It was only a matter of time before he "man-up" the coop.

I nearly had it in the bag...coop was being ordered, plain and simple, no frills no thrills. but then he clicked on the "accessories" box and it was all over. yes, the beloved is "manning up" the coop. oh there are so many wonderful things to add to it! joy of joys! Linoleum flooring! air conditioning! big screen TV!!! The chickens need these things...they want these things, the wet bar is ESSENTIAL to their well being. Egg production will surely come to a screetching halt if they do not have the wired in stereo system...how will they get their funky chicken on? seriously! they will lay faster if we put an espresso machine in there! if he keeps this up he will be living out there and i'll keep chickens in the house!

It's Diva Chick Day tomorrow!

This is it! The Day has come at last when i shall sit
down and order my flock! I even found a magazine
called Chicken at the local Borders tonight! I shall
puruse it this evening while stuffing my face with the
last of the Muddy Buddies and a big glass of water, to balance out the fact i have eaten like crap all day today. Gavin is doing MUCH better, we seem to be on the right track, however the beloved is scared to put him to bed alone so i think i shall have a sleep over with Gavin in his room so that everyone feels better :) right now the boys are all upstairs watching Ironman on the Blue Ray player some nice person (me me that would me moi!!) got the beloved for his birthday the other day. he was most pleased. I have to admit, i don't see a difference in picture quality but the men of the house assure me there is and it's "blowing them away"

this weekend Baby Diva and I will be heading to Concord, NH for a dance competition, we are staying over at the luxurious Best Western with some of the other families. Tres Chic non? So no blogging until i get back, i have to knit BD a pair of dance leg warmers and i'm under strict orders to get it done!!












Cheep Cheep cheep cheep!

Muddy Buddies--gluten free crack!

I stress eat...ok i do, i admit it and right now I am imagining Richard Simmons in those stupid little shorts he wears jumping up and down outside my kitchen window yelling at me to "be strong" in that little squeaky voice of his...as i laugh in an evil way and continue to chow down...mwwuuuahahahahahaha!

It's been a rough morning here on the hill. Gavin (aka Hoobie or tribble boy) woke up lethargic and vomiting...not good signs when you are severly epileptic, no fever and the vomiting continues...we suspect he is seizing up a storm and i have been advised by his neuro team not to leave him unattended and feel free to use his Diastat to stop the seizures (like i needed to be told that!!!) waiting to find out if we are headed for an overnight "sleepover party" at the hospital...good times. so i'm calorie loading just in case because once i get to the hospital with him i'm not eating...the food is questionable and i really won't be in the mood anyway.

So here i sit, taking turns between staring at the phone and staring at Gavin (who is dozing on the couch) everytime he twitches my blood pressure goes up. poor kid, i feel so bad.

Coffee IV needed for today....

Another restless and sleepless night, not sure what is going on. I'm exhausted and ready for bed by 9 but once my head hits the pillow i'm wired. very annoying indeed as i seem to drift into sleep early hours of the morning only to have the feeling someone is staring at me, I open my eyes and i'm looking in to the big brown ones of Gavin "hi mom, you want to get up" gee Gav, not really. so then the dance of putting him back to bed starts. I learned this dance from watching Supernanny...yah know when the darling child keeps getting up and you keep putting them back to bed and VIOLA! soon enough they are sleeping soundly in their own bed...on the show it takes about 10 minutes, i can spend up to 4 hours trying to get Gav to stay in bed...obviously Supernanny has never dealt with a kid like mine. Anyway, up early and i have a large cup of the nectar of the gods sitting next to me. It's wacky wednesday here..the busiest day of our week, usually left over day because there is no time to really cook dinner. Yesterday was beloved's birthday and i made him a special dinner...veal (ewwwwww ewwwww grosssss!!!). I got a roast at the farmer's market, it is grain fed, no hormones, no antibiotics, free range, brushed daily and probably had a bed time story read to it each night before it ended up on his plate. well, he enjoyed it, i had salad.

Jeez Louise you would think getting some chicks would be easy!!! Ok so the continuing saga of owning chickens goes as follows. Took me and my Hoobie (Gavin) down to the local feed store to order our origianlly planned chicks...much excitment! Well, apparently there is a minimum due to the fact they do NOT want people to just buy chicks as a Easter toy for their kids (seriously??? well i guess it's possible) and i'm sorry my coop will just not hold 12 chicks..yeah, no. And to make matters worse i'm finding it near impossible to get the original chickens we wanted...but we did come across this beauty who is also part of that same family/breed of chickens...it's the Partridge Rock Chicken (beautiful plummage) and easier to find..so we are going with that one! I'll be ordering at the end of the week as i did find a place in CT that will let you order smaller amounts and they are close by so the little dears won't have long to travel. i guess if i could have found some fellow chicken raisers who were looking to replenish their flock we could have split a larger minimum but those i know who do are all set with their chickens so i'm on my own!

The Beloved mentioned pigs last night...i nearly fell off my chair. I'll be looking for the pod that hatched this person that looks like my husband today....not quite sure what has gotten into him at all.

We are family obsessed by chickens! The beloved started to get a little ahead of himself, putting the cart before the horse (or the egg before the chicken...or is it the chicken before the egg?) and had us on a full fledged farm with sheep and more chickens and whatnot. we had to reel him back in a little but he did manage to get online and discover that we are in deed zoned for agriculture still as we are living on what was formally the vast farmlands of North Attleboro back in the day, so no need for permits and all that paperwork stuff. As soon as he orders the kit i will start the process of ordering my chicks. I think after long debate and looking i am going to have to head down to Attleboro's Barn and see what they have to offer. I can order them online and its all good except you have to order a lot of chicks...and really i think we can just handle 4 or 5 to start with. i don't want to get way in over our heads. My cousin of course reminded me of the "chicken tractor" we saw at the Common Grounds Fair back a few years ago and so beloved is all excited about that. Essentially it's a mini coop that you move around the yard, there is no bottom to it so the chickens are free to eat the grubs living in the grass and ticks...and of course fertalize as they go. how cool is that? it's no more than some PVC pipes and chicken wire, very lightweight. of course we will only let them in it when we are outside just in case the thing blows over or a red tailed hawk thinks we have left him a happy meal!

Speaking of, and please brace yourself for this, the kids have named the chickens (that we don't have yet mind you) and they are as follows: Emily is calling hers Nuggets, Brendan is calling his Noodle, Cody is calling his Parmagina and I decided on Patty. Now put the word chicken before those and just revel in the warped minds of me and my children. it's awful i know...but ever so fitting.

Keep checking back for more chicky updates! pictured above is the Plymouth Rock chicken..the breed we hope to get!

I did it!!! I convinced the beloved that chickens are a good idea! so starting soon we will begin the construction of a coop..he is currently online looking at coop kits rather than gathering the plans and materials himself because cost wise the kit just makes more sense! I cannot wait, i'm thinking small...just 3 or 4 of the little guys, they have to live in the house for a while until the weather warms up and they get bigger...not even sure if i will actually get to order them this season, it may have to wait until next Spring....depending on how quickly we can construct and all! i have all kinds of sites bookmarked and have been reading and picking the brains of some of my friends who have chickens....all of them have nothing bad to say at all! the eggs are delish and the poop makes good fertalizer for the lawn! Cody is super excited, Emily not so much. I think the boys will be good with helping, so wish me luck as i try to convince beloved that sooner is much better than later :)

Putting my scouts to work! yah mule yah! :)

today i took 4 boys (and one teenager...brother of one of my boys) to the World War One Memorial Park here in town, this park is truley a gem, the grounds are beautiful, it has a fantastic playground, gorgeous gardens and the zoo is one of a kind! You could spend the entire day there having a picnic, playing on the playground and exploring the zoo...bring some apples and carrots cut up and feed the animal friends while you are there, trust me they will appreciate it!

Well, our adventure at the park was at the zoo only today (since it's February and a bit chilly to be playing on the swings!) my scouts all arrived sharply at 8:30 am to get the zoo up and ready for the day to begin. We started out with feeding and cleaning out the animal pens...pygmy goats, too many to name, Vito the Donkey..who was much spoiled by my boys with some pampering and major brushing, Gunther the very pot bellied pig...who despite his rather grumpy appearance is rather sweet in a tusky sort of way, llamas who were very happy to see us and of course the various sheep, chickens and Ruby the pony. the boys got right into it and i never heard a complaint or fuss from any of them...matter of fact they were fighting over who got to clean up what poop! Our zookeepers were wonderful with the boys and really let them do most of the work...which was awesome! We learned a lot about the animals and how to take care of them...and had fun all at the same time...they boys asked if we could go back again, i'm thinking that is a big old YES!!! Thanks to all our new friends at the zoo and to Andy Z for arranging our visit...i guess this means we are even for all the years i helped you in English class??? HA!!! Cody is still trying to figure out in his head that his Mom actually was young enough to be in school...minus the dinosaurs :)

Snow...BALLS!

It's yucky wet nasty snow...too wet to make a decent snowman...however, that did not stop Gavin (you may remember him as tribble boy from the previous blog) to start begging to go outside and frolick in the snow....at 7 am. i held him off until 9:30 and we bundled up and ventured out. there was not much snow to use, but we managed to make a small and pissed off looking snowman. Now what to do with the rest of our day.

Cody had his first ever sleep over at a friend's house last night and successfully made it through! he is currently passed out on the couch as the boys didn't really sleep, big surprise! We are back to the orthodontist later today to get molds made of the pre-teen's mouth because TA DA he needs braces!!! Oh the joys!!! The ride home yesterday after he was told was very quiet except for him informing me that his teeth were fine (they are most definatly not) and that our orthodontist (graduate of Harvard dental school mind you) was wrong. He seems to have settled on the fact he is getting them even if his mother has to sit on him during the process. I spent the rest of the night threatening his teenage sister (who has already been there done that with braces) that if she tells him anything negative about it i would sell her to the gypsies...oh yeah, gypsies....they don't have cell phones or ipods...i checked....and i'll find them, mark my words i will find them. She kind of rolled her eyes at me and agreed, for now.

So here i sit, i wonder if anyone else even reads this junk that i write, but it is mighty fine therapy!

Who are These Children and Why do they Keep Calling me MOM???

Captain's Log: Day One. This morning 4 grumpy and seemingly starving children entered my kitchen, they spoke only in grunts and seemed to want to communicate with me...but the language barrier was to great. The male species smelled a little funky and the female looked as if she could kill anyone that entered her "personal space". the littlest one (I shall call him Tribble Boy) was by far the friendliest and i rewarded him with some Cheerios.

So here it is day one of school vacation and already i am dreading the entire week. I am hoping and praying the weather holds out so i can at least throw them outside to air out if the fighting gets too bad. Baby Diva is going to have her friend over so the girls will be fine but the boys have begun getting snippy with each other. Sadly, 12 yr old boys just don't have "playdates" anymore...not sure what exactly they do do. My guess is wait for the younger brothers to have friends over then run rough shot over the littler boys and boss them around....which then leads to screaming, spitting, clawing and mom intervention. There is not enough coffee in the house for me to deal with that today so looks like I'll be making a Dunkin' run later. Pictured is the yummy yarn i got downtown the other day. It started out as a cowl all cabled and lovely but i soon realized that project was a little ambitious for my limited skills...so now it's becoming a pair of cabled gloves that i must say are coming out pretty good. of course i won't be able to work on them until the youngest (tribble boy) is asleep...he is reving up his engines for the day and i'll need to wear my running shoes to keep up with him!!!

Chocolate.....food of the gods

So today was the annual chocolate lover's stroll in our beautiful downtown, 300 of North's finest showed up to stroll down the streets and collect their bounty. it was a lovely day, sun was out wind wasn't blowing too hard. we paid our $6.00 which went towards the downtown association (who does a marvelous job with upkeep and all kinds of fun kid events during the year...money well spent i think) got our official candy bag (yes it's a little creepy that the funeral home in town sponsored the stroll this year) and off we went in search of the giant pink hearts in the windows of the stores participating. we got chocolate cars from the driving school, chocolate dragons from the chinese food resturant, and pink chocolate boxing gloves from the gym!
we stopped into the library for some hot chocolate then off to the yarn shop! yes granted they were not giving out chocolate and of course they were quick to let me know, of course i was so busy drooling over all the yarn i barely noticed until finally one lady had to actually poke me in the arm to get my attention....as soon as she found out of course it was all about the yarn..spent a nice long time getting a tour of the store and some free patterns! all in all a marvelous day..and i have a bag of chocolate to eat tonight....what could be better?

Happy Valentine's Weekend! So i went shopping today for non Valentine related things and was just about run over by the senior crowd as they frantically grabbed boxes of chocolate off the shelves...wow...and i had to laugh at the guys who were picking out the most ugly stuffed animals (stuffed advark? really?) known to man and just hoped their girlfriends had good senses of humor. The kiddos are all getting a little something and i'll probably make them a good hearty breakfast but really i don't buy into the whole thing. I'm a poop i know. HOWEVER, i will not argue with chocolate! mmmmmm now everday should be a chocolate holiday! tomorrow baby diva and i will be heading downtown to the 13th annual Chocolate Lover's Stroll in hopes of getting some good stuff. Its a nice way to drum up some business for the locals and there is chocolate involved...what could be better. Weather looks good as well, yup it's still winter but at least our faces won't be ripped off by icey gusts of wind and the sun is going to be out!

This is Pokey the wonder pony...Gavin's ride...he is afraid of orange traffic cones and the sound of splashing water. why can't any animal we come in contact with be normal? I'm beginning to think it's us. Pokey also likes to shove adults into the side of the barn and has a tendency to nip....but not Gavin, he wuvs his boy so much...sometimes i think they are well matched due to their impish behavior :)

This is Montana...the 1,000 lb beast my son Cody rides, he is a sweet boy who has a passion for candy canes....which i love to give him because he will then have minty breath when he bestows the juicy horse kisses (ewww i know) HOWEVER, tonight while giving him his snack I didn't realize my 8 year old had moved next to me....and had Montana standing on his foot. yup, he didn't make a peep (he is autistic and has an insane pain tolerance) but get this..nothing broken, tiny bruise and he was jumping around the barn soon after.....weird. We still love Montana but now realize he is a boob who doesn't look where he is walking.

It's a Snow Day!

Whooo Hoooo! I love when the school system decides the night before a storm if there will be school. Now i don't have to deal with the unpleasantness of a teen and pre teen getting up and showered and dressed to come grumbily downstairs to be told "oh there's no school" this way they can just sleep in. Of course the snow has not actually started yet, it's supposed to come down hard and heavy starting mid morning. Today is horse riding day and sadly i think i'm going to have to cancel since last time we had snow i almost got stuck going up the driveway/hill of where the stable is, i had to spread some manure to get traction...not fun. However, I'm thinking if the coffee rush kicks in this morning i could call and see if we can go over before the snow starts....hmmm, too much thinking this early in the morning. i'm going back to bed with the cats and i'll think more on this later....much later :)

This is our other cat Teddy B. He is the complete opposite of Hyacinth, he is loving to the point of being obnoxious and will drool all over you when petted. He doesn't bend his legs when he runs so he kind of looks like a gazelle leaping through the Savannah....he also falls off things quite often yet loves sleeping on his window perch. when you pick him up he goes completely limp like a wet rag and loves nothing more than being hauled around the house like this. Hyacinth hates his ass.

My Cat is in a Food Coma

This is Hyacinth, she is a rather lazy Maine Coon Cat....she just didn't have the energy to make it all the way to her food bowl this morning, she actually just plunked down and kind of waited for one of us to shuffle it over to her. If she were a loving pleasant cat it would be easier to deal with..however, she isn't. Living truely up to her name (Hyacinth Bucket (pronouned Bouquet) she is a brat, very snobby, kind of stares at you with complete disdain and if i could serve her food in her hand painted china with the perriwinkle flowers she might allow me to pet her.

This is what I do instead of watching football....ooohhh aaaaahhhh now for some snackies to replenish my energy for more knitting!

Super bowl smuchmuperbowl!

I detest football. I've never preteneded to like it, it bores me to tears. I also get annoyed when grown men scream at the TV set during a game....of any kind really. it's annoying to have to remind them that the little people on the field CANNOT in fact hear them. So i decided to just have my own Super Knitting Bowl. Now with the SKB comes of course all the lovely munchies one would have durning a football game....'cause you have to keep your energy up. You don't have to wear anything special...heck pajamas will do just nicely and of no particular team color either...the brighter the better!

There is left over cake from the pre teens grandparent birthday celebration yesterday (aka the 3 hours of hell i spent with my mother in law) and it mocks me from the counter. Yup, it's a gluten overload and it looks yummy. So i'll be heading over the farmer's market later this morning to see if my cake guy is there. he sells GF cake by the slice ($2.00 a slice..very worth it) and it's divine. I am hoping he has some coconut cake left when i get there but the lemon is very good too. if all else fails he always has some chocoalte chip muffins...again...yummy! they have a band playing this week Cactus Attack...and indie folk band who are excellent!

time for another coff a cuppy!

I hab a stubby nobe!

OOOOOOHHHHHHHHH my sinus' hate me! wow! Talk about being really attractive, i can't breathe through my nose so my mouth is all dry and my lips are chapped and my nose is red and sore from non-productive blowing and my eyes are watering and of course when i least expect it a flood of snot comes pouring out (dontcha wish your girlfriend was hot like me) no medication seems to relieve the pain so i'm burning essential oils (rosemary, tea tree, lavender, and eucalyptus) to try to clear it out. i can't even taste my coffee and that is about the worst thing ever!!!

i was informed this morning we have "no food" in the house. now, we have food...if you open the pantry there is actually food in there, it's just you have to be a little creative about it and the other inhabitants of chez hoppin hill seem to be having difficulty with that concept. i do buy food, i buy it quite often it's just that the human hoover boys i live with suck down all the stuff they like best within 2 days and then we are left with "no food" at least my daughter attempts to look outisde the food box but even she is complaining so it looks like i'll be grocery shopping at some point today....i'm hoping the girl scouts will NOT have a table set up out front selling their calorie packed, gluten filled cookies of doom, i am weak and delerious from medication...i might just buy them out.

The Birthday Boy and His Domo......looking for trouble.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRENDAN! i offically have a pre teen in the house once again! he was up early this morning all a flutter about opening presents...which he has to wait until later until he does (mwwwwahahahahhahahahaha) but it's his choice for dinner tonight and he has decided upon Applebees (gag).

today is also the day my son cody starts riding lessons with his brother Gavin. Gavin has been riding for nearly a year and cody has desperatly wanted to join him....i caved in big time when he flashed those big green eyes up at me and offered up his piggy bank money to help pay for it. oh he know how to work the system let me tell you! it was a light dusting of snow this morning, i'm chugging down the coffee and getting the kids up and going for school. we also have teacher conferences and dance class today....it's going to be a multi cup of coffee kind of day for sure!

where would i be without......

.........Isn't that such an open question? one that everyone should ask themselves and fill in the blank accordingly. I often wonder if something in my life was suddenly not there, what would become of me. Of course i'm not talking the "what if there were less of my thighs" because i would certainly celebrate that let me tell you, but bigger things. Where would i be without my friends? family? coffee? I have been taking inventory lately of all the things that make my life super duper, yes coffee is high on the list...but also the support system i have...those who make me laugh, those who help my son, those who tell me i'm right or wrong. I love those who are in your face honest and don't let me wallow in my own self pity and i love those who comfort me when i can't shake the blues, i love those who teach me something new and those who let me teach them. I love those who do not judge my choices in life, they let them play out knowing that somehow it will all be ok. I am looking for the simpler things in life, they don't get bought at Target or the Super Wal-mart (although that place has freakin' everything....i could get lost in there for days) I long for warm weather and being outdoors....i miss my painted toes which are all covered up by wooly socks all the time it seems. I cannot wait for the first of my bulbs to start poking their heads up out of the ground.

The Coffee Cozy......behold it's splendor!

Living la Vida Loco minus the gluten

Just to clarify...i'm not a trend setter/follower...i'm not jumping on the old "i'll cure the world with what i eat" I just got sick of feeling sick ALL THE TIME! so it took years for me to finally take care of myself...hell, with 4 kids i'm lucky i have time to brush my teeth. but yes, low and behold i cannot process wheat in my picky little intestines. Thinking back this has probably been building up over the years but who thinks of it? I was told it was my thyroid, yet even though my numbers kept coming back within "normal range" i still had issues, oh then it was IBS...ewww, so bump up the fiber (and of course wheat...whole grains...not really helping) maybe i'm lactose intolerant (goodbye ice cream waaaaaahhh).

It's been 15 weeks since i kicked gluten/wheat to the curb...i've never felt better. sure it takes a lot of label reading and some recipe tweaking but nobody in my house has complained much about the slight difference in taste in some foods (although they are not thrilled with the consistancy of the rice pasta...but it costs so much i have nooooo problem with making them the regular kind and just the "special" pasta for me...makes me feel like a diva anyway).

There seems to be a new theory that if you eat gluten free you are going to loose all kinds of weight. I did loose some, i go back and forth from 12-15 lbs gone but in all seriousness this is not a lo cal diet...matter of fact sometimes it can be a higher cal diet depending on how much playing with a recipe you do. I did it because i needed to feel better...and oh yeah, I can eat ice cream again, my digestive system is my BFF, my skin is clear, no more dark circles under my eyes, no headaches, i sleep better, more energy....seems like a no brainer.