Five Little Bonnets lined up in a Row...

 Sounds like there should be a nursery rhyme in there somewhere, doesn't it? 

Somehow all this reminded me of mama and how she loved the old nursery rhymes. A few years before she passed away, we found a pretty Mother Goose book in a thrift store. Mama bought it. We sure enjoyed looking at the pictures and reading the nursery rhymes. 

My silly blog, as a matter fact, was kinda fashioned after the old nursery rhymes. (some of us never get past the age of 10, you know).  :)

I remember when my daughter Lynn was setting up my blog she called and asked, "mama, what do you want on your blog...how do you want it to look?" "Well", I said, "a few nursery rhymes, some hens and baby chicks, and maybe a rooster". "What name do you want to go by", Lynn asked. "Ummm, how about Henny Penny".  So now you know. :)

My blog really needs updating but I can't seem to get anything to work and Lynn is way too busy to bother with trivial things such as this. 

I still haven't taken a picture of the garden, except this from our early morning walk...Poppy is in there somewhere. We were walking Eli and Ellie.

Well, I started this post a week ago then got busy with the garden and cleaning up the yard. 

I carried all the bonnets and aprons to the farmer's market again last Saturday...and guess what! Sold four more bonnets. What a surprise. I mean who would have thought that old fashioned bonnets would sell? Maybe more folks, like me, are longing for the simpler times, the good old days.

Poppy and I leave early tomorrow morning for West Virginia. Our granddaughter Madison is getting married on Saturday. Hang on, let's see if I can find a picture...

well, here they are...this picture was taken just a few months ago...her handsome fiance' is seven feet tall and just graduated from dental school. Madison is into her first year of teaching physics and chemistry...

Gosh, Poppy and I never, never, go anywhere. Do you reckon we will even know how to act?

Guess I had better get busy. Still got all the animals to worry about. Plan to leave them all with plenty of food and water for the weekend, plus a neighbor will stop in morning and night. Eli and Ellie will be boarding at a nice new kennel about a 15 minute drive from here. They tell us that Great Pyrenees are well cared for there. We will sure miss them.

Will leave you with a little humming bird picture...Poppy thinks is really neat. It's the shadow...

Thank you friends for stopping by. I loved your comments on my last post. Can't believe, even another follower. Sure appreciate you all. 

Love, Henny

Yearly Porch Cleaning...

and it's that time again! Sometimes here under all the trees, seems like the pollen will never end! What a green dusty mess the back porch was, so on a warm sunny day last week I went to work with a mop and bucket of warm soapy water...and of course the water hose.

far from perfect, but here's our clean porch...chairs fit to sit in again...

Oops! Just realized I took the picture before putting the clean tablecloth back on the table. The old porch floor needs another coat of paint...maybe one day.  

and, the other end of the porch...

Well, the porch doesn't look as pretty as I would like but most of the dirt and dust is gone.

So yesterday I went to work on our little front porch...dragging furniture around while mopping and scrubbing and rinsing away a year's worth of dirt...

and here's the other end of the teeny tiny porch...

My favorite thing about the little front porch is the old cupboard. You can barely see it over to the right in the first picture. I've told the story a hundred times, but the cupboard was a gift from my cousin Patty...

Anyhow, I've taken out all the fall dishes and stuff and added spring dishes...

I had to rake and scrape to gather the right dishes. My next trip to the thrift store I hope to find a pretty flowered pitcher and a few more things. 

Patty and I were texting about the new spring look and she suggested moving the candle to the side instead of in the center...so I did.  Poppy must have thought it looked off balance and centered it again. :(  

Anyhow, decorating the old cupboard added joy to the scrubbing of the front porch.

Better get busy. I'll be doing the farmer's market tomorrow. I have finished three aprons and 4 bonnets this week. Want to show you this cute one with the flowers and bees and butterflies...

and a couple of lavender bonnets...(pardon the messy bed)

Sewing is messy work.  :)   Thank you so much dear friends, and a new follower. Oh my. Thank you!

Love, Henny

Another first!

There's lettuce growing in the teeny tiny garden...

Lettuce fit for picking and eating! I'm pretty tickled about that. 

Have I told you about the farmer's market?

Well you see, wishing for a little extra spending money and seeing all the sunbonnets and aprons I've sewn, hanging around decorating my little sewing room, I decided to call our county extention office. What a sweet lady I spoke with..."honey, she said, we would love to have you"!

"Spring Fling" , opening of the markets, begins May 5th, so I packed up and was there at 7:00 am.  Can't see my table in this picture, but here's half the market...

My bonnets and aprons were a big hit, who would have thought! My first sale was to this lady who was a vendor there selling beef from her ranch.

She wore the bonnet and apron all day and had it on again last Saturday.

Anyhow, you have got to see this! Talk about luck! I've been raking and scraping for fabric to sew with and said to Poppy, "with the money I made at the market, I'm going to Walmart tomorrow and buy a few pieces of fabric"! 

And so I did...

Every piece I picked up, the clerk scanned and said, "oh, this is on sale for $1.00 a yard"! Be still my heart!  Here's my messy little sewing room with my new fabric folded under two new bonnets...

Right now I'm working on three bonnets and two aprons. Pieces stacked on the right of the sewing machine need stitching. I then move it to the little table on the left for pressing. Kind of a one man assembly line. :) Works good for me. 

S

and...

So, I am all excited and into sewing again...what with a stack of new fabrics and a place to sell what I make. 

Okay, I'm sure you have heard enough. Thank you for listening and oh my goodness, new followers! Who would have thought! Thank you so much!

Will say goodbye for now and leave you with a picture of Randall Rabbit, visiting with me in his home...

Love, Henny

Not once, since February 2013

until now, have I gone a whole month without publishing a blog post. Feels like starting all over. 

So here's our little ole log cabin, not quite as deep in the woods as it once was...

down Henny Penny Lane where the two, not very bright, Guineas guard the place and compete with Eli and Ellie as to who can bark or scream the longest and loudest warning alarm for every thing that moves...

and the chickens, well we're down to one big feeling rooster and six humble hens and getting a few eggs every day...

The playhouse still stands but needs a good cleaning, especially the rusty contents of the "Old Motor Grader Road" museum...

and back in March I started vegetable seeds in the teeny tiny greenhouse that actually germinated and thrived and are now planted in the teeny tiny garden. Sorry I don't have a picture of the garden yet, duh, how slack of me. I will be back with one.

Can you believe single garden plants, even at Walmart this spring are close to $5.00 a piece! I had to start seed. Could not afford to spend that much on plants. Remember back when you could buy a six pack of vegetable plants for 3.99?? Boy have things changed!

Oh, I do have a picture of the rose bush Andee gave me for Mother's Day three years ago. It grows in a pot inside the garden gate. It bloomed beautifully this Mother's Day...

Doing fine also are Rosie the goat, Miss Ducky, and Randall Rabbit. Guess my best news today is to tell you that our sweet Ellie is doing well. We still have vet appointments with blood work and pills to take twice a day but she is like her old self again, maybe even better...

Here are Eli and Ellie early this morning...

Of course, that's Eli in 'his' chair and Ellie on the old couch.

So if I still have a few friends out there, thank you for looking in. Oh my gosh! Smokey will never forgive me. I've forgotten him. Let me find a picture to add before he reads this post...

Here he is! He says there's plenty of room for both of us at the sewing machine. :(  He's my boy!

Love, Henny

Not just Ellie,

But Poppy and I too, felt better after reading all your "get well" wishes. Thank you very much...

Ellie is doing great and almost back to her old self. She just may eat us out of house and home before the doctors get her medications adjusted. She is on Prednisone and Fludrocort. It's the Prednisone! Dr. Davidson said Yes, Ellie has one goal right now and that is to find food. We think she has gained back the weight she lost and maybe a little extra. She goes back for more bloodwork on Monday. 

Ellie was showered with attention last week at the vet's office. It was her first visit back for bloodwork after being hospitalized. Most of the staff came out to greet her with hugs and kisses and were pleased to see Ellie looking much better. 

I hate to say anything but it's that time of the year again..."the snowball bush"!! When all the green blooms first came out Poppy said, Mel you've got to take a picture...

So many snowballs, the limbs will never support them, said Poppy.

So now they're turning white, but still not fully opened and no broken limbs, yet...

Seems the warmer weather is finally here to stay and it feels wonderful. 

Miss Ducky hasn't been back on her nest since losing her two precious eggs but enjoys swimming on the pond these warm days...

and our early morning walk down Henny Penny Lane one day last week. The sky and clouds were just so pretty, to me anyhow...I could feel spring...

even looking out across the old cutover was pretty...

some mornings everything just feels beautiful, doesn't it?

Guess that about it for now. Mostly just wanted to say, "thank you friends"! 

Love, Henny

Been a little stressful around here...

stuff happening, you know, those everyday problems that can drive you crazy, problems I kept thinking I would post about...but then when our sweet little Ellie became deathly ill, well none of those other things seemed important.

Here's Ellie, saying hello from her hospital bed. 

This nightmare began March 16th when we carried Ellie to our regular vet for x-rays. She had been limping and having trouble getting up. But what a surprise, the x-rays showed nothing. Ellie's hips and legs looked fine...But, Ellie came home a changed dog.

Give her 24 to 48 hours we were told because she had been sedated. Those 48 hours turned into six days of not eating or drinking. She lost 8 pounds and spent two of those days in the vet's office getting fluids and bloodwork done. Bloodwork showed a serious bladder infection that had spread to her kidneys. 

We left the vet's office on Thursday the 23rd and drove Ellie to an emergency hospital in Raleigh. She stayed there three nights and underwent extensive bloodwork. The doctors all suspected "Addison's Disease". Ellie was hooked up to IV fluids and put on 2 different antiobiotics, 2 different steroids, a feeding tube, and 2 meds that would hopefully give her appetite back. Ellie began to show a little improvement and on Sunday we brought her home.

Tuesday we got a call from the hospital confirming that Ellie has Addison's Disease. There is no cure for Addison's disease and Ellie's quality of life will depend on lifelong treatment. We came awfully close to losing our sweet Ellie girl. Gosh!

So, I will just have to come back with all the other day to day happenings around here...

One thing for sure, while away on all the trips to and from the vet's office and emergency hospital Smokey had our place under control...told us not to worry, he would keep watch...

Thank you friends.

Love, Henny

Burrrrr!!

What a shame we had temperatures in the 70s and 80s in the month of February, tempting spring to arrive early...

Oh, I thoroughly enjoyed those warm beautiful days...

even the butterflies were out and about and birds busy building nests.

So, we all got too relaxed and what happened? Winter came back! Freezing temps last night and a freeze warning again tonight. Covering everything is simply too overwhelming. We might as well say goodbye to the tiny figs and pears once again.

Anyhow, Sunday morning we had sleet and snow flurries...

Looks pretty dreary, doesn't it? I mean, if it's going to be winter and snow, couldn't we at least have enough to play in?Before all this dreariness arrived Sunday morning, I was simply amazed at the sunrise...

Look closer. I actually thought the woods were on fire...

I should have opened the back door instead of taking the picture through the screen wire.

Once upon a time I did a blog post on this big dog house that sits in our front yard.  My brother Randall, who passed away in 2004 built this dog house and gave it to us many many years ago...

The last time the house was used was when our little red hen named "Jewel" hid a nest of eggs inside and sat quietly, and patiently hatched eight baby chicks. What a surprise that was! We thought a fox had caught her.

Anyhow, Sunday morning while I was at the grocery store, Poppy sold the doghouse to a nice young man who wanted it for a small hen house. Seems his young daughters had a few chicks they were raising. So coming home from the grocery store I stopped for a red light and there turning right in front of me was a big truck and trailer and loaded there on the trailer was the doghouse. Like it was meant to be...so I could say goodbye to Randall's doghouse. Kind of hurt my heart. But at least the house will be put to good use. 

and since the snow didn't amount to anything here, Eli and Ellie played in the leaves down near the pond...

Guess that's about it for now. I'm far behind once again visiting and reading but friends, I'll be there soon. Thank you for your visit.

Love, Henny