Pages

Monday, November 12, 2012

The Chickens are in da house

Today at lunchtime we braved the unsettled weather and made the trip to Chook Manor at Little River. There we purchased 4 gorgeous Brown Shaver girls who were 12 weeks old on the 5th of November.
Driving home with teenage son in the back seat, Mr SFP and I contemplated names. He wants to call one Camilla in honour of Charles and Camilla's visit to New Zealand. Funny, I never thought of him as a royalist. I like Izzy and Henny Penny. Teenage son piped up that one should be called dinner.......I'm sure he's just pulling my leg!
We got the girls home and settled into their new house and run. They spent a lovely time in the run scratching about in the weeds. I can see why people use them to condition their vege gardens before they plant them up. 
The hardest thing was trying to round them up at bedtime and get them in their house. I'm hoping this will become a learned behaviour as I don't fancy chicken wrangling every night. I must admit I've made several trips down the back to check on them and count them since their arrival. It's a big responsibility being a Mother to 4 more. Plus I just checked to make sure they were all tucked in for the night. So cute to see 4 little chickens cuddled up to each other on their perch.
I'll leave you with some pictures of the girls........TTFN Mrs SFP xx 


Sunday, November 11, 2012

Beautiful sunset.

Mr SFP disappeared with my camera today- something to do with work. Unfortunately this meant  I couldn't take any pictures of the progress achieved in the garden this weekend.

He did take some arty pictures of last nights sunset and rainbow. I'll add these and hopefully get some more pictures tomorrow. We're off to get the chickens at midday, so I should have some pictures of the girls in their 5 star accommodation.
TTFN Mrs SFP xx


Saturday, November 10, 2012

The Chicken house is finished!!

The chicken house was finished on Friday........hooray!! My very clever craftsman has made a wonderful job and has thought of everything. I'm amazed- everywhere I look there is an innovative idea. It makes me smile each time I walk down the path to open the greenhouse, or to hang out the washing. I've taken some progress pictures and I'll take a picture of the finished house tomorrow. We hope to go on a road trip on Monday to Little River and collect 4 brown shaver chickens. I'm excited and nervous. We may have to have an official opening of Chook Manor- ribbon cutting and cucumber sandwiches?

No mistaking who lives here!

While I was working in the Potager garden last weekend I had some company. Naughty Spock had stayed out all night and was catching up on his sleep. It was like the equivalent of a hangover- he couldn't keep his eyes open. It must have been cosy snuggled up in the pea straw.


It was very hard work and I wondered why I had thought this a good idea, but one corner of the Potager garden is now complete!! It required hours of weeding as it had been in lawn, and digging in many bricks. I added pea straw and compost, but it's done. I put my bean support together which I had won off Trade Me a couple of years ago and planted my White Lady runner beans grown by me from seed. Also planted silver beet- for Mr SFP and the chickens and lettuce plants. I'm very proud of my efforts- only 3 more sections to go........may take a while.


I'm very proud of my construction skills as I had lost the instructions LOL.

The fence is to deter our big dog Rosie from using the garden as a toilet- oh the joys of owning a dog....not!
I'll leave you with this pretty white campanula growing in the flower garden. I'll be back very soon with details of today's progress in the garden.  TTFN  Mrs SFP xx