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Thursday, December 4, 2008

Eggy Bliss

Wow. My hens are tremendous and I love them all! Today was a 9 egg day. Yesterday was miserable with cold winds and snow and general winter unpleasantness. I felt sure that today would be a bad egg day as a result. I was so wrong. I have no idea what the hens were celebrating, but I feel sure they must have been well pleased with something to give me 3 more eggs than my best egg day, and 4 more eggs than my usual egg days of late. I just want to go give every hen a little cuddly squeeze of thanks. They would probably be less delighted with that than I would be, so I shall leave them to their roosting.

Here is a picture of today's eggs. I set them in this lovely asparagus dish that I found on our summer vacation in North Carolina. I'm not a huge fan of antique shops, but Kelly loves to look for old tools, so I prowl around in a sort of grumpy manner saying to myself "Now why would anybody want to buy that thing?" when I look at some of the items. I should not be so harsh, I know, but some of the items for sale really make me wonder. Anyway, in one of the antique shops we stopped in, while Kelly was ogling wood planes in a locked cabinet, I found this rather quirky dish for $12, so I bought it. I have no idea if it is antique or not, but I do love asparagus, and the texture of the dish delighted me. I'm sure somebody will read this post and say "Now why did she want to buy that thing?!" There is a wee bit of shine to the eggs because they were cold when I brought them inside, so they had a bit of condensation develop on them. I wiped them with a paper towel but they persisted in being shiny! Two blue eggs! Hooray!
In addition, I was remiss yesterday, because I did not fully show the extent of the tractor. Please note that I am now rectifying that error. Here is the front snow plow part. I find it large and intimidating but Kelly is very excited about it. I am excited about the job it will do in clearing the driveway. Maybe that is what the hens were celebrating!

12 comments:

Unknown said...

Blue eggs are the best! Great tractor....maybe I can get one when I get my government bailout:)

Claire MW said...

Yes, I love it when I sell a couple of blue eggs mixed into a dozen browns to a new customer and I show them the eggs and their eyes nearly pop out of their head!

I hope I actually get the government bailout this time. I didn't qualify last time. I swear I will spend every penny of it! Probably on another sheep!

Joanna@BooneDocksWilcox said...

Don't ya just love collecting eggs? the various colors make it so much fun too. what a delight for me. How many laying girls do you have? Yours sure are producing much better than mine right now.

Where did you vacation in North Carolina? we are in the most nw corner of the state.

Claire MW said...

I'm not sure how many are actually laying right now. I have a bit of a motley assortment, some who are very old (5-7 years) and some who are rescue birds, but I have about 50 hens of age. So in a sense my egg count is low, but some are likely too old and some are still recovering from previous circumstances, and some may be too young.

We started our vacation at Biltmore (loved the gardens and the winery!) and then we went along the blue ridge trail and stayed for a day in Hiddenite, a small town with one of those sluicing mines where we got some fun little stones, then we went to Winston-Salem for a day, then on to Raleigh to visit friends for a couple of days, and then to Seagrove for another day. We had such a marvellous time - it's a beautiful state.

Sarah Elaine said...

Love the blue eggs!

My goodness you are a prolific blogger! At this rate I'm going to have to check in every day to find out what's new!. :-)

By the way, I told my friend Karen (All Downhill from Here, linked on my blog roll) about your chicken hat. She loved the idea!

Claire MW said...

Imagining a crew of runners out on a trail in a mess of chicken hats....strikes me as quite hilarious!

Anonymous said...

I am having a hard time looking at your pictures with snow in them!!! It still feels a bit like spring here in the NW and I have to keep looking at the calendar to realize that yes, we are in December ;)

Your eggs are lovely! I have 2 little banty hens that are laying right now and one lays brown and one lays blue - very fun!

Wow!!! You have a lot of chickens.

Congrats on your tractor! Now that you have one, you won't know how you survived without it ;) It looks like the snow plow is going to come in handy this winter.

Don said...

Hats off to your best egg day ever!

I'm afraid that the eggs will start freezing before I can get to mine!

I am getting some Aracaunas next year. I have Ameracaunas (green eggs) now, but I want some blues. Have you heard of a hen that lays plum colored eggs?

Claire MW said...

Kenleighacres - I started out with 2 chickens also. It was just that then I couldn't stop! I wish it felt like spring here. We have to wait until the end of March for that.

Don - plum colored eggs? For real?? I would love to find that, but I haven't heard of such a hen. Now I must go do some research on it!

sugarcreekstuff said...

That plow blade is very impressive. I have blade envy.

All but one of my Ameracaunas are taking a winter break, some of my Wyandottes are molting and the rest are spring chickens, one is a mama right now. Yesterday I got 4 eggs out of 27 hens. Do they cut back on the grain? No way. They had better start making up for it if they know what's good for them.

BTW, I sent your bag out yesterday afternoon, if you could please let me know when it arrives safe and sound, I'd appreciate it. Thanks again.

Laughing Orca Ranch said...

Men love intimidating tools, don't they? lol!

How funny that the wood planes were locked up. Maybe they were embedded with diamonds? hehe

Your asparagus dish is charming! And I love asparagus, too. Yum!
We don't get blue eggs, but we do get green eggs. I don't they are as pretty as your blue eggs, but I do love their uniqueness. :)

~Lisa
New Mexico

The Kooky Blogs said...

You have some very pretty chickens and eggs :) Can't wait till my Americana hens start laying. Everything is starting to slow down with the cold weather, burr.