I love looking back over the week when I write weekly review posts and seeing how blessed our week has been. Sometimes the days seem a bit rushed, or a bit blah, but when it is all put together I realize how varied and rich they have actually been. I also realize how much of our life revolves around our animal friends and how much we like it that way.
When Amanda bought her pet rats a few weeks ago, her intention was to keep them in her room. But rats are very intelligent and like a lot of mental stimulation and after a couple weeks, she felt they were getting bored and depressed in there. She works full time and there just wasn't a whole lot happening for the rats to take interest. So we decided to try moving them to a table in the playroom where they are next to a big window and there is plenty of activity all the time. This has seemed to be good for them and the kids love them. I am constantly getting reports from their audience about what they are doing now. They can be a little messy so I bought these little potted palms at Walmart to provide a bit of a screen around them. This also helps keep the onlookers back just a little out of their space. It's a setup that seems to be working well for kids and rats alike.
This week I started putting the little hens out during the day with Albert the rooster and Sonic the turkey. They have been joyfully running, flapping, scratching and clucking - all the things that happy chickens are supposed to do. And Albert and Sonic have seemed to enjoy every minute of it, although they did nothing but stand and stare in amazement at first.
However, in the other coop things were not going so well. Poor little Lilah was getting beat up by the roosters, Samson and River. So I did some research and bought her a pack of Chicken Saddles or Hen Aprons.
She doesn't look at all impressed but I think she looks adorable. I hope it helps. I do let her out of the coop to run free in the yard but she just goes back inside the coop again on her own. When the little hens get a bit bigger and I do a little more work on this coop so it's more secure I'm planning to bring five of them over here to give her some other hens to hang out with.
Our oldest and youngest dogs enjoying the kids, and the kids enjoying the dogs.
We had some cooler days again this week and a little rain, but we also got to play outside. And the pear tree is loaded with little baby pears. I'm hoping to can lots of them this year.
Quiet playtime inside.
Daily workbook time
Michael has had a very busy week. Sunday morning we were at church and Sunday School at White Hill Church of the Brethren as usual. After church we went to Dap's for lunch and ice cream. Then in the afternoon he attended a youth activity at Calvary United Methodist church.
On Monday he had basketball practice at White Hill in the morning and then volunteered at the Food Pantry at Calvary in the afternoon.
Tuesday and Wednesday were pretty quiet with a large focus on schoolwork. Along with his usual math and language arts lessons he is doing on a unit for science on birds and in social studies he is working the through the biographies of United States Presidents. In Bible/Religion we are studying the biographies of some of the faith/worship leaders. On days he is home more we spend a lot of time working on schoolwork and then fitting in bits and pieces on the days he has other activities on his schedule.
We have a friend who sometimes calls Michael to some yard work for him and he called Thursday so Michael spent a couple hours working for him before going to volunteer at the Food Pantry again in the afternoon.
Friday Michael did work for our friend and this time two of his cousins were there working as well. He worked longer Friday since he didn't have any other activities to pull him away.
Today he slept in, did his chores, worked on cleaning out his closet (his idea, this is what he does in his free time for fun) while listening to very loud music, and we ordered Dominoes for dinner.
It's a good end to a good week.
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