Thanksgiving Eve

 It’s Thanksgiving Eve, and I’m feeling even more like an orphan than I did last year. Grief takes time, and the holidays are hard without the people who always made it special when we were young.

Still, I am thankful that I have a nice place to live. The hens and I were all thankful for a lovely day today.

Hens enjoying the sunshine

I’m thankful that the scaly leg mites seem to be under control. Do I see new healthy scales growing back, or am I imagining it?

This Dominique's legs have fresh yellow scales between patches of old scales

Blackbeard's feet before treatment (10/27)

And today--her scales are dark green

At least Blackbeard’s feathers look better.

Neck feathers are fully filled in now

I walked back to the creek this morning. It is lower than I have ever seen it. There were lots of deer tracks in the mud.

The creek is very low, edged with ice, and the mud is pocked with deer tracks

Hopefully we will have a wet and/or snowy winter to fill the creek up again.

Looking downstream where normally submerged branches and trash are exposed

Terry has lots of Michigan holly in one of his deer-fenced nurseries. He has started harvesting it for winter decorations.

Michigan holly berries

In other signs of the changing seasons, he rearranged the equipment in the tractor shed. He pulled the tractor out so he could move the snowblower out from behind it. The lawn mower and the Gator go to the back, and the snowblower stays by the door, ready for the big snows that will fill the creek.

The snowblower comes out of the back of the tractor shed

I’m thankful for these guys. Obviously, Banjo is feeling very comfortable in his new home.

Terry and Banjo

Bingo is still a little shy, but will at times nestle between my knees, just out of reach. On a really good day, I can pet his head.

Bingo between my knees

I’m thankful for the friends who are coming to share dinner with us this weekend, all the other people I love near and far, and the memories of those who are no longer with us.

I encourage you to remember the immortal words of M.F.K. Fisher—“With good friends around us and good food before us, when shall we live if not now?”

First snow

 We had a dusting of snow Monday morning, but our first real snow came during that night. I woke at 2:00 to that particular quiet and gentle light that comes with snowfall. I don’t know where the light comes from. We’re in the last quarter, so the moon can be ruled out. Then the silence was broken. Hoo-hoo-hoooo. The owl was close to the house. Then came an answer, farther away. Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo. The owls called back and forth. I put on my glasses and got the binoculars. To my amazement, when I scanned the oak closest to the house from the guest room window, I saw the owl almost immediately. It was sitting on the top of a branch, its silhouette unmistakable. I hear owls far more often than I see them. This was very exciting for me.

Morning dawned to a winter wonderland. After I took this picture, I realized that the windsock is the only way one can tell this isn’t black-and-white.

River birch and apple orchard, windsock at the right is the only color

Backyard

North yard

White pines

The hens were not so excited about the snowy beauty. The Wyandotts and Goldie were the only ones who had not seen snow before, yet the Wyandotts were the only once to venture out in it. Dottie was first, peaking out from the door…

Peeking out

And then flying up to the windbreak, where Bonnie joined her.

Dottie and Bonnie on the windbreak (Bonne is a little darker)

One at a time, they both flew farther out into the run, where they seemed nonplussed. What now?

Oops! Now we're surrounded by snow

Eventually, they achieved their apparent goal—one of two patches of bare ground under the shade shelter.

Aha! A patch of open ground

When I opened the inside door to the coop, many of the girls were still on the perch.

We'll just stay here with dry feet, thanks

As soon as I started my chores, they crowded around the outside door but refused to go out.

Jesus Christ! It's that big two-legged animal!

I almost forgot to put out the scratch grains. I threw it right in front of the door for easy access, but still only the Wyandotts and Ms. Congeniality came out to eat. Poor Goldie. She flew to the windbreak support and paced back and forth, debating the pros and cons. Is it worth cold feet to get scratch grains. Should I stay or should I go?

Goldie: I want scratch grains. I don't want to stand in the snow. I want scratch grains....

The cats are still cute, although growing rapidly. It’s getting hard to pick them up with one hand.

Our big boys napping in Terry's chair

As usual when winter approaches, I can’t seem to stay out of the kitchen. In particular, I am carb loading as if I am going to hibernate for three months. I wish. Over the weekend, I made bierocks, a.k.a. runzas. It’s a bun stuffed with ground beef, cabbage, and cheese. I was trying to use up the Cabbage that Will Never Die. Even with four cups, finely chopped, the cabbage lives on. What else can I make. In addition to the cabbage issue, I like making bierocks because the dough is so nice to work with. It feels good in my hands.

Bierocks

Yesterday, I made cookies that I saw on a TV show. I downloaded and bought the ingredients so long ago that the caramel sauce expired last month. While I haven’t made the final decision, I’m inclined to call it a fail. The chocolate/pecan shortbread dough is exceedingly crumbly and hard to work with. The filling is essentially butter with a tiny bit of caramel sauce and powdered sugar mixed it. I put the required tablespoon of filling in each cookie, which is a lot. 

Chocolate pecan sandwich cookies

Predictably, it sits in my stomach like a brick. Terry seems to like them, though. On the plus side, the recipe only makes 12 cookies.

 

Halloween Fire, pumpkins

 Who knew an ordinary couch could be so much fun? The cats just love it. The chase each other over, under, and around. I don’t begrudge them their fun, but I put a blanket over the couch to keep off the cat hair. Bingo is unclear on this concept.

Bingo! No cat hair on the couch!

Banjo can’t seem to figure out that you are not hiding when you still have one body part in plain view.

I know you're in there, Banjo.

We had our annual Halloween fire last weekend with Jane, Nancy, Paula, Kate, and Newton, Kate’s Corgi. Terry had been piling up brush and unusable scraps from the old deck all summer. The fire was soon burning briskly.

Burning brush and deck stairs

Jane brought the required apple cider doughnut. I was amazed to learn that Paula, who has spent her whole life in this area, had never had a cider doughnut! Can you use those words together in a sentence? Kate had never heard of cider doughnuts until she moved here from Wisconsin, but even she had eaten her share since relocating. So Paula had a delicious learning experience.

Mmm--cider doughnut! (Thanks for the pic, Nancy)

I took a picture of the group

Left to right: Kate, Newton, Jane, Nancy, Terry, and Paula (in the smoke)

While Paula took a picture of me.

Me taking the above picture

A few weeks ago, Kate told me about a video on TikTok demonstrating how to get chickens to carve your pumpkin. We had to try it. I removed just the outer dark orange shell. I thought the girls would be on it like flies to poop. Instead, they initially ignored it Full disclosure: it may have been because we were standing outside the fence with Newton, who was eager to herd them. At first, they all ran to the opposite side of the enclosure. After Kate and Newton left, the bravest of the girls came over to me, but still ignored the pumpkin.

Chickens ignoring the pumpkin

I gave them space and went back to the fire. When I came up to heat the chicken soup and add the noodles, the chickens had started in.

Starting in on the pumpkin eyes

The trouble is that they don’t know where to stop. 

The hens got carried away

By the next morning, the eyes and nose had fused into a heart, way too early for Valentine’s Day.

Happy Valentines?

It was obvious that I’d carved the mouth too low for the chickens to peck at it. Terry smashed the first pumpkin and left it for the girls to clean up. He carved a second pumpkin with three faces, trying to get the mouth up higher. The hens were able to limit themselves (I was afraid they would overdose on pumpkin and get the collywobbles), and did not go so crazy on the new pumpkin. After a day, here’s what we had.

Face 1 of 3

Face 2 of 3

Face 3 of 3, with a snowman nose

 I hope the girls had fun. Some of those faces look pretty scary!