I've had this list compiling for weeks now. And yet, I never got an opportunity to actually tweak it so it was where I wanted it to be until a couple of days ago. Man, I'm busy!
It's been kind of hard here the last few days. Alvah's mood went South starting Monday, where it was just a gradual decline and then yesterday he woke up and was just NOT happy with anything all day long. I ended up giving him his Risperidone at 5:00 out of desperation to try and help calm him down as the self abuse was back. He's been on and off today on the fits. I called the psychologist's office as she was talking about putting him on a morning dose of Risperidone on top of the low dose he's on in the evening and asked for them to okay that addition, so I'm still waiting to hear back from them on that one. Hopefully we can get everything regulated and working well before school next week. Fingers crossed here.
The list for this month gets longer and longer the more days pass. I've got lots of projects to do in the sewing department and unfortunately I don't see some of them happening (like the daughter's undergarments) until school starts next week. Alvah has just been too much of a handful of late to do anything really labor intensive.
On top of the sewing, at some point we're going to have to process the chickens as cold weather is coming up very soon and that means no more eggs period. The two non-broody hens are actually laying again despite all of the feathers in the coop, so I'm thinking that the rooster (who is DEFINITELY thin in the feather department right now) is actually the one molting the hardest and the broody hen is, of course, plucking her feathers out, so I'm not sure if she's molting or not yet. The other two are starting to lose their feathers, I saw today, so I'm not sure how long I'll be getting eggs. I'm up to four over the last four days, so they still aren't laying dependably yet (considering that they are both three years old, I can't really say it's a surprise). I'm not sure if the processing is happening this month or next. I'm leaving that up to my husband as he's the one who is going to be the one doing the work (since one of us has to stay in and watch the son) and has the number of the friend who would have real world experience on processing birds and things and could help us get the job done. Depending on how things go we might be trying to quickly doing the deed while the kids are at school or getting a babysitter while we take care of it. We'll see how that goes. At least there are only four birds to worry about.
Humorous side story on the chickens. The broody hen has been REALLY determinedly broody this time around, but even after the other two started laying eggs again in their favorite nesting box, the broody hen refused to move from her spot that she was sitting on in the coop. I couldn't figure it out as even the one time that someone laid an egg near her she let it grow cold and sat in that one spot. I took her off of her spot one day and shooed her out to go and get food and water down her neck and noticed something under the straw in the nesting boxes, so I moved the straw, expecting to find an egg that had escaped my notice. Nope. Determined broody hen is determinedly sitting on a chunk of bread that had been thrown in for a treat at some point. I was baffled, but amused, I have to admit.
The weather was actually nice and sunny for like three days straight this week, which made the garden VERY happy for those few days, so I might actually see some real production from the garden this month yet! We'll have to wait and see, but I'm hopeful anyway.
Anyway, let's get to the long and varied list for this month, shall we?
Sewing Goals *probably worked on once school starts*:
- Make sleep pants for the son (turns out one of the side effects of Risperidone, which was seen immediately, was a want to wear clothes ALL the time, so I am in desperate need of pajamas for him as he hasn't wanted to wear pajamas to bed like ever)
- Make night gowns for the daughter (as she will get jealous if the son gets something cool sewed for him). Make pillow case nightgowns or dresses (depending how they turn out *laugh*).
- Finish up second roll of unpaper towels
- Embroider and sew apron for daughter for Christmas
- Work on embroidery on pillow cases for family back East for Christmas
- Try to finish first tote bag
- Make reusable feminine care pads (this is a project to use up some scraps and things while also ending up with a "just in case" product at the end)
- Work on new comforter/puff quilt for Alvah out of various scraps of cloth
- Work on flannel blanket for son for Christmas
- Make more handkerchiefs
- Work on mending
Organizing goals *to be done once school starts*:
- Get den cleaned up (it's a huge disorganized mess right now)
- Work on master bedroom closet
- Gut and reorganize pantry
- Detail clean car
- Detail clean children's rooms
General goals:
- Make cookies with daughter (this is to be done BEFORE school starts)
- Do final check list of school supplies
- Pull out back packs and start packing them with things like gym shoes so they aren't forgotten later on.
- Get lock installed on new-to-us mini freezer and park it in its new spot.
- Continue to harvest raspberries from bushes in yard and add them to freezer bag in freezer.
- Keep eye out for good sales on apples and other produce and process if it works out.
- Process what few peas there are in fridge, slice cabbage leaves into tiny pieces and make into freezer slaw, harvest and freeze fireweed blossoms, harvest more rose hips.
Garden goals:
- Continue to fertilize the garden at least once a week (weather permitting or not)
- Harvest from the garden often, especially the peas, and watch for mold or blight issues (due to all of the moisture we've gotten this year)
Molting only shuts down egg production for a short period of time - up their protein if you can during it which will help. Also, 3 years is not necessarily the end of their laying - I lost my oldest hen at 8 years last summer and she was still laying a couple times a week. I can't remember - are they Icelandic chickens? They are made to deal with Northern winters - a solar light might be worth looking into to keep them laying thru the winter and we run extension cords out to our coop for a small heated dog bowl which doesn't use much electricity - it's better than dealing with frozen water! Melissa V
ReplyDeleteErika, that's a long list, but if anyone can conquer it, you can! So, do your kids start school on the 14th or 21st? We start here on the 14th. I had professional development this week; I do have Friday off, however. I'm ready for school, but the summer just flew by!
ReplyDeleteIs your husband doing ok with sleeping in the daytime? I hope Alvah's situation improves! Good luck to both kids for a great school year!
They start on the 14th.
DeleteSo far Clark is doing okay sleeping during the day, thank goodness. He's even slept through some really horrific moods on Alvah's part. So yeah, so far so good :).