Shake a Tail Feather

The weather is getting warmer, which means much more outside time for the minions and I.  To ramp up for our summer fun DH and I have been busy. 

See our rope swing?  It is attached to a branch about 30 feet in the air. 

Luckily we could borrow a truck because we feared we could have made a video of stupid redneck tricks with our first attempt with a tractor and extension ladder. 

Can you tell it is loved by everyone? 

We were also fortunate enough to be the recipients of a play fort from one of DH coworkers, the only condition?  Come and get it. 

DH and I worked on getting it placed in the just the right spot most of the day Saturday.

We married it to our original play fort with the two slides.  We used the tunnel which at one time attached to a climbing wall/ladder from the newly acquired play structure.  We will soon have 3 slides, 3 big swings, a baby swing, trapeze, climbing wall, teeter totter, and a tandem swing.  That does not include the super cool rope swing! 

Also the new little girls needed to move to their new home.

We got this little playhouse for free, it was getting dumped in the garbage pit at DH work.  We cleaned it out, scrubbed it out, ran some electric and put bedding down.  Frankly it was time, the little ladies were getting smelly. It is amazing how quickly they went from this.

To this.

See those feathers, even tail feathers.

Sunday morning I went in to check on them, and we seem to have become a wasp/yellow jacket house overnight.  Poor little things were all crowded into 1 foot square area staying away from the monsters.  We scooped them back out and back into the farmhouse they went.  DH sprayed all the cracks and crevices to get rid of the buzzy monsters.  We will have to remove all the bedding and scrub down the insides to get all the poison out of the building again. 

The few moments I get I weed flower beds a bit.  We haven't had a chance to plant our garden yet, but my porch plants are looking good.

I bought 2 tomatoes.  One grape tomato and one slicing tomato.  The grape tomato plant is on the porch, and look I have blossoms!  OK the tomato plant has blossoms.

I put a couple of cabbage seeds in a whiskey barrel and I have some sprouts, and a lot of weeds coming up too.  I also have a couple of kinds of lettuce, and romaine coming up in another planter near the porch. 

I will be able to make some more chive blossom vinegar.  Hope I can get at least a quart.

I will have a lot of strawberries, the plants were loaded with blossoms, and even the wild strawberries in the field are loaded.  DH was forbidden from mowing the field at least that area.  I get 1 acre which is my bird/bee/butterfly sanctuary/habitat. 

We have also been wrangling these little ones.  We try to keep them from attempting to cross our road to the "other pond", but the ducks and geese like to go between the ponds, which results in squished fowl and I am not a fan of cleaning them up. 

I have a couple of hours free this morning before Finn will want to venture outside so I better shake a tail feather so I can get a little sewing done.