Into Exhaustion

I know it does not look like much but it is a Treasure to me. I wanted an outdoor area for some of my chickens and a friend donated all of his odds and ends boards and chain link fencing and this is what we came up with . It is not pretty but it is Stout  and Solid .  It took a good three weeks to pull together and I really got stumped along the way trying to figure out how to work things around the main frame that he and his grandson put up. It has all of these braces that make it so solid but also a real puzzle for me to figure out how to outsmart the raccoons finding cracks. By the time it was finished I hurt my shoulder and back and my doc said I would have to learn to pick my battles??? There is no choice -just things that need to be accomplished as I am not getting any younger or stronger and have to do it while I have the ability and the eyesight.

The pigeons enjoy their new digs as they now have room to spread their wings and to lay in the sun if they so choose.

They have plenty of perches to roost on now and are not crowded.

Then today I finished my second space for some of them. It has an enclose yard  that they love. I put PVC pipe overhead and stretched netting overtop of it so they could not fly out and HOPEFULLY the Hawks cannot fly in???? I had to rebuild the entire frame as it had all rotten away . Ssoooo OF COURSE my shoulder is screaming at me.

This is a few of the youngsters sight-seeing and they liked what they saw. They played and chased bugs all evening long and did not want to go in their house and go to bed. I had to wait till dark and chase each one down and place them in their house so I could Lock the door to make them safe.  Maybe after they find their food in there in the morning they will know where to go tomorrow night?

It might not look like much but I am very proud of have pulled it off. It looks kinda like a bench but it is a small nest box, made out of every thing I had scavenged from kindling Crystal brought in during last winter . Next I will fill it full of hay for the cold weather and add the little Old English chickens in this area. Before the cold winds blow I have some heavy duty plastic I will hang to help protect them. Now they will have lots of light . They will enjoy that .

I had ran in the house and did a load of laundry and fixed some cornbread so that will be my breakfast, lunch and supper and I am ready for it. Almost too tired to eat? My shoulder is complaining but I am doing the exercises that the therapist showed me and that really helps a lot. If I could just let it take a break it would heal for sure.

I did hurt it again last night yanking on my tiller. I had just got the spring back for it and tried to start it. I pulled furiously( or at least as furious as a 66 year old grandmother can yank???)  It would start and run a few licks and then die??? I begged and pleaded and then had to quit as my shoulder just quit responding at all - kinda like the motor did? I HATE to have quit in my vocabulary , but this time I was just whipped , so I have not got my winter kale planted at all and it is almost too late, and it just breaks my heart - as I need it for my eyes????

After being run out of bed before daylight this morning by something jumping on Callie right under my window, I am good and tired and aching all over. What a wonderful day and a lot of work accomplished. I am very grateful.