easy!! I have to do 12 in green, and purple, 6 in yellow for starters...

Candy Shop start

Eighteen 9-patches, 100 more to go...

One more thing...

I should have read my last post before I published it....I should make sure you understand that the 1/3 bar of soap is grated into the water. I scored my bar so as I was grating I knew when to stop.

Trying Something New

I found this recipe for making your own laundry detergent using the products in the pic. So today James and I made some. It is super cheap per load. I haven't done any laundry yet, but I will keep you posted on how I think it cleans. From all the posts on the blog I got it off of, everyone raves about its cleaning. One lady has pet rats and used this soap to wash the rat's bedding. She said there was no smell left. So this makes me hopeful that it is what it is....you know what I mean?
If you're curious, I dissolved 1/3 of the bar soap in a quart of hot water. Brought it to a nice simmer on the stove and stirred until dissolved. We then added 1/2 cup of the Washing Soda and Borax to the soap water and stirred until too dissolved. Took it off the heat. In my mop bucket (3 gal) I put one quart of hot tap water. Then poured the soap mixture in and filled it with cold water up to the 2 gallon line. I let it set for about 30 miinutes and stirred it occasionally. It will begin to gel. We then poured it into two empty old juice gallon bottles. I think we ended up with about 1 2/3 gallons.
Each time I use this soap I will have to give the bottle a bit of a shake to mix it up again. Anyway, never hurts to try to cut back on some expenses!!

Brooke Leigh

Baby Brooke Leigh, 6 pounds, blue eyes, brown hair. Super long legs, big feet and long fingers - A Darrington for sure with Alissa's nose. She is super good at frowning. Here she is showing the jaundice so she is on the Billipad.

Our wild weather

This picture James took on Tuesday of the wild weather we had going on! The wind was clocked at 60mph in Pocatello and took down trees....we just rattled really hard. BTW- this is the Iona hill.