sigh. autumn has officially arrived. the days are getting shorter and nights are getting cooler so time has come to prepare the garden for winter and harvest all that remains before the first frost.
thankfully, we had quite the crop of green beens to harvest – just the right amount to make a batch of dilly beans!
if you have a favorite dilly bean recipe, please share!
it’s hard to believe but it’s been about 16 weeks since Odin’s Adventures with Backyard Chickens began which means they coul start laying in the next couple of weeks ( depending on the breed, hens can start laying at 20-24 weeks, although some have been known to start at 16 weeks ) which means i have to build some “nesting boxes” to attach to the coop to give them a dry, clean spot to lay their eggs.
we designed the coop with external nesting boxes in mind so we could simply lift a lid and grab the eggs without having to enter the coop. but right as i was going to start building the boxes, someone within external nesting boxes told me they have problems with frozen eggs in the winter. it seems that it doesn’t take long freezing air circulating around uninsulated boxes to turn them into eggsicles!
d’oh!
after a quick search i found a design for a nesting boxes for a “chicken mcmansion” that included a few inches of insulation on the walls and lid and decided to follow his lead by framing out the plywood sides with 2x2s and fitting in some 1″ foam insulation.
the general rule of thumb is about 1 box for every 3 or 4 birds which means 3 boxes should be plenty for our flock of 8 birds. the boxes about 12″x12″ which is a fairly standard size for backyard birds.
here’s a close-up of the corner after the external siding was nailed over the insulation and 2×2 frames. all things considered, everything came together nicely, although i would later discover that the “lip” created by the 2×2 would create a bit of challenge on making a snug fitting lid, all the moreso because my jigsaw is broken.
after building the nesting boxes, i had to remove the siding from the coopand cut out a portion of a 2×4 stud to make space for the box to be inserted flush with the wall. but how to removed the nails that held in the stud?
any day i get to use my dremel cutting tool is a good day 🙂
after some huffing and puffing, i got the nesting boxes secured to the side of the coop. the fit was almost a little too snug but nothing a little cursing and banging with a hammer couldn’t fix 🙂
and, yes, i still need to put some shingles on the roof which is why the coop is covered with a tarp. so much to do and so little time.
here’s the nesting box and coop after cutting out a hole in the siding and nailing it up, which was a measure thrice and cut once job. it was a little tricky to cut the siding and not leave more than an 1/8th inch gap around the box but it all came together nicely!
well, all except for the one flaw that you can see if you look closely. nothing a little trim can’t fix 🙂
and finally odin gets a chance to test swinging open the lid and reaching into the box to see if he could reach the bottom of the boxes to grab the eggs.
he could, which is A Good Thing since he’ll be running out at 6 in the morning in the winter every day to do just that!
about 6 weeks after bringing The Girls Home we already began to suspect that one of our ameraucana hens was, in fact, a rooster as it was developing a comb and plucking feathers off hens necks. but it’s not unusual for a hen to develop rooster characteristics in a flock without male so we held out hope that She was not a He since neighbors might not be too keen on waking up to a cock-a-doodle-doo! at the crack of dawn.
about a month later “She” started attempting to crow but it was a mangled, pitiful attempt at a cock-a-doodle-doo! but we still held out hope that She was not a He since it’s not entirely unusual for a dominant hen to try to get her crow on.
at that point whether She was a He was a bit of an academic point in terms of of annoying neighbors but we still thought perhaps she was just testing her vocal chords and would eventually chill out.
but alas, two weeks later, The Dude Who Looked Like a Lady started unmistakably announcing the appearand of the morning sun with a full-blown-the-sun-is-rising-and-i-want-the-to-let-the-world-know-COCK-A-DOODLE-DOOOOOOOO!
so, with a touch of sadness, in the interest of maintaining good neighborly relations, we arranged to have him sent to a caring home in the country.
in washington county blueberries are a big deal considering the fact that, at least according to the machias chamber of commerce 85% of the world’s supply of wild blueberries come from the county. so, it’s probably no surprise that the annual wild blueberry festival is also a big deal to the residents since it draws folks from all over to an area that doesn’t enjoy as much tourism as other parts of maine ( i think the population of machias easily triples over the weekend of the festival ).
as you might imagine, the cooking contest is a important part of The Blueberry Festival Tradition and landing the coveted Blue Ribbon is quite an accomplishment.
so, odin and his grandmother decided to enter a pie in the cooking contest and see if maybe, just maybe, they could win a prize. even if they didn’t, everyone would win in the end because we’d all get to eat the remains of the tasty entry.
but first, before any cooking got started, we all went out to watch uncle andrew run in the blueberry 5 mile road race. this is an important element to the story arc because the race got started late which means we got back later than expected which means odin got to making a pie later than expected which means i weas already starting to wonder whether we’d make the deadline for entry into the content ( no fault of uncle andrew’s, of course, who finished the race in fine time. ).
while odin did have a little help making the dough for the crust from scratch, he didn’t need any help rolling it out for a two-crust style pie.
next, meremere puts some finishing touches on the crust while odin prepares the blueberries with sugar and whatnot following a recipe published by the university of maine cooperative extension in the 1970s ( although it’s hard to tell because, oddly, there’s no copyright date on the booklet ). the recipe has won a blue ribbon in the blueberry festival in the past, so hopefully i’m not divulging any important family secrets with this photo ( it’s the recipe entitled blueberry pie II )!
you’ll note, though, that i’m not divulging the crust recipe 🙂
time to pour the blueberries into the pie pan! at this point we were losing sugary blueberries quickly as they would quickly move from the bowl to odin’s mouth.
meremere teaches odin the fine art of joining the lower and upper crusts together which is an important part of the aesthetic of a two-crust pie.
odin spreads a bit of whole milk over the pie crust to help it crispy perfection.
a proper blueberry pie isn’t complete without a generous sample of sugar sprinkled over the fresh milk.
and with that, it’s time for it to go in the oven! but since it’s after 10 a.m. it’s already clear that we’re going to have a tough time meeting the 11 a.m. deadline for entry. d’oh!
about an hour later, the wonderfully aromatic blueberry pie was done cooking! hurray! but it was already 15 minutes after the 11 a.m. deadline! booo!
undeterred, we decideed to walk down the festival judges and see if we could get them to accept a late entry. how could anyone resist odin walking in with a beautiful pie in a wicker basket?
oh noes! by the time we arrived at the blueberry festival it was already 30 minutes past the deadline. the kind woman at the information booth said we were too late and really should have entered the pie at 8 a.m.
but she did say if we really wanted to we could still try and drop off the pie, although she made it clear that there really wasn’t any point since they had already started judging.
and, lo and behold, when we arrived at place to drop off the entries we were met with a rather intimidating sign which said, “Do Not Enter Judging”.
sigh. we had come so far and we snowdeals are not the type to give up easily.
so we paused, took a breath, and odin knocked on the door.
whatever hesitation we had immediately faded away as soon as the door opened and it became instantly clear that the kind ladies responsible for fielding entries were never going to turn down a pie carried in by an adorable six year old with a huge smile.
hurray!
with the pie officially entered we now had to patiently wait 4 hours when the winning entries were announced. luckily, there was plenty to keep us preoccupied amongst all the vendors and activities at blueberry festival nestled in and around the historic center street congregational church which puts on the festival.
activities like throwing baseballs while waiting for the judges to finish judging.
and shooting baskets…
and tasting tasty treats like organic goodies from hatch knoll farm…
and eating frozen treats while…
…riding on a train…
and watching music on the steps of the historic center street congregational church…
and checking out the maine blackfly breeder’s association exhibit which atttempts to educate folks on the importance of the black fly which is usually thought of a just painful nuisance ( see their proposed legislation )…
and after checking out a raucous group from new york ( unfortunately, i forgot their name ), sponsored by the beehive collective, who performed on the steps of the church…
after all that fun, it was finally really, super duper close to time to announce the winners of the cooking contest. while the organizers prepared for the announcement, i did what i am known to do, and wandered around to the back side of a large billboard to take some pictures of the map showing the distances folks had travelled to come to the festival. all of a sudden, on the other side of the billboard, i could hear my kris and my sister and mother shouting excitedly, “oh my gosh! oh my gosh! oh my gosh!”
i ran around to the other side of the board and couldn’t believe my eyes. before making the announcement over the PA system, someone had just posted the winners in various categories.
holy waaaaaa! OMG! ODIN WON THE BLUEBERRY BAKING CONTEST!.
( note, we entered him in the contest as odin, which is his nickname and eric c snowdeal iv which is his “given” name. almost nobody calls him eric but it’s nice they chose to use his given name since it will be more recognizable to local residents when the results are published in the local paper. )
we ran back to where we had dropped of the pie so odin could pick up his blue ribbon for his award winning two crusted pie. who knows, maybe we’ll look back and recognize this as the start of a storied career in baking.
finally after such a long day of waiting, odin got the chance to taste his award winning creation.
and it was good. really, really good.
perhaps we’ll have to come back next year just to defend his title 🙂
time for a good ol’ fashioned new england clam bake! well, not really a clam bake in the stricktest sense since, we gathered in a backyard and not on a beach, but the celebration was certainly in the spirit of a traditional clam bake with lots of family enjoying lots of seafood and stories on a fine new england summer day.
no clam bake is complete without lobsters fresh from the bay!
and, mmmmm, clams steamed to perfection.
no, despite my best attempts, odin is not at all interested in playing with the crustaceans. in fact, he claims to like seafood at all!
adventures in family portraiture. so happy odin’s great grandmother could attend the clam bake and i could get a picture with her, odin and her newest great-grandchild, zachary.
odin and his great grandmother, affectionately known as gigi.
it’s been far too long since i’ve had the chance to get a picture of them together.
i came *this close* to getting a photo "for the ages" with zachary and gigi but zachary had other plans 🙂
25% silliness, indeed.
mmmm. even more perfectly steamed clams.
i just imagine why more folks don’t enjoy a fresh clam dipped in melted butter.
lobsters, steamed to perfection.
i actually prefer clams to lobster, but i’m certainly not going to turn down the tasty crustacean.
odin’s, uh, wants to make sure we know the lobsters are trying to escape.
i don’t know if it makes any difference, but i’m told placing the lobsters "head down" is the most humane method of steaming.
a couple of odin’s cute cousins are kind enough to stop racing about a nanosecond and pose for a photo. thanks!
nope, i’m not going to pass up an opportunity to get another photo of gigi and zachary.
who is this kid who looks far too old to be my baby boy?!
yup, again with gigi and zachary.
fun with toddler portraiture. the ol’ eat-the-fist pose.
zachary strikes a serious, thoughtful pose in the arms of his mother.
teh cuteness! zachary and his mother.
for as long as i’ve known the levee on route 1 in machias which keeps the tidal flow from machias bay out of the middle river has has been called, simply, The Dike.
The Dike has always had space for parking, and when i was a kid it was a popular place for folks to sit and pass the time watching cars pass by and the tides come in and out ( and who knows what else after sunset ). in more recent times, it seems that The Dike has become a popular spot on the weekends for the local farmers market and a flea market where all manner of junk, er, treasure gets served from out of the back of parked vehicles ( as an aside, the dike has been in use for 150 years and is a recent source of controversy as the state would like to remove the “flappers” that prevent the tides from going into the middle river which has angered some local residents. )
i was a bit pesimistic that we’d find anything worth keeping, but odin was quite sure i was wrong and after strolling for a bit he found this sign made from “found” wood in harrington, maine that he thought would, rightly, be perfectly perfect for The Girls’ chicken coop!
if i’ve done my googling correctly, it appears the the nice man who made and signed the sign is, leon raikes, a professor of english at the university of maine.
thanks leon!
after our search for jasper we spent some time hanging out at the elementary school of my youth ( which was named after rose m. gaffney who began teaching in 1897 and i often have wondered if she ever sent any of my relatives to the principle’s office ).
the school looks quite a bit different than when i was a kid, but it was fun to watch odin play on the monkey bars and imagine that they might – just maybe – be the same bars i played on when i was his age.
being on elementary school property, it’s always good to learn a lesson. and mine for the day? that it’s a lot harder to get *out* from inside the bars than i remember it being 30 years ago! as luck would have it, i had the camera so unfortunately it was impossible to document my attempts to escape 🙂
odin plays the ol’ game of see-if-i-can-kick-the-camera-while-on-the-swing. someday he’s going to win.