parenthood

Life has taken me in such an awkward direction. I mean, it’s not my job, my home or my home business, but….*heavy sigh*….my son. 

I spent so many years, 20 to be exact, raising him to be a good man, to make wise decisions, to be responsible. But somewhere along the way he decided to HATE ME for that. Can you imagine?? HATE ME!!!! 😞

i didn’t beat him, abuse him, or…whatever. I just called him out on his shit and rewarded him for good behavior. He has high functioning autism so I did everything I possibly could to get him as much help as possible with that not to mention changing the holy HELL out of my life to accommodate his needs. 

But he’s been a fighter since he was born. He never wanted to learn a damn thing from me but my god, did he ruin his life in spite of me or WHAT?? 

I suppose I’ll cut right to it. My son moved out of my home at the age of 20 with an amazing full time

job with FULL benefits, he had a car, 2 bank accounts with plenty of money, he had furniture, plenty of nice clothes and a mom and stepdad who said, “if you need ANYTHING just let us know”. Btw, he moved out cuz he wanted to, not for any other reason. 

Four months later he knocked up his very first girlfriend, after losing his job, his apartment, his car, his bank accounts and took up drinking, vaping and smoking pot. 

WTF DID HE LEARN IN 20 FUCKING YEARS????????????????!!!! Not a god damn thing. And IM the one who feels shame, embarrassment and sadness. Not him, apparently. 

He refused to tell me his address because he didn’t want me to “track him down”. What???? He blocked me on social media, changed his phone number and that was that for MONTHS. I never did a single thing to prompt ANY of that. 

You know how I learned about his girlfriends pregnancy?? One of his two best friends DIED. Drowned in the lake down the street and his OTHER best friend’s mom called me to see if my son had a decent outfit to wear to the funeral. Apparently they had been in contact with my son, but not me! 

Wow. Just, wow. 

My son finally texted me after this unfortunate event. (For the record, he did NOT attend the funeral. He bailed. It was his best fucking friend!!!!!!!) Anyway, it was then that he gave me his address and phone number. But he still didnt want me to interfered in his life. He didn’t necessarily say this, but honestly, he didn’t say much at all. I took the hint. 😞 

I've asked him several times what the sex and the due date was for the baby. Only today he sent me a video of a gender reveal party (that I wasn’t invited to) that showed the baby is a girl. 

Great. 🙄

I mean, who cares? He clearly doesn’t want anything to do with me and he clearly doesn’t want me to have anything to do with his child. (A child, btw, that he claimed for YEARS he never wanted.) 

*heavy sigh*

The holidays are coming. My son’s birthday is coming up. What do I do?? Send him a gift? Do nothing? Text a happy whatever? What SHOULD I do?? 

😞 

Im so angry. So upset. So ashamed.

 

😞 

A huge part of me wants to shut him out and forget he ever existed. The mom in me just can’t. 

Working hands

Farming....it’s not for sissies. 

For example, today (Sunday)  I woke up at 6:30am, had a coffee, then while still in my night clothes, I washed and packaged up eggs, put them in the egg cooler and took them outside to the end of the driveway. 

After that I threw on some clothes and went outside to stomp  the ice out of my breeder chickens water dishes and refresh them. Then I refilled my layer flocks water. After that I proceeded to the garage where my silkie chicks and Coturnix quail are and I emptied out their ice and replaced it with water. 

Once the water is done, it’s time to check on feed. The same procedure followed for feed. Once I made it back to the garage it was time to switch gears yet again and do the first round of egg collecting. First, down to the breeders, then the layer flocks, then the quail. 

I’ve learned over the years to use a bucket instead of a wire egg basket. It seems the chickens associate my hands and anything I carry with FOOD! This, in turn, convinces them to eat their own eggs. So I need to collect them in buckets so they can’t really see what I’m carrying. 

Okay! That’s done....for now. Back to the house, where we are in the middle of some “home improvements”. Sheetrock, mudding and sanding it is! 

Now that we’ve managed to accomplish that (for the third time), I’m coughing up sand, feel like I have cotton mouth and am in dire need of a drink and a tissue. 😳

At noon time I will fill up milk jugs with tap water (about 6 of them) and bring them down to the breeder chickens as their water will certainly be frozen again. Then I’ll collect eggs again, hoping that none have frozen and popped. 

Then I’ll go back to the garage and fill buckets with scratch to treat the chickens in order to prevent boredom. If they get bored they fight and eat eggs. 😒

Back to the house! Now I can warm up a bit. Oh wait, I need to start dinner. Oh my gosh! The kitchen is a mess! Mud on the counter, pine shavings in the sink, water on the floor...etc. I need to clean this place up first! 

Rush, rush, rush....clean, clean, clean! 

Dinner it is!!! Prep, prep, prep, cook,

Sauté, bake and boil! 

Phew!!

Now to clean the kitchen and....uh oh!! I have to check one last time for eggs! Collect, collect, collect....down to the breeder pens, collect, collect, collect. 

I return to the house and, with a huff, put the eggs on the counter to be washed, go and change into my night clothes, and...oh no, I forgot to check on the incubator!! I add water to the incubator to insure proper humidity, then back to the kitchen to pack a lunch for Brian. 

*pours a glass of wine....then another*

Oh no! I forgot to bring the egg cooler back in! *runs outside and brings the cooler back inside*

*heavy sigh*

I finally clean up the kitchen and sit down. Thoughts of spring time and planting season come over me and I need to write it down! Get the notebook and start making notes. 

“Mom, I need some gas money.” Says a familiar voice from his bat cave. 

*dramatic eye roll* Why don’t you have your own gas money? I ask. Lessons are never ending for parents. 

“I don’t know...” guilty face. 

 “I want this back on payday.” I insist on teaching him a lesson.

My thoughts are written down. My offspring has retired to his room. My other half has also retired to bed. Even the dog sleeps at my feet. But me? No. I’m up...still trying to wind down knowing darn well that I have to get up early and go to work, then come home and work all over again. 

These hands are aging faster than I ever thought. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. 

EGGducation

There’s a few things that took me a while to learn about chickens and their eggs.

First off, chickens typically lay a single egg a day but on average, each year a chicken takes a little time off, 3-6 months depending on breed and weather conditions.

That’s the second thing, weather. If the weather is extreme (like a cold winter or really hot summer) then a chickens body may have to work overtime to survive. When this happens the chicken will stop laying eggs until the chickens body no longer has to work so hard. 

The other reason is that chickens molt once a year. That means they lose all their feathers and regrow new ones. Their body has to work hard to regrow feathers when this happens so they stop laying eggs. 

As a combination of the above two it is rule of thumb for chicken owners to increase calcium and crude protein in their chickens diet to assist them in recovering. (Believe it or not diet is extremely important in any living thing.)

Another thing I’ve learned is never to trust what you read about specific chicken breeds being setters and non setters. (Chickens that like to sit on eggs rather than lay them vs chickens who do not). All chickens go broody sooner or later. Some more than others of course but there’s no such thing as a non setter. *eye roll* My experience is limited to about 20 chicken breeds that I’ve owned but I’m pretty sure I’m right. 

Another way that farmers keep their chickens laying eggs in winter is by adding light in their coops. Chickens have these little sensors in their eyes that can detect light and hours of light. So when the winter comes and the days get shorter so does the chickens egg laying cycle. So farmers try to trick those sensors by providing light in the coop, typically on timers. 

By the way, the reason chickens go in at dusk to sleep is because they can’t see in the dark. 

Next is that one thing all chicken owners should have in their garden is Oregano and one thing for all chicken owners should keep in their pantry is apple cider vinegar. 

Oregano is a strong, natural antibiotic to chickens. Whether it’s fresh or dried it is always helpful when you have a chicken who isn’t  feeling well. Like any antibiotic, you should always use them sparingly so they don’t build an immunity to it. I like to put fresh oregano in their water supply about twice a year. Once in late spring/early summer and again at the end of the season just before winter. 

Apple cider vinegar is like a parasite killer or wormer for chickens. If added to their drinking water it will kill bacteria that may be making them ill. If their poop is runny or too light in color they may have parasites. This is a good time to use this. I give it to mine in the spring and mid summer when bugs are at their worst. 

I’ve also learned that “chicken math” is a common joke amongst chicken owners. It basically means that a non chicken owners idea of one chicken is like four chickens to a chicken owner. 😁

You remember that quote “If you build it, they will come”? Well, if you sell eggs, customers will come...religiously...and yell at you when you run out. 😳 So make sure you continue to re-raise new flocks each year to keep production up. 

Just an FYI: eggs will never have the potential to become baby chicks if there’s no rooster in the flock to fertilize them.  And even if there is a rooster in the flock, if you refrigerate your eggs they will never develope in any way. 

Tip: Fresh eggs do not make good hard boiled eggs unless you steam them, or let them sit in the water for a long time, or let them sit in the fridge for 2 days after boiling and before peeling. The reason is because there is a membrane just under the shell. The egg shell has pores that allow oxygen in very slowly. When the egg is very fresh there is no air helping to separate the membrane from the shell. So when you try to peel them they’ll just rip apart. 

Oh, and never wear shorts, flip flops or anything else that exposes your wiggly digits, painted toe nails or freckles because you will be an instant target to your tiny raptors. 😂

Chicken Mama

I've been raising chickens for about 3 years now. I've been buying chicks from Murray McMurray Hatchery https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/index.html since long before owning my own farm. My mother used to purchase chickens from them when I was a kid.

Anyway, I raise chickens for eggs. I sell their eggs. Upon raising several different breeds of chickens I've become a bit of a chicken addict. I love chickens!! They're easy to raise, easy to handle, easy to sell and easy to buy. They are cheap to feed and profitable if you sell their eggs.

I'm currently researching egg incubation so that I can hatch eggs and sell the chicks for an extra income.

I've had everything from standard breeds, to the best egg layers to bantams and silkies which I'm raising right now for the chicks they can produce. I have them in 2 large sister runs. Each run has it's own coop and they can be kept divided or opened and allowed to blend flocks. At the moment, I have the fence closed and I have a flock of 35 laying hens in one side and a flock of 55 plus 12 turkeys on the other side.

I also have a small coop within my largest coop specifically for breeding pairs. My current flock of 55 will be ready to start laying eggs in September. I chose a large blend of breeds for the different color eggs they lay. So I'll have a beautiful rainbow of eggs by then to sell to my customers.

The reason I want to begin hatching/raising my own chicks is for three reasons: One is that it can be rather expensive to continuously purchase layer flocks every year. Also, I could potentially make money off the chicks. The last reason is to kind of right a wrong I committed as a child.

My siblings and I used to play a game called "Who's the Rotten Egg". We would go down to the barn and collect eggs. If we happened to find an old nest we would begin the egg fight and whoever got nailed with the stinky rotten egg was the loser. Well, one day I threw an egg at my sister and I missed. It went flying past her and broke on the ground. To my horror, there was a nearly fully developed baby chick inside, then dead because of me. So now, I'd like to bring some chicks back into the world, perhaps replace the ones I so carelessly killed as a child.

The breeds I will be focusing on will be White Silkies and Mille Fleur D'Uccles. Both are bantam breeds. I will begin the breeding practice in the spring of 2019!

Turkey Poults: First year observations.

This is my first year raising turkey poults. My purpose for this is to sell them for food and raise money for my farm, so I chose Broad Breasted breeds of Whites and Bronze Breasted turkeys. I chose these breeds because they were specifically bred to grow muscles rapidly making them large enough to slaughter at around 20-25 weeks of age at approximately 20’ish pounds.

So, upon arrival 1 died immediately. Within 4 days 3 more died. I began with 16. It has been a VERY cold April so far and shipping took several days so the poor little things were freezing. 

Once they got warmed up I had to teach them how to eat and drink. Not as easy a task as chicks. So I used 3 of the 50 chicks I also purchased at that time to teach the turkeys to eat and drink. That worked well but I still had to encourage the turkeys to eat by digging in their food, dipping my fingers in their water and touching their beaks with it. Not to mention I added other foods to catch their curiosity like, venison, lettuce, strawberries and apples all put through the food processor. 

When I lost the fourth turkey poult I was surprised. They had been doing well just an hour prior to me vacuuming the front porch (AKA the chick brooder). I later learned that turkey poults are so sensitive that even being startled can put them into shock and kill them within mere hours. 👀 

It was then that I got some helpful advise from some other turkey farmers. Turkeys don’t like rain, loud noises, sudden changes of any kind and they need you like they need their mom (unlike chicks). When they go into shock, they’ll drop/collapse. If this happens and they don’t seem to be active as they were before or interested in food or anything, you have to massage them. Circular motions all over to get their circulation going again. Do this several times taking small breaks in between. You should see signs of improvement within 20 minutes to an hour. Then all should be well.

So, as a result of the shock factor from the vacuum, I was no longer able to vacuum the porch. The dander from all the chicks was over powering. I had to keep opening the windows and ventilating with a window fan facing outside. Like the dander wasn't bad enough, the turkeys learned how to fly at only 2 WEEKS!! I was shocked! No one prepared me for that. The chicks usually take a month. Well, they immediately took over the entire porch, which is quite large. And they do not have fear like chickens do. Nope, they saw me as Mom, not the lady with food. So every time they saw me they'd come running looking for food and comfort. When I just sat with them they would open up a bit, start strutting, run laps on the porch back and forth and just sit on my lap and nap. So I guess you could say, its kind of like having a puppy.

At 5 weeks of age, they had completely ruined the rug on my porch. Oh yes, the poop. Poop machines!! My gosh. The dander was totally out of control. I was dusting sometimes twice a day and frankly, I was having a very hard time getting anything done out there without being totally bombarded by the turkeys. So I got some advise from other turkey farmers who said, "Put them out!" So I did.

I have been consistently letting them out all day and forcing them back into the coop at night to sleep. Every morning I open the door they come running out and drop at my feet in the sunshine. They stretch out a leg and a wing and take a brief nap. It was pretty funny. They were sun bathing, probably because they'd been cold overnight.

After about 5 days, I added the chicks to the coop. I picked a time when it was going to be cold and rainy. This way, the chicks would be forced to stay inside the coop for the day, maybe longer and develop a sense of "home" so that when I did let them out to explore their run for the first time, they'd know to return to the coop for safety and food.

All in all, I've decided that raising turkeys is much more challenging than raising chickens. I hope they're lucrative.

How Times are Changing

It\"s occurred to me on more than one occasion that I\"m living in an era that I don\"t belong in. Or at least one that I don\"t like. I feel like I should have been in another time, place, dimension...I don\"t know. I just know I don\"t like anything about the way things are now.



So much war....war....a war that won\"t stop. Not ever. This isn\"t a problem that has a solution. We\"re (as people) just too different. I know that the human race is supposed to be linked, like a herd. A social species. But think about it like this, what if the world were a fish tank? Now lets say that you mix large fish with small ones, and aggressive ones with community fish. Now lets shake things up some more, lets say you have a fresh water tank, a salt water tank and a brackish tank. Now poor them all together. What will happen?



WAR.



They will all fight to the death, and which ever ones survive will then die from the environmental changes.



We\"re all going to die.....if we can\"t just leave each other alone.



It began so long ago and has transformed the world into what it is today. Chaos. But no one sees it as chaos, for some reason. Because people only see the now, what\"s in front of them at the moment. Years and years and years of shaping, molding, brain washing, lying, crime, disease has made this.



If we stop trading with other countries, helping other countries, allowing other countries to invade ours, paying other countries and sending our patriots to other countries then and only then will America have a shot at rebuilding itself, its citizens and its resources.



But that won\"t happen. There\"s too much money involved now. Too much debt. And frankly, we\"re all afraid of each other.



So like I said before, we\"re all going to die. It\"s too bad. This world has so much potential.

Racism

Its an ugly topic. Its an ugly word. But its also a HUGE problem in America today.

After so many crimes and so much controversy it seems we're on the verge of a Civil War. Why??

I don't understand. In this day in age, it shocks me that so many people still feel so bitterly towards other races. I could care less what color anyone's skin is. As a matter of fact, if anything, I may feel a tad bit jealous from time to time, simply because I'm white and don't tan very well.

I don't believe that the color of anyone's skin is the issue these days. I think culture is the issue. Now, I may be a little bias because I've never been away from the North East apart from Florida, so I don't really know much about other states and cultures, but from what I see around here, culture is the problem.

True culture has been fogged over, shaded and tweaked over the years. And what we once thought were wonderful cultures have now become something considered undesirable by the surrounding masses. For example, a city that I work in has a very high population of people who receive state benefits simply for having too many children to support in their current financial bracket. After speaking to many different people about this specific issue, I've come to a single conclusion: The culture of these people are all the same. Strangely enough, they are NOT all the same color and do NOT all come from the same country. They simply share the same culture. This specific culture strongly believes that the more children you have the better and that if you have kids together, you stay together. Now, I've heard many people say this is a religious belief, but frankly, I've met and know many of these people and I've NEVER seen them attend a single second of church. Nor do any of them practice any particularly religious behaviors and ceremonies. The amount of "sin" they commit daily is quite remarkable for these "religious" people. So for this reason, I consider the problem a cultural prejudice.

Okay....now that I've explained by example why I think its cultural, this is why I think it leads to hate. Having children is not a problem until all your neighbors have to pay for them. When there is nothing wrong with you, yet you fully believe that you should be a stay at home mom and continue to have baby after baby with men why do not honor their status as father and man, then you become a problem, a financial burden to all of your statewide neighbors since most states will financially support innocent children with tax payers money, those individuals suddenly get paid to literally stay at home and make babies regardless of their partners beliefs or honor systems.

Everyone knows that Americans are getting lazier every day. And believe me, when you work 40+ hours a week just to see it all fly out the window to Uncle Sam and then you turn around and see an unemployed person walking the streets in their pajamas, talking on the latest and greatest iphone and wearing 14kt gold jewelry with diamonds the size of golf balls on them, it really makes one want to quit their job and have a few illegitimate  children. But, not everyone can stand to do that so they kill themselves working for people who don't appreciate it and who don't work for anyone at all. THIS....is what creates hate.

So when your leaders fail you, don't take it out on everyone else. Take it out on your leaders, right? The only problem, there is a right way and a wrong way to do things. For example, cold blooded murder never accomplished anything except war. And I know people see Police as leaders, but they are not. They are simply enforcers of law. Our leaders are our government, our Judges, our Politicians. But no one cares to go after them. That would be too hard. I mean, they all have high power positions, teams of lawyers and bottomless pockets.

Knowing this, when someone of a particular culture does something as nasty as shoot police officers at random, or torture and kill customers at a café just because they don't practice a specific religion, or terrorize an entire city with shootings, looting, muggings and rapes because you feel like a victim, you are nothing more than another criminal and you should be punished at the fullest extent of the law.

Having said that, if you are truly racist and see nothing but the color of a person's skin, you don't belong here. America is not for you. And you need to either leave this country immediately, or be punished to the fullest extent of the law for any kind of crime you commit against anyone. This is 2016 and we do NOT practice slavery of any kind. Its gone. Its over and it NEVER should have happened in to begin with. Humans have come a long way, but if you refuse to accept the world you live in, get out.  America is the land of the free. Its the only place in the world where anyone from any country can come to work and raise their families in peace.

Our government has failed us by providing unlimited funds to people for no reason which in turn created a brand new culture of lazy free loaders who feel entitled to free money and use racism as an excuse when their tax paying neighbors get mad because of all the money they have to pay the government for those said freeloaders. Now, remember when I said the people of this specific culture believes in having as many children as God grants them? Well, do the math. When working people see the value of the dollar and respect it because they grew up working, they refrain from having many children as they are too expensive to raise. So that particular culture lowers in population while the other one drastically increases in population. Numbers don't lie. Its a vicious cycle. And it will do nothing but cause hate and war until someone steps up to the plate and fixes it.

Give the people a reason to earn their keep. Make them understand the meaning of hard work and respect. Do this and they will love you for it. Eventually, they will see the error in their ways and they will soon raise their children to work and respect that work for all it will provide them with.

But please, don't scream racism whenever a crime is committed, or whenever someone gets killed by someone who isn't the same color as the victim. Unless their is true, unquestionable evidence that it was crime against race, do NOT accuse anyone of it. You will only hurt your community. But please....PLEASE....contact your local leaders, write a letter to the President of the United States!!! TELL THEM....there is a problem and suggest ways to fix it. THIS is how you can change the world.