Music night

Friday night turned into an impromptu music night, filled with drums and guitar.

Asher mastered the art of sitting independently (for two nano seconds).

9 days new

Our family with Mr. Asher, 9 days new.

Thanks so much to Tami for capturing our family so well!

6/52

I better post this before we reach week 7.  We'll call this - Week 6, chicken addition.  Clearly Asher is freaked out by having a chicken on his shoulder.  

like sister like brother

Hey, tummy time.  I like this. 

I can see everything!

I am really good at this.

Oh no.

Tessa's face plant here.  Do all kids do this?

Hello Girls

We had been looking on craigslist for a used chicken coop for several weeks when Scott found this one for sale just 3 miles down the road from us.  I didn't like it.  But he convinced me to set up a time to take a look.  "It has good bones" was the only nice thing I could say about it.  And so we bought it.  I wish I had a picture of it in the back of my Dad (little) truck.  Thank goodness it was close by!  After we got the sun shade fabric off, it did look a little bit better.

Then we ripped it apart.  We replaced all the walls, the roof and added a real metal roof as well.  It was looking good, but the blue paint made it look great!

We replaced the chicken wire and locked Tessa in for a night (or 2 minutes) and with the help of 3 other guys, got it moved into the back of the property (we really could have used 8 - the coop was heavy!)

Early on Sunday Scott returned with the girls!  All 10 of them!  We won't be keeping all of them.  But the person selling them would only sell them together, and I really liked the breed of hens he had, so we will pick 4 or 5 that we like and sell the rest.

And Tessa's dream came true when she got to hold her first chicken!  We clipped their wings and introduced them to their new home.

So meet our chickens.  The black chicken is an Australorp.  The light brown is an Americana.  The dark brown/reddish hen is a Rhode Island Red.  And the white chicken... well we have no idea what that one is.

And this girl is my favorite looking hen, but seems to be the most timid :(  But she is staying.  She has been named Henrietta and she is a Barred Rock.  Tessa is petting another Americana.

What will the others be named?  Hattie, Dorcas, Gladys and maybe Geraldine.  

(for those that don't get the names, they are names of my Grandma's - some great and some great-great)

And we were surprised Monday morning with an egg!  It was greenish is color.  One of the Americana hens laid it.  They are called easter eggers because they lay green, blue and even pink eggs!

So we are now orange and chicken farmers.  Let us know if you would like some fresh hormone and antibiotic free eggs!

And it's done!

Do you remember the part in the movie The Money Pit where Tom Hanks and Shelley Long get used to living with their construction workers?  Well, that has been us, for the past 2 months.  What was supposed to be a 1 week job turned into a month + for one worker (solely because of him) and the new crew we hired to finish the rest of the job was here for another week + because we kept adding little things on (solely because of him again because he kept bringing us beautiful products to add to our already laid out plans.  Sneaky, yes, but did we love it?  YES!)

What did we do exactly?  Added a front and back wall to the house (the side walls were already there since our neighbors put theirs up long ago.  We also added a retention wall and steps along the back of the house (because of our flood irrigation, our house is built on a large pad, and the back of the pad just sloped into the rest of the back yard).  Added paver walkways and finally added a fireplace to the back patio as well.

So here we begin, on June 6th.  Trenching was done and the next day footers were laid.

We had very slow progress like I said, but eventually we had walls going in on the front east and west side of the house, as well as bricks laid for the retention wall.

On July 12th, our first contractor was finally done with the work we had paid him for.  (My Dad decided to man the tractor so he would not have an excuse for not getting everything done that day).  He was surprised when we went with someone else to finish everything (seriously, he was surprised!)  Oh yeah, and you may recall that we had a baby on the 9th.  Just what everyone want is construction on their house happening when you bring your newborn home (and have to nurse 20 out of the 24 hours of the day in solitude in your room because all the workers can still see into your house because you haven't gotten around to adding blinds in the back).

Thank goodness he was done when he was and the tractor work was done by my Dad because we had a colossal rain storm that weekend, and the water ran away from the house.  Good job Dad!

Then enters the dream team!  They stuccoed the walls, laid a walkway from the front drive to the existing patio in the back, built the stairs, finished the retention wall (adding pavers to the top) and built the stairs in a matter of a few days.  Oh yeah, and the fireplace.  I gave them a picture, and they went to work.

Then came the add-ons.   We were planning to stucco the fireplace, until Margarito brought in the cultured stone.  We were planning on a concrete bench, until he brought in the travertine.  Obviously more work for him the better, but he really knew what he was doing because it looks beautiful!

The painter finished up his work on August 10th.  So a full 2 months of workers at the house.  But it is worth it now.  And with all the walls and gates up, we were able to start on another project - the blue chicken coop!  More details tomorrow about our newest additions.

Asher EVERETT

Meet Claude Everett Smoot

This is my grandfather.  I remember back in 2008 when I called him to tell him I was pregnant with my first child.  I remember everything about that conversation.  He was very happy for Scott and I.  And we joked that we should name the baby Claude.  He then added that if it was a girl, we could name it Claudia.  I informed him that Claudia was actually a popular hispanic name here, and he laughed, saying he was born in the wrong country!

In December 2008, my mother got the call that she needed to come home to Kansas and say goodbye.  She went back with a message for him - if the baby is a boy, his middle name will be the same as his, Everett.

Well, it wasn't a boy obviously as Tessa Harper was born in May.  But fast forward 3 years and Asher Everett was born.  I think his name is perfect.

I think he thinks so, too.  (I know he is happy we didn't go with Claude, too!)

Us in 2005/Grandpa Claude with his 4 (!) daughters

And there is another pretty cool kid with the name Everett (my friends Annie and Adam's son - which was also a family name).