I think it would be-------eztia! Why, you ask? Because she would be the only one to take the time to research it's history, and study past champions, and memorize all the angles!!! You go, ez!

Hi all, I just finished watching a Sarah Richardson kitchen makeover and she did the most beautiful backsplash design! She used 12" x 18" pieces of carrera marble with a 1" x 18" strip of black mosaic tile and 2 each 1" x18" of gray mosaic tile between each piece of marble. Stunning! She is definitely the tile master. Or mistress!

Any of you OLLDies raise chickens or bees? I'm about to start with both and wanted to hear the do's and dont's.

@creeser,
No, but I WANT to get chickens and have fresh eggs. I just don't think our small yard has room for them. Bees I'll leave to others. I don't even like honey. But I'll admire yours from afar.

@feeny....re; umbrellas walmart believe it or not. i was getting ready to order them online, but found them there.
never done chickens or bees.

feeny, you don't need a lot of room for chickens. If zoning would allow, you ought to take a look at some of the small coops. My aunt has a small one with just 4 hens and it's such a perfect size. That's what I want to get. Something small and manageable.
And no roosters.

The first is the size I want to build for chickens. The second is a great compact size.
[houzz=][houzz=]

@MM and Olldbobbi. Re: ping-pong. When I was a teen, our "forever house" was "evolving," and the dining room held a ping-pong table for months and months. Anyone walking by would just join in. I played the former Korean Junior National Champion (coincidence) when we were both in our 30s and gave him a run for his money for about 5 minutes!

I like the swinging bed in the "playroom" of the OLLD House.

@olldbobbi. I can't imagine living anywhere for 90 years. I can't even imagine living to be 90!

well sounds like ez is gonna be the ping-pong champ!
heard on the news this week that the oldest living woman, 114, from georgia passed away. i thought, my god, don't think i want to live that long.

My grandmother passed away about 3 years ago at the age of 99. She was in great mental and physical shape and it probably sounds weird, but when we found out she was dying, it surprised us! Us grandkids actually thought we'd just pass her on down once our parents passed away, like a lovely family antique.

@MP. No ping-pong for me these days.

Is there a place to swim at the OLLD House?

Here is a Houzz photo of a swimming pool with a beach entry. wheelchair accessible!

@creeser. Re: chickens. Check your zoning law. Then decide if the neighbors' dogs would bark all the time because of the chickens. If you do get chickens, have everyone start collecting egg cartons for you. You will need a LOT of them!
No roosters. They crow whenever they want! Someone in my neighborhood had one for a few years. 4 am and it would start making a racket, off and on all day, as well.

creeser! Why? Why do you want to raise chickens?

My cousins have chickens & a vegetable garden, but they live in the exurbs & have at least 2 acres. I think they have about 5 hens & a rooster. They have an enclosed shed & enclosed fully chicken-wired section. But also another section that's open on top .. but lost a chicken to a hawk that way, so that area might have been fenced or the closed off now.

creeser, can you travel if you raise chickens? Just wondering if you need to hire a hen sitter if you go out of town.

MP, that wouldn't be hard to take!

What's everyone cooking for dinner tonight?

and we can go to the ocean

leftover chili

leftover vegetarian chili!

Today must be lefover chili day!

There's no zoning laws for chickens out here. We've got 160 acres, so no bothering the neighbors. I didn't want a rooster, not only for the crowing, but because I didn't want babies. I just want eggs.*L*
MM, you have to have a chicken sitter. Like any other caged animal, they have to be fed and watered daily. Chickens scratch through the dirt hunting for bugs and their water suffers for it. It really needs to be changed twice daily. We seldom travel, but my son lives over the barn at the end of the field, so he is our resident pet/chicken sitter if we do. My bees won't need a sitter though! *L*
bobbi, I like chickens and I want the fresh eggs. I'd have a whole zoo if hubby let me. *L*
astraea, the predators are the only thing that bothers me about getting chickens. Other than the hawks, there are coyotes, raccoons, possums, dogs and cats and probably even bobcats around. Ooops.. and snakes. I had the idea of putting their fenced in coop inside my fenced in garden in the front, but hubby vetoed that. Said he didn't want a chicken coop in front of the house. I mean, it's not like we really have to worry about curb appeal out here..*L*

I'm cooking a cajun spice turkey breast for supper. Green beans with potatoes on the side and something else I haven't decided on.

creeser, you win! What time is dinner???

30 minutes! I'll set you a place at the table!

Thank you!

Yes creeser, animals dig under the fencing too; forgot what my cousin did to prevent that. Is there any other reason to get a rooster .. to make the hens happy? I guess you get 1 egg per day per chicken, as long as they're laying. Do you know what breed you want?

And now you've made me hungry!!

@MP. The back deck of the OLLD House is wonderful. I am imagining myself snuggled into a sleeping bag on a deck chair at night (with a mosquito net tent) and in the pool all day. :D

I'll be right beside you ez...one lounge chair over! :)

chili is ALWAYS better 2 days later!

creesy is goin all out! you know that is going to be scrumptous!

Stealing C P's computer for a minute:

I do not know anything about chickens, but don't you need hens and a rooster to get the chickens?
Biology 101

Because I am off my computer all day I:

walked 4 miles
cleaned and scrubbed the fridge
spent two hours trying to figure out this******new cell phone
cut up lots of veggies for stir-fry with shrimp over Jasmine rice
made TWO margaritas
drank the two margaritas
Now, going to watch On Demand Downton Abbey.

We have a new OLLD?

Any new "fights" going on?

https://www.houzz.com/magazine/raise-backyard-chickens-without-ruffling-neighbors-feathers-stsetivw-vs~5022490

Morning all, please don't talk about dinner, my stomach absolutely turned cartwheels at the mention of chilli. Tried some bland breakfast a little while ago and it is admonishing me for inflicting that on it. The male German leaves tomorrow and is cooking an authentic schnitzel dinner tonight that I was really looking forward to but I won't be there. Don't even feel like sitting socialising.

Chooks 1.01 - chooks are really cute and become very tame. Contrary to what people think they can be very quiet you forget they are there, other times, like all women, you can't shut them up. They only lay eggs for about 2 1/2 - 3 years by which time they are no good for anything, even eating. Check out all species as they do vary in the amount of eggs they lay and their egg laying life, and the chooks are priced accordingly. Not all chooks lay every day. If there is a problem with wild animals digging, the coop needs a wire mesh floor attached firmly to the walls which can have dirt placed over it for the chooks to scratch. While large snakes will eat chooks, the smaller ones love the eggs. The quality and colour of the eggs depends a lot on the food they eat and too much of something can be as bad as not enough. They love vegetable scraps - tomatoes are one favourite and corn. They also need grit to ensure the shell of their eggs is hard. Sometimes chooks will go broody and the best cure for that is to buy some almost ready to hatch eggs and let them hatch them and raise the chick, which of course equals more chooks for you.

As to a hutch, they love to roost up off the ground at night and are happy to be totally closed in, so providing a platform, even with some divisions as beds, and covered in shredded newspaper and/or straw is essential. The straw doesn't have to be changed daily, just when it looks bad but it is easy to remove droppings daily to keep the coop clean and non stinky.

Astraea - if there was a hand behind that spider it pretty much would have covered most of it. I'm sure I did post a photo once before that showed the size but I can't find it.

The annoying parrots are the cockies - Sulphur Crested White Cockatoos - we have a huge flock of them here but fortunately they don't ground very much. They are a very much "do not feed" bird. Don't know about tearing up cars, it wouldn't surprise me, but they do love to chew on wood - balcony railings, eaves, fascia boards, anything. They have the most raucous screech that is deafening, but they can easily be trained to talk. If you ever see any of them caged in an animal park trying saying "Hello Cocky" to them. I told the story once before how I did this in a park up in N Queensland, I just love talking to them, but didn't realise there were 2 busloads of Japanese tourists nearby. Once the birds started answering me back and asking "Scratch Cocky" I was surrounded by cameras and videos - wasn't quick enough to charge.

Bobbi, DD took the kids up to Monterey for a short break and they went to the Aquarium and absolutely loved it. Got heaps of photos - it looks a great place. I loved how the kids could draw a jelly fish on a screen and it came up on a huge screen on the wall. Miss 6's drawing and I was thinking of enlarging this photo for my ensuite

@olldroo. The drawing Miss 6 did of the jellyfish is precious. There is a fellow who comments in the DD section who does custom tile design. I wonder if he would turn her drawing into a tile for you? Probably does the image digitally, so you could have whatever size you like. Just an idea...

feeny - would this be small enough for you

http://www.omlet.us/products_services/products_services.php?cat=Eglu+Go&subcat=Introduction

I think your main problem might be the minimum distance the coop has to be from adjoining houses.

Love it, roo! But, no, chickens just aren't meant for city-size back yards. ;-(

@judy: Despite Biology 101, what you are usually eating when you eat your morning egg is an unfertilized egg. No rooster needed unless you want the eggs fertilized and hatched into chicks.

Promised you some roo photos last night. This is a place about 1/2 hour from us the kids love

Good thought eztia, he could probably eliminate the gap too. I just loved the eyelashes!! I will think about that, he could ship to DDs as she is coming out in June - we hope.

Just realised - ping-pong - count me in!!!

Roo - Love the photos from Koala park .. those are just the right size for me; looks like a wallaby she's feeding? The koala looks nice & chubby .. I want one (LOL)!

astraea, I'm not sure, but I think I could put a layer of the wire on the bottom of the pen as well, then cover it with dirt and straw to keep things from digging in. That's one of my issues I need to check on before we build the coop. Not sure the type of chickens yet. Maybe a couple of different breeds. I love the look of the Silkies, but they lay such small eggs. I guess it depends on the hen, but I think you can count on an egg every other day while they are laying.

judy, no baby chickens! That's why I don't want a rooster. Hens will lay eggs without a rooster, they just won't be fertilized. And I LOVE Downtown Abbey! Got it recorded and need to watch it.

We need to get feeny fixed up with a small, single hen coop in her kitchen. :))

Oh, creeser, that is funny, a friend of mine owned a block of apartments at one time in an older area of Sydney that was gradually taken over by a specific ethnic community. They used to take the doors off the upper kitchen cupboards and replace with chicken wire and stash their chooks in there. They also made raised garden beds in the lounge room for vege growing. My friend gave up and sold the apartments.

You would have to make sure the wire floor of the coop was attached to the sides so there was no way of anything getting in between.

Different breeds of chooks lay different amounts of eggs per year. Choose one or 6

http://www.backyardchickens.com/products/category/chicken-breeds

Lots of reviews too, you might need a week to go through it all.

Also http://www.mypetchicken.com/chicken-breeds/breed-list.aspx
http://www.small-farm-permaculture-and-sustainable-living.com/types_of_chickens.html

None of them give price but probably if you created a shopping basket you would find out.

The next series of Downton Abbey is about to start here in a few weeks. We have the Australian Tennis Championships starting next week and at the moment they are advertising all the new programmes that are starting "after the tennis".

roo, there you go! We will make her cabinets a coop. Oh she will love it. Wonder where she hides her key? We can sneak in, revamp her cabinets and fill them with chickens and a rooster. Imagine her joy! *L*

Creeser my daughter is mad for chickens! She's jealous of your chickens to be! We bought a metal chicken on a string the other day for her bedroom! I'd love to grow my own veg/fruit and have chickens, ducks too because my wee fella loves it for dinner. I am not telling her about chickens in the house though!

A metal chicken on a string! Now that's MY kind of chicken!

Once I get them, lisa, I'll post photos for you to share. We went into a store called Tractor Supply this past weekend and there was a small red hen and rooster, perched on a buggy by the register. Also, there was a lady shopping in the store with a small black hen perched on her shoulder clucking contentedly. So cute! I didn't know you could take your chickens shopping with you. *L*

Boy, you guys don't live in my "neck of the woods" .. people with chickens perched on their shoulders?! (LOL). When I was a kid, they still sold ducklings around Easter, and Mom got one for me. It was so adorable .. but apparently fragile, because we let it swim in the kitchen sink, and it got sick & died .. I was heart-broken. So the next year, an uncle felt sorry for me, and I came home to find a full grown white duck in the house; grandma was NOT pleased! She'd had a farm, and knew that ducks are not "indoor pets"; you just looked at him, and had to clean up a puddle. He lasted just a week in the house!