A Full Weekend

We had a very full weekend to say the least... In the past week Brian and his "crew" collected 50 gallons of Maple Tree "sap". See, sap runs in early spring when the temperatures are below freezing at night and get well above freezing during the day. We've had some beautiful days in the last week. Their numerous milk jugs and 5 gallon Home Depot pails are now empty and ready to be filled again. They boiled all they had collected and we ended up with a little over a gallon of "syrup". It takes 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup a.k.a "Liquid Gold".

The Boys built their own fireplace/cooker.

They started about 2:00 and we took the last batch off about 11:30, yes it was a very long day, but a nice gathering of friends with wet and muddy kids and yummy food. The 5th season is finally here and our backyard is super wet and muddy but the kids loved it :)

 

The late night Saturday and then the time change we did not get rolling very early yesterday morning. Of course we had to have some pancakes for breakfast and as my groggy eyes try to find all that I needed I checked my phone and see that our baby chicks had shipped! As Brian is turning on his phone he looks and notices he has a new voice mail. Well low and behold it was our local postal sort facility saying our order of chicks were in! We TOTALLY were not expecting them until today and had NOTHING ready for them since they were coming from Minnesota. We didn't even have any feed. Knowing the little girls were desperate to be in their new home Brian made a fleeting trip to get the brooder box and pick up the chicks. We got them home and set them up with all their baby needs of Gro Gel and Electrolyte Water and headed to our nearest Tractor Supply for feed and bedding. I do have to say having the variety we got this time is lots of fun! We are trying to figure out who is what and our surprise chick is a Top Hat! She (or he) is very light so I am guessing it might be a Buff Laced Polish, a fav of mine.

I will get some better baby chick photos, oh man do the boys love them. I set up a bench right beside the box so they can stand up there and peer down at them. Gracyn points and says "chit-chen, chit-chen" to the one he wants me to pick up so he can pet it :)

I'll have to turn off the heat lamp to get some good pics of their colors, there are 30 total, one extra then we expected that they threw in for free for added warmth but one of the favorites we picked out, Buff Cochin with feathered feet! There are 30 all together, 3 are my cousin's so we'll have 27 total.