Saturday, March 01, 2008

In like a lion

Here's hoping the old adage about March is true, in like a lion, out like a lamb, as here at Henbogle it is snowing hard at 8:50 am, and the NWS forecast is calling for 5-9 additional inches today atop the 3" or so that fell overnight. Sigh. I am so DONE with winter and snow, but apparently the message has yet to be received by the weather gods. The snowy winter is really feeding my unreasonable longing for a greenhouse.

The girls are out in the hendome. They weren't too happy about the snow on the ground, but the lure of treats was too strong to resist. The other day Dan came upon a bale of hay fallen from a truck, and stopped to bring it home for the girls. He threw the bale in the dome and they are in hen heaven. We'd intended to stop by the feed store and buy a bale Sunday, but mis-timed it and the store was closed, so the girls had to do without. Scratching through the bale and eating the seeds gives them something to do and keeps them happy. This morning I threw a couple of handfuls of scratch into the hay and they'll be occupied happily for some time.

On my way back to the house I refilled all the bird feeders. I'd say at this point we've gone through about 125 lbs of sunflower seed, and 15 lbs of thistle seed. It is money well spent, feeder bird watching is more entertaining than cable tv anyday. I find the upside down finch feeder especially amusing. Some of the finches, and even a few chickadees, figure it out right away, but there are always a few who never do get the idea.

Well, time to make some pizza dough, I think tonight will be an excellent night for a big pizza feed. As I nearly always manage to set the smoke detectors off when I make pizza, it's time to test out the new microhood and see how good a job of smoke removal it does. Once I get the dough made, it will be time to buckle down and make some decisions about what seeds I will be ordering. I've been a quivering blob of indecision, but it is more than time to get off the pot, as they say, or I'll be SOL when order fulfillment time comes around!

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

It was snowing when I got up at 4:30 this morning it was snowing but it has added up to only an inch. You don't mind taking our 8-16", do you? [running to hide now!]

Ali said...

You'd better run! I'm huffing and puffing and BLOWING the storm northeast!

Anonymous said...

Hwah! Thanks for the laughs: "quivering blob of indecision" and "SOL". But don't worry about the seeds: even with the best planning one always forgets one crucial thing. It's the Murphy's Law there. You do, however, probably have a short window if you're doing an all-Fedco order. I hate to break it to you but 4 things I ordered went on backorder and this was in early Jan.!

Kim said...

Make. It. Stop. Please!

We got another six today. But the sun just came out (3:30pm) so hopefully we'll have a sunset.

Seed ordering should make you feel all springy inside.

Anonymous said...

Thank God I'm not alone in not ordering seeds yet! I was starting to think I was the only person in the world who hadn't done it, yet.

I'm curious - how do you like your new microhood? (BTW - the kitchen looks great.) When our stove conked out a few years ago I decided to get a microhood, and I was amazed at how much more counter space I had.

Hope all is going well. I haven't been blogging much because - well, I'm not sure, maybe because I'm so darn sick of winter - but I wanted to drop by to say Hello!

Meg said...

Boy, you guys up there are just getting hammered this winter!

Good luck on the seed order--we had accumulated so many catalogues and lists of potential seeds that in the end we resorted to something just a tad more sophisticated than throwing darts.

Ali said...

Well, everyone, I managed to procrastinate all weekend and avoid looking at my seed inventory or drafting a list. I can't wait to be gardening, but I am finding it hard to get seeds yet knowing I still have a few more weeks to go before I can plant any. Sigh.

Tracy, great to hear from you! How is winter progressing in your M state? Thanks for the kitchen compliments, I am loving the microhood and the extra counter space is a nice bonus.

Erin said...

Don't hate me, but I'm totally jealous! I grew up in Maine and now live in Boston, and we've only had two tiny little storms all winter long. Every time it snows in Maine, it rains here. My mother still lives in Maine and she sends me an email everyday reminding me how many days are left until Spring. I guess we always want what we don't have ;)