Barred Rock Peeps

I made a quick trip to the farm store yesterday morning to see if they had gotten any chicks. The store was very quiet when I walked in, and at first I thought the shipment hadn’t arrived. By the time I got to the live animal section, though, I could hear tiny peeping noises. The chicks must have been a bit subdued from their travels.

I was the only customer and had my pick of the shipment. I got 16 Barred Rock pullets, paid for them ($4.50 apiece, which is way more than we’ve paid the last couple of years), and brought them home. They settled right in:

The brooder box is in the old garage. I popped out there a couple of times yesterday to make sure the chicks were still doing well. This seems to be a lively, healthy bunch.

I can breathe a bit easier now that we have peeps. I am the queen of contingency plans, but I hate to implement the fallback strategy unless I absolutely have to.

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After I got the peeps settled, I ran up to sewing for a bit. Until the plant sale is over and all the plants are in the ground, my sewing socializing time is going to be limited. The weather yesterday was stellar, too, and I wanted to take advantage of it, so I didn’t stay long. I came home and attacked the herb garden. We would still like to extend the chicken run into this area. It is wild and overgrown but also full of lots of seedlings. The first thing I did was to dig up two very old, very large lavender plants. I think they’ve been in there for close to 20 years. One had gotten so big that it was blocking the entrance to the garden, but I couldn’t get to it until I dug out the other one. I did not try to save either plant. At that age, they get woody and misshapen. (It’s not like I don’t have plenty with which to replace them.) To my delight, I found a smaller lavender bush underneath them that still had the nametag next to it. The variety is Lavandula ‘Elizabeth’. I plan to dig it out and move it to a prime spot over in the big garden.

I dug out eight or ten lavender seedlings—a fraction of what is out there, because my lavenders are so promiscuous—some catmint, a true hyssop, a bunch of thyme, and some garden sorrel. I took all of the seedlings back over to the greenhouse and potted them up there for the sale. I still have lemon balm, oregano, and bee balm to dig up, but that will have to wait for the next nice day.

I am going to label all my lavender seedlings as “Janet’s Surprise Lavender.” I had so many different varieties in the herb garden at one time that it is genetic chaos out there. People won’t know what color the flowers are until the plant blooms. They could be white, pink, pale purple, or deep purple.

My goal for this plant sale is to double what it took in last year. I think we can do it. We’re offering some really cool and interesting plants that cannot be had locally except from us.

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I got an e-mail from the owner of the quilt store north of town yesterday. I am scheduled to teach a Serger 101 class there on Monday. She asked if I would contact a potential student to make sure she was prepared for the class as she had inherited her machine. I called and chatted with her for a bit. This student says her machine was working when she got it, so I encouraged her to sign up for the class. With her in the class, I will have five students.

The store owner also said that people are asking for more serger classes. Who knew that this was such an untapped market? She asked me to look over the calendar and pick a few open dates. I probably won’t schedule anything until June. The rest of April is a nightmare and May isn’t much better.