My Continued Adventures With Pea Fowl

My eldest daughter raises pea fowl.  She has been working toward getting a specific color for a long time and finally got that one elusive bird this spring in Artemis.  

I hope I get this correct, she is a purple, black shoulder pied female pea hen. 

 PHEW!  

She was being picked on in the barn and got ill so daughter took her to the peacock vet 

(yes there is such a thing)

They fixed her up but while being treated she had to stay in the house.  

Now it is COLD in MI and Artemis has not been outside long enough to develop her winter feathers so she will be staying inside for the winter.  

As you can imagine this presents some issues, especially bathroom issues.  

So...mom and her diaper making skills to the rescue!  

This is not my first time either.

I have made them for Gizmo, Beep and Stan in the past.  

Gizmo and Beep have passed and Stan lives in the barn.  

I know she really misses Gizmo and Beep so I won't be surprised if she keeps Artemis in the house.  She cleaned out Beep's bedroom so things are trending toward that.  

She has not been able to make herself clean out that room since we lost Beep.  

You can read about that here if you are interested. 

 If you want to read about Gizmo you can do so here.  

There are many stories about them in addition to these if you search my blog. 

I digress.  

Last night she came over and brought Artemis.  

She is a beautiful bird and very well behaved (unlike Beep).  

She doesn't try to peck you in the eye or eat your shiny bits and bobs.  

She even knows her name!

So the mission last night was to make a new diaper.  

My daughter chose a Philip Jacobs print and I set to work.  

(pretty proud that I centered those swirls on both sides)

I had a pattern I made last time I made a diaper for Beep so used that as a guide.  

Each bird is particular, like we are, so each diaper must be made to fit that bird.  

I made the pouch part pretty easily with a few adjustments then we had to try it on her to make sure where all the straps would connect.  

Artemis was a trooper with the on again off again nonsense.

This is the finished diaper.  

A plastic bag gets placed in the pouch and the pouch covers the cloaca to catch the waste.  

We started using velcro and that was MUCH easier then the safety pins she used to use with Gizmo.

This is my daughter putting it on her.

You can see the back part here.

The pouch connects to the back as does the harness that goes over her head and around her chest.

The harness is sewn to the back part, while the pouch straps connect with Velcro.

Everything fit well and they were ready to head home.

Exciting times at my house last night!  

I am hoping to settle down and work on my baby quilt commitments tonight or at least this weekend.

Do you have any exciting plans for the weekend?

~XOP~

Odds and Ends

I was asked about the closure of the Linky on WIPs With Friends each week. 

 I will typically close it around 24 hours after opening it. 

 I realized that this made it inconsistent for my followers. 

 In the future I will be closing the Linky at 10am EST.  

This should give everyone time to post their links.

On another note, hubby and I went thrifting on Wednesday and just look at this great Pyrex/AnchorHocking/Glassbake haul!!

After he cleaned it all up and laid it out this is what we brought home.  

(the cake plate I had)

The two in the center are Pyres and in great shape!

The two square pans and the bread pan are Glassbake as is the mixing bowl.  

The two casserole are Anchor Hocking. 

 Look at those white lids!!! 

 Pretty good haul for one trip I think.  

I had a full purchase card so was able to get an additional 35% off our purchase for the day too!!  

We typically go on Wednesdays when seniors (anyone over 55) gets an additional 25% off,

 but this was an exceptional score!!!

Another fun thing I thought I would share.  Remember last week when we were on farm duty?

One of the things we were supposed to do was to gather eggs.

The chickens are fairly easy, and actually so are the pea hens. 

Except for one crazy bird that I did not know about.

There is a dresser in the coop and Aurora likes to go to the top and back up against the wall to lay.

So her egg falls down the crack between the wall and the dresser.

It most often gets "stuck" in the crack, suspended above the straw provided for her to lay her eggs in.

Which ends up looking like this.

(Top photo for perspective)

That crazy bird!  

That's what I have going into the weekend.

I started cutting out a quilt for our priest that is leaving soon.

I hope to have it all cut out very soon as the weeks will be getting so busy!

I'm going to do a version of this block that I made for my Bee this month.

I am going to do rainbow pluses though.

I can show progress next week, I hope.

My Folksy Fish top is finished too, but no pictures until that baby makes his arrival and I can gift it.

Have a great weekend and let's meet back up on Monday shall we?

~XOP~

Weekend Happenings

I had a pretty good weekend and I hope you did too.  

My daughter came over to have me make another peacock diaper for Beep. 

 It seems that she has outgrown the first one I made.  

So I made another one.

The pouch was not wide enough so this is the remake yet again.

*SIGH* 

Here you go, a photo of Beep in her diaper

Then DD showed me this photo of my grand pea hen on Santa's lap!

My hubby was being all secretive in the kitchen and then came out with this mug of hot chocolate.  He melted chocolate and put it on the rim.  

Then dipped it in crushed peppermints.  

The mug was full of hot chocolate and marshmallows.  

He is too good to me!

Last night I was working on finishing up some bridal shower gifts and I got up from my machine.  When I sat back down this is the sight that greeted me.  

Autumn was poking her face through the machine to get my attention.

I always worry about her when she does this.

Don't want her sticking a paw where it doesn't belong!!!

The bad news is that my machine began acting very strangely. 

 I love to use my knee lifter. 

 Last night every time I used the knee lifter my feed dogs dropped down. 

 It was the strangest thing!  

So I have my hubby bringing my machine into the shop for repair today. = (

I have another machine that I can use, but I miss my main machine.

I hope Jay can fix her.

What are you working on?

~XOP~

A Piece of Your Heart

Today is Friday.  The day most of us look forward to every week.  

This week Friday was not a good morning.  It began last night.  My daughter raises peacocks.  

One of the pea hens that she searched for for a long time had a sinus infection.  

So she took her to the vet.  The vet drained it and gave my daughter antibiotics to give the bird.  

My daughter noticed that the bird was not using her leg and thought it might have been dislocated from all the scuffle of the day so took her back and had an x-ray done.  

No dislocation, but clearly something was wrong.  

So he sent her home with an anti-inflammatory drug to give the bird.  

So my daughter held the bird and tried to give her the medicine and 

heard a "snap", yes, she broke her leg! 

I received a panicked call and a "mom I don't want to be alone can you come over" call.  

I packed up and drove to her house.  

The bird was quiet so we decided to let her stay calm and go to the vet again in the morning.  

This morning.  They did another x-ray and the leg was not just broken it is shattered.  

Considering the bird still has an infection and another hurt let, the vet did not advise surgery. 

 He was worried she would still not be able to use it and t

hat with the sinus infection it was likely she would become septic anyway. 

 Shelby decided to let her go.  It is always so difficult to make that decision. 

 It was the right decision, you don't want them to suffer.  

My heart breaks a little bit every time we go through this. 

Her birds are pets, part of the family, part of our hearts.  

So Godspeed Oksana.  

Go to the big lake pen run by Osirus.  

Keep Octavian, Luna and Gizmo company and play with your friends there. 

 You will be missed.

~XOP~