A lot can happen in a month and half!

This has been a busy, but wonderful month and half. We have been bad about posting updates, but hope to catch you up some with this post. I can't really figure out how to change the order of the photos easily, so bear with me in this out of order post. It is appropriate actually, because many things are out of order these days. Our house looks like this:

Yep....those are moving boxes. We are due to close on our first house and become homeowners this Thursday. It's not done until its done, so we aren't going to post pics just yet, but will do so when things are final.

Here you see Henry with our first egg! Last Tuesday, Emily walked home for lunch and checked on the chickens and this little gift was in one of the laying boxes. They have since produce two more bringing our grand total to a fourth of a dozen!

I got my hair cut...mom requested pictures...

Here I was trying to show the size of our first egg. The first ones are smaller and eventually get to be "normal" sized, although they will always be all different colors and sizes....part of the fun of having your own chickens.

The first egg in the egg collection basket given to Henry by his mom.

Emily had shoulder surgery on Sept. 24th. The staples are now out (thank goodness) and she is doing great. She had a shoulder decompression - two bone spurs removed, bone removed that was impinging on the rotator cuff and collar bone shorted 8mm. She had a slight setback when she found out she was allergic to pain medication and has lost about 8 pounds in a week, but the stomach is getting back to normal and the physical therapist said she is a rock star with great range of motion.

I know I mentioned that I wasn't going to post any pictures of the house, but here is a teaser...this tree will be in our new backyard! They don't have trees like this in Texas and when they do, they have a fence around them and some sort of historical plaque. It is HUGE.

Here are the chickens enjoying some of our leftover corn on labor day. They really know how to clean an ear of corn.

Here is Henry being goofy with his ear of corn....delicious!

Home grown poblano pepper....

New flowers by the front door...

Every year on labor day weekend, Matthews throws a huge festival called Matthews Alive. This was held one street over and made for a fun, crowded and traffic filled weekend. Here is a shot of the street. There were THOUSANDS of people and lots of expensive food and crafts....

Instead of spending a ton of money on expensive food at the fair, we had out own picnic in the backyard....hamburgers, grilled corn and grapes! Obviously we need to invest in some outdoor furniture. Here we are using empty cat litter containers....classy!

The cats still love each other. They are sitting in the open window upstairs on their perch intrigued by the crew putting a new roof on the neighbor's house.

We turned our lower boxes into flower beds because we couldn't compete with the ants. I was so excited and then realized that I had just created a box full of food for the deer....so I had to build these covers to put on at night...the flowers are still happy a month later.

Henry also started a new job as community outreach coordinator for Covenant Presbyterian Church and has been working hard on a garden project. Check it out here: (http://www.friendshiptrays.org/Gardens/GardenMain.htm). This garden is also in the running for a huge grant from Tom's of Main. You can vote everyday for the entire month of October. Go to this website (http://www.tomsofmaine.com/community-involvement/project-sponsorships.aspx) then click on the community tab and scroll down until you see "Friendship Trays Garden: A Plot to Thicken Community." Vote EVERY day! We hope you are all doing well and we hope you will plan a trip to visit us once we are settled in the new house! Peace! Emily and Henry

spring onions, big ladies, and worm poop

Here is the spring onion crop. Or, whats left of it after a couple weeks of eating them.


The chickens are full grown now. No eggs yet but should be soon. We bought them a wooden training egg that you leave in the nesting box to show them where to lay.




































Got worm poop? The lettuce on the right was planted with some vermicompost (worm poop) added to the planting mix. The lettuce on the left hasn't sprouted yet because it is sad that it didn't get any worm poop.

Omens for the Owens

Yesterday I saw both an owl and a hawk on my way home from work. Today while mowing the grass, I stopped to watch this little incident. That's right, a serpent, in an apple tree, at the pastor's house. Meaning?

Yes, Emily has seen the pictures. She is not pleased.


And yes. The chickens are all alive and safe.

Yucatan Mission Trip

Wow, my first blog post ever. A couple of weeks ago I traveled to the Yucatan with 32 members of Covenant Pres. Our ages ranged from 17 to 58 and we had two families of four that made it their family vacation.
We flew into Cancun and then drove to a small town called Piste, which is about 2.5 miles from Chechen Itza. Our work for the week was to put a cinder block and concrete roof on a sunday school building and lay some concrete slabs. You can see the SS building in one of the pics (I didn't try to match pictures with content, too difficult for my first post). The hardest work day was sealing the roof with concrete. We built scaffolding and handed buckets of concrete up to the second floor roof. VERY hot and messy work. Cement burns hurt.


One of the pictures shows a chicken coop made with scrap materials. Our chickens are so spoiled. Almost every house there has livestock (pigs, chickens, ducks, turkey) but I was surprised that I didn't see a single vegetable garden. During bible school one day a large pig walked down the street and started rooting up someones yard. Many of our Covenant people were making a big deal out of it and a small child asked me "you don't have pigs in your country."
I told him we did but we keep them in factories, not really.

We slept as everyone does there, in hammocks. Getting used to non-nap sleep in a hammock would have alone been difficult enough, but we also had to acclimate to sweating at night, dogs fighting outside our hut, roosters crowing (not just in the morning), and one dude who snors really loudly. Luckily we worked hard during the day and I had ear plugs.

Most days followed this schedule: breakfast, work til 1pm, lunch, siesta, bible school and women's craft (I went one day and made Emily some earrings, partly because I love her and partly to rebel against the sexism), whole congregation play/hangout time, dinner, more hangout/play time, devotions, hammock. The thing that struck me most about the trip was the congregations example of Christian community and their willingness to share it with us. The pastor and many congregation members worked with us each day and the whole congregation played sports (soccer and basketball) with us (they called me Michael yordan). They also prepared a meal for us, gave us gifts, worshipped with us, and proudly showed off their Mayan history.

They took us to see Chechen Itza which is amazing and very difficult to describe. The amount of astronomy and mathematics that they not only knew but incorporated into Chechen Itza is quite astonishing. Almost the coolest part though was the way we got to see it. Since the town is so close almost the whole town works at Chechen Itza and therefore the town's economy is based almost solely on tourism (which is down 50% from last year). One congregation member and vendor at Chechen Itza told me that during the Swine Flu scare no one came for 2 months and he did not eat. Anyway back to the cool part, the congregation was proud to show us their history so they loaded us in the back of three trucks, waved us through the parking attendant (congregation member), and through the entrance. Once inside two tour guides (congregation members) gave us a tour. It was fun for us to experience such a turisty thing in a non-turisty way.

They also took us to a cenote (google pictures) one afternoon. A cenote is a cave with a deep spring fed pool that you can swim in. There are hundreds in the Yucatan. It was an amazing experience that I can't describe adequately.

The last day and a half of our 8 days we spent on a beach in Akumal (place of the turtle in Mayan). It didn't feel at all like mission work or work at all (I was getting paid and earning time off) but it was certainly restful and generally wonderful. The beach is gorgeous. I went snorkeling out on the reef and saw many fish and turtles. three other guys and I also went on a very nice boat ride and held fishing poles for a couple hours.

It was a great trip. I really enjoyed the intergenerational aspect and the hospitality and community of the Mexican people. I loved being picked up at the airport by Emily, Carson, and Collier.

Look who is getting BIG!!!!

Here is an update of the chickens...we have taken them on a few field trips outside and they really are changing fast!

They have all learned how to roost and seem to like being as high as possible.

They are still very curious and seem to enjoy being outside in the grass.

They also like shiny things...like wedding rings and camera lenses...

Here is chipmunk, affectionately called Spaz. She really is a crazy little bird and is definitely at the top of the pecking order!!!

They even have more feathers since these were taken a couple of days ago! They are really growing up!

They even tried out their coop and ramp and were old pros. They did great. We stayed outside for a while and they laid right up next to the edge closest to us. They are very social!

We hope you enjoy this Memorial Day weekend. Love, Emily and Henry

More baby chicks...

Look who has arrived....

We have to start with the most important news of the day. Carson, our nephew, turned 5 years old today. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CARSON!!!! We love you! Time certainly does fly.

Here is some of our spring crop...butter lettuce, romaine and baby carrots.

Here are our seed starters for our summer crop... okra, corn, cucumbers, and green beans here. We are also planting squash, zucchini, several varieties of tomatoes, and bell peppers. There is more, but that is all I can think of right now. See older posts for more info.

And here is our mint. After taking FOREVER to get started, the little plant is out of control. Sorry it is sideways. I forgot to turn it.

Here is Henry showing of one of our monster sugar snap peas. DELICIOUS!

And some more exciting news....these five precious babies came to live with us today.

There are two New Hampshire Reds like this one....

Here is a Barred Rock.

Another New Hampshire Red...This one has a VERY yellow head.

And another Barred Rock...these are the ones that you often see in folk art. Google them.

And here is an Ameraucana....also known as an easter-egger for the color eggs is lays. Right now this little one sort of resembles a skunk....she is really cute.

They like to huddle, make noise, eat, drink water and POOP. 

They are very curious ladies...

And very sweet...

Here is our set up for about a month and half. They have to live inside. We will gradually decrease the heat lamp. They will stay in the upstairs bathroom.

These two were VERY curious. I could have sworn I saw Leo roll his eyes with an attitude of...ARE YOU KIDDING??? And Josie was so excited she was running in circles and meowing. We have introduced them to each other, but will keep the door to the bathroom shut tight when we are not around.

We will post more photos as I know they will change quickly. I know it is going to be a ton of fun! Peace, Emily and Henry