Visiting Kentucky

Fiance's parents live in southeast rural Kentucky now. It's a big change from the metropolitan area they left, but it's on his mother's childhood homestead.


This is the view from their front window (sorry about the screen, I am writing in iPhone mode and am using iPhone pics for now). The snow blanketed everything on the first day - gorgeous and ephemeral.

We brought them three of our hens. We love these girls, but we know they'll have a good him here, and we need room for the new ones coming this year.


They didn't seem to mind the fourteen hour car ride too much, but they did stage a breakout of their box from time to time.





Malai loves car rides and laps, so this was heaven for her.

The hens laid two eggs in the box on the way down, and a third egg once we arrived. Productive girls!


We checked out the local feed store to see if they had any prefabricated coops for sale, and I discovered seeds come in huge bags for cheap prices!!




The only problem is that you have to be careful of which kind are genetically modified. But I did pick up a bunch of peas, peanuts, onions, and rapini.

We celebrated Passover with Fiance's parents, and his uncle and grandmother who live on the homestead. Malai took to Grandma Hazel immediately!


There was matzoh brei the next morning for breakfast - egg made with matzoh and sugar. Next time, I'll take mine without the sugar!


While there a thousand and one Walmarts and fast food places and dollar stores in these rural counties (bleh), we were starved for coffee shops.


When we saw this in a town 45 minutes from his parents' house, much excitement ensued. We're happily/sadly addicted.

There's a lot of poverty and crime in the area of the homestead. Fiance's grandmother owns 400 acres of farm and woodland. Trailer parks border all around the edges, several decorated with confederate flags. It's a different sort of life, here. Very different from our coastal CT lifestyle. But I enjoyed driving around looking at everything and observing people.

I especially enjoyed the miles and miles of rolling hills.


One day, we drove to Mammoth Cave National Park.








That is a Kentucky cave cricket. We also saw a bat!

Overall, it was a scenic and southern experience, mixed with a Jewish holiday and a national park.

I have some wonderful friends watching over my plants and animals at home, and this morning one of them sent me this photo:


These are my crocus babies I planted last fall. What a welcome sight! We'll be home to see them tomorrow. Can't wait!

Happy Spring!

Weekly Wrap-Up 2 of March

Spring breeze -
the pine on the ridge
whispers it

The nights are cold, but the days are full of sunshine and the crocus are showing their colors in the front yard. Spring has finally touched upon New England.


Highlights of the past week or two include:

Seed starting! I filled up a 72 cell tray with peppers both hot and sweet, tomatoes large and small, and onions and leeks. I scratched in some worm castings from the vermicomposter, placed them on a heat mat, and beneath a grow light. This was Thursday night. Saturday night, I was ever so surprised and pleased!

Mini Vacation! Lover had a business meeting in Washington, D.C. I took the train down to meet him Monday night. We walked around the Mall to see the memorials lit up at night. On Tuesday, we visited the American Craft Museum, the Air and Space Museum, The National Gallery (both the West Wing and the East Wing), and the International Spy Museum.

New discovery. I was absolutely thrilled to discover a very chic craft store called "Make & Mingle" in the town of Fairfield. You can check this store out before a movie at the Fairfield theater, and then hit up Las Vetas for coffee. All in one area!

Maw. There's still an algae problem in the goldfish tank. I didn't want to add one more animal to the small aquarium, but I also don't want to use a chemical algae-cide. So, I got an algae-eating plecostomus named "Maw." We have an albino version in the other tank named "Valve" and he has really kept it spotless! Maw looks like the pic below.

Outliers. I read Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers" on the train traveling to DC. I would strongly recommend it to anyone! It dispels the compelling American myth of the self-made man or woman, and portrays how no one is made successful without both practice and opportunity. It also touches on many other topics, including education and entitlement..

All in all, it's been a pretty good week. Next week we have our kick-off for Bridgeport Beautifies, a trip to Cape Cod, and to see "Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo."