I believe that it's a mystery!

Yes, I admit it, we're crazy. This spring we (my family) got over 100. Yes, read it again, almost 150 chickens for meat. Imagine me coming home from work (the horse ranch and day camps) and all that cute little peeping sounds coming from a warm corner in the garage. I was just a little overwhelmed... ;) Well, that was early summer, and now they (the chicks) are no longer chicks. =( and resemble small chickens. I believe that they are at least single serving size by now. Anywho... Over the last couple of days we have lost about 9 or more chickens to some mysterious something! The doomed select (That's what I'll call it for now until we figure more out) are very lethargic, sleepy, no appetite, but they drink normally, they keep their feather fluffed as if they are cold, and don't run around like the healthy ones. Yesterday morning we lost 4 in the morning and 3 more later that day. On the previous days we had lost about 2-3... The only thing that we could come up was Avian TB and your chickens are either immune to it, or not... and there's practically nothing to be done about it. Apparently, it can take months even years before your poor little chicken succombs to the disease after you start to see symtoms, and either your chicken is immune to it or it isn't. Judging from the death count - we've only lost the Rhode Island roosters that we got. (We got 2 different kinds of chickens for meat the RIR and Red Broilers). The disease is also to infect your flock if they are stressed in any sort of way. We have just come out of a 100 degree spell, which stressed them quite a bit!

Anyway, that is my post for the day. I might go out and help my brother fill in the bunker that he relinquished for the cause of burying the dead birds. (Or I might not...)

Time Does Fly...

It feels like yesturday I was looking at the calender thinking how long and wonderful summer was going to be. Let's just say I blinked before I could catch myself. I thought that I would have all the time in the world to get some reading done, sewing projects completed, craft room organized again (honestly, you can never organize things enough!), complete all the requirements on my NARHA certification... yeah, the workshop/training session is only a couple weeks away, and I don't even really know where to begin... I've read the horsemanship manual through level 3, but Level 4 is huge... I need to become a member, get 25 hours of teaching in (I probably won't even be able to get 5...), and so much more! What happened to my summer?! Oh, yeah... I've been camp counselor, gardening, traveling, quilting, etc... The camp counselor thing has taken up 4 weeks so far and I have another to go... But I wouldn't trade the time spent for anything else.

I've thoroughly enjoyed every moment of the camp counselor thing (and I have my share of stories, believe me! =D) Like in the camp from last week, one of the boys was commenting on how he's at a highschool reading level. So, being homeschooled, I had to ask him what he's read that places him in that level. He named some books off but all of them were contemorary/modern novels that I wouldn't really count as anything worth reading (like The Davinci Code, which was one of the books that he named off). I asked if he had read any Homer, Dickens, Austen, Emmerson, Steinbeck etc. (I've read these authors and more in a lit class that I took from an amazing teacher. Go read some classics and original works! You'll be amazed at some of the treasures that you can find in them!) The little boy said that he hadn't read any of those (My bad! He's in the public school system. Not to really dis on the public schools, but you lower your standards when it comes to whatever comes out of those prison cells)... So I said that he wasn't really in the "highschool level" (Publis schools... what legacy is America leaving her children? Not a good one). We started mildly arguing about it (leave it to me to make anything an arguement... bad habit...) and he finally said "Okay, I'll be the big person here and not argue with you." Ouch. He's going to be entering middle school very soon. Let's just say that I was dying from laughter from that!

We're getting all growed up...

Wow... lots of milestones this year for many of my friends and me... Graduation, getting engaged/married, etc. But none of it has really hit me until this morning when I was sitting in the pew listening to a friend (who I've grown up my whole life!) who was preaching. My aunt was sitting next to me and she was welling up. I almost did too. We've all come so far, yet it feels like yesterday I was making mud pies in the back yard with him. *sniff, sniff* This is when you start to ask yourself: Do I really want to grow up and deal with all the nasty things in the world of adults? With being an adult you have more responibilities yet more freedom. More severe trials yet more satifaction from reaching your goal. I guess we all have to step up to the plate and take a swing at things eventually. You might not hit it the first time around, but you will have more chances someday.

Catching an even greater glimpse of God's creation!

*Sigh...* I just had one of the most amazing weeks ever! Some friends invited me to join them and another family on a trip to the Wallowas in Eastern Oregon! I created an album of most of the pictures I got on Facebook and there's so many I couldn't muster the patience to upload only a few select ones onto here, so here's a link! http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=30339&id=1127710451&l=5e1bc00e92

We brought some horses with us and went trailriding almost every day for a week! (the only day we didn't ride was when we went on a hike) The best trail riding spot (in my opinion) is the hunting reserve (but we didn't see any animals. Isn't that coincidental?). The worst was the trail (or should I say trial?) to Aneroid Lake. One of the horses decided that she didn't want to get her feet wet in a creek that went down the trail, so she jumped up onto a rocky burm that was on the side that dropped into a river/ravine. The rider jumped ship only to land in the rocky terrain on the ground and almost get stepped on as the horse turned around back into the creek. We only made about 2 miles up a 6 mile trail. The whole trail was narrow, two-way, dusty beyond breathing (think Oregon Trail on this one, k?), treacherously rocky, and the horses were beginning to get extremely sore legs and feet. Let's just say we were done with horses for the rest of the day when we got back to the cabin.

Another memorable highlight of the trip was conquering that same trail on foot. It's 12 miles round trip and the first two miles are very steep, and jagged rocky. I ditched the walking stick very early on... ;) Once you got past the first 2 miles then you walked across alpine meadows. *Sigh* It was well worth the excruciating pain. You come around a corner in the meadow, and there it is! Anaroid Lake! You walk quickly down to the dock and kick off your sweaty shoes and socks and stick your feet in the water. I must say, I was in absolute bliss. Then my stomach started complaining at me. I hadn't eaten breakfast since we had gotten up at 6 to get on the trail early. Out come the home dried strawberries and bananas! The nice thing about them is that they're light enough to pack up the trail and offer enough sustanance to get you back down the mountian!

The rest of the week was spent boating, fishing (I never did do that though ;D), more trail riding, shopping, socializing, watching the thunder showers etc. I will definately go back. <3