Deer, Guineas, and Dumperoo

Now I know that deer hunters in some places have a bad reputation because of a few obnoxious rednecks...like here in our county where hunting with dogs is allowed.  The hunters park their muddy Toyota pickup trucks, with their dog boxes on the back, up and down these country roads.  The hunters sit in their trucks with their doors wide open and talk to each other on their cb radios, waiting for a pack of dogs to run a deer out of the woods.  Often there is a deer or a dog getting hit by a passing car.

My point in telling you all this is a little story about Poppy.  Poppy "still hunts".  He goes alone into the woods, sits quietly in a tree stand or on the ground, enjoys the wildlife, and waits for a trophy buck to wander up.  He was doing just this yesterday when he heard one of the trucks crank up and head down our path.  He also heard the dogs barking in the distance and getting closer...he sat there very still, listening, when suddenly a large doe comes running right to Poppy sitting there on the ground.  The doe looked him right in the eyes!  Poppy said he waved his hand and said, "you better run"!!!  The doe took off!

Poppy was in the woods only about a quarter of a mile from our house.  I was in the yard tending the animals and also listening to the commotion...when that large doe comes running right up behind our chicken house and stops!  Perfectly still!  I think she knew where she would find safe hiding!

Update on the Guineas...

The babies have made it safely through these freezing cold nights of late.  Of course, that heat lamp hanging over their feed dish has been a life saver!  There is a drop cord run from the outlet on the side of the house all the way down to the pen near the pond!!

They have grown...and beginning to look like Guineas...

Eating chick weed found growing in the garden.   

Funny characters!  Papa Guinea is proud and stands looking into the pen most of the day...

Hope I haven't offended anyone talking about deer hunters.  We honestly do need the hunters because of the huge deer population.  Just tone it down a little!!! :)

Dumperoo tried to help with the sewing last night...

Thank you for stopping by!

Love,
Henny Penny

Happy Thanksgiving

I missed having the gang here this year.  This is what happens, I suppose, when even the grandchildren are about grown.  It was only Poppy and me for dinner.

Poppy got home from work around 12:00 just as I was putting the food on the table.   Quite a bit of food for the two of us! 

 

 

Pardon the pots on the table.  I like old fashioned, and collards are simply better in a cast iron pan.

The dishes are washed and the food is back on the stove, covered until supper time.  Poppy has changed into his camouflage and gone hunting.   

Mama has been on my mind today.  My Mother died on Thanksgiving day, in 2007.  I miss her every day.

Well friends, wishing you all a very happy Thanksgiving.  I am on my way outside to visit the animals!  Hope to be back real soon! :)

Love,
Henny Penny

A Wedding, Mama and the Piano

I had the pleasure of attending another wedding yesterday!  That makes two in the month of November!  You know what they say about "anything that happens twice"!

This time it was Shelby's Granddaughter getting married.  She was a pretty bride with her naturally curly red hair. 

Now would you believe that I sat through the entire wedding ceremony in the church with my cell phone on!  I shudder to think about that thing ringing as the bride was saying "I do"!!!  They would probably have banned me forever!!!  I am careful always to turn off my cell phone...but not yesterday!

Talk of weddings brings back a memory of mama.  When we lived in Robbins in the 1950's, Daddy bought a piano for the house.  Shelby, Jackie, and I were all given piano lessons.  Of course, Shelby was the only one who learned to play.  You may remember the story of my piano recital from an earlier post...how I wore the beautiful red gown! :)  Shudder again!

Anyway, mama never had a piano lesson, but she could play the piano by ear.  In the afternoon when the house was clean and lunch was over, mama would get a bath, fix her hair and lipstick, and get dressed before daddy got home from work.  She would sit down at the piano.  This is the living room where mama played and sang those old songs...

Even today, I can hear her sweet voice and remember two of the songs she played and sang...

There's an old spinning wheel in the parlor
Spinning dreams of the long long ago
Spinning dreams of an old fashioned garden
And the maid with her old fashioned beau

It seams sometimes I can hear them singing
While the organ's softly playing old black joe
There's an old spinning wheel in the parlor
Spinning dreams of the long long ago


The other song was....

Somebody's tall and handsome
Somebody's brave and true
Somebody's hair is very dark
And somebody's eyes are blue

Somebody came to see me
Somebody came last night
Somebody asked me to marry him
And of course I said all right

The ring is on my finger
Of course, you cannot guess
The one who placed it there
The night I told him yes

Thank you for looking at my blog.

Love,
Henny Penny

Sewing Room/Living Room

What in the world would I do without my tiny little sewing room?   "My space"!  "My place"!

To escape from the camouflage and the wild turkey tails mounted complete with feet and beards.  The deer mounts, deer antler mounts, and the ten pound Bass mounts.  The fox squirrels mounted on logs sitting amongst random antlers on top of the TV cabinet.

Stacked beside the bookcase are ammo boxes and next to the ammo boxes a camouflage container with a padded swivel top that doubles as a seat for the hunter.

Padded, zippered, camouflage gun cases hang from either side of the gun cabinet and antlers on a rope, used for rattling, hang from the corners of the gun cabinet.  A tomahawk with a leather strap hangs from a lower corner of the cabinet.

Hidden behind the fat leather chair stands the mighty crossbow and stuffed behind my Mother's old cedar chest is the crossbow case.

The house smells of freshly dug earth worms, and more often than not there is a camo face mask and bandana soaking in a little soapy water in the bathroom sink.

Friends, this is my living room I am describing here!

Today I am thankful for feminine daughters.  Daughters who tell me to be who I want to be and wear what I think is beautiful...even at my age.  I am thankful for lace and ruffles and kitty cats, for things soft and pink, and things that are lovely.  Can you tell maybe that I have just had a long, delightful, encouraging phone conversation with my Daughter, Lynn, from "A Mother's Journal".   Lynn inspires me!!!

So inspired, I begin digging out pantaloons and pieces that I have made but never had the nerve to wear.  What am I waiting for...to get a few years older? 

An old Canner

The old cupboard, yet again!  I love this old cupboard.  I never grow tired of waxing and dusting and admiring it!  I will always be grateful to cousin Pat and her husband Mike for giving it to me!

Pat and Mike were in New Bern the weekend of the wedding.   Guess what treasure the two of them were hauling around this time?  For me, no less!!!

Pat says the old canner is well over a hundred years old.  Fits right in here with me!  I love it! 

Hay must taste better eaten off the top of the head.  By the time I got the camera, most of the hay was gone, but what a funny sight...she had a ball of hay on her head...

The twin hens, Ruby and Rachael...

Not much to post about today.  I've been busy cleaning house.  I simply woke up in the mood to clean out...as mama used to say,   "there's not enough room to lay a pin down around here"!  :) I surely do miss mama and her funny sayings.

Hope to be back soon.

Love,
Henny Penny

Poppy and the Leaves

Today after lunch, Poppy sat down to watch the noon news, before going hunting.  I went outside and picked up the rake!!  Where to begin!!  The spot I raked clean last week was covered in leaves again!!! 

Poppy must have fallen asleep watching the news.  It was getting on near 2:00.  Thinking, I would drag off one more sheet load of leaves and stop for the day, I glanced up and saw Poppy coming toward me.  He was walking fast, looking rather intently at my work...is something wrong, I ask.  He didn't answer.  He walked on past me and my rake, and threw himself into that pile of leaves!  He surely did...

He said, "actually, this is pretty comfortable".  It just looked so funny!!  I should have raked him onto that king size sheet with the leaves and pulled him to my leaf dump.

The chickens following me around finding morsels of food and bits of grass that have been covered by the leaves...

I am making a progress...I need to think of this as two hours of exercising every day.  According to the info found on line, a person weighing 150 pounds burns 242 calories an hour raking leaves!  Wow!  I should be slim and trim...

We need to keep encouraged!  Thank you for looking at my blog.

Love,
Henny Penny

Daughters

Thank you to a new follower, Marty, from "Welcome Words", who writes a beautiful blog with lots of posts I am looking forward to reading.

Also thank you and welcome to Luckybunny, a new follower.

The fact that anyone reads my blog amazes me, as I am not a writer!  Never would I have dreamed anyone would follow my blog.  Thank you.  I am so excited!

You know when you see something every day, you reach a point where you no longer see it, even though it's still there.  Like these pictures of my daughters.  This is Lynn...

 This is Andee...

An old double frame holding these two pictures from the early 1970's, sits on my dresser.  Every morning, when I sit in front of the mirror at that dresser, these sweet little girls are there too.  Most mornings I don't even notice, but then some mornings they catch my eye.  I pick up the pictures and think, where have the years gone?  My little Lynn with the blue eyes and freckles across her nose, and my little Andee with those dark brown eyes...as mama used to say, black as little chinkapins!  

Is there anything any better in this world than feeling your child's little arms around your neck?  That's me holding Andee after a fall that hurt her mouth.  Lynn and my Mother both came running to comfort Andee too.

Oh my!  These 70's hairdo's!  It took a bunch of teasing, but it stayed in place!

This picture was taken in Smyrna, Tennessee in 1965.  Andee was only a few days old.  That is a happy smile on my face!

Any of you who read Lynn's blog, "A Mothers Journal" will know how much she loves flowers and dresses and purses.   Well it started at a young age...

Remember the old saying or poem, "A son is a son til he takes a wife.  A daughter is a daughter all of her life"?  I would love to have had a son too, but daughters are really special.  

Thank you for stopping by.

Love,
Henny Penny