Welcome Kathryn, Clara and Kaylee!

We've been planning to get chickens for a while now, and we finally did it! We have coop plans in the review process with the HOA (more on those details later) and a brooder with three chicks in the guest bathroom. Say hello to the new additions to our family:

We got two Araucanas (also known as Easter Eggers) and one Welsummer. They were supposed to be about a week old when I brought them home on Monday, but we're pretty sure the Welsummer is at least a couple days younger than the Araucanas because she is so much smaller and her feathers aren't as developed yet.

A while back Sean and I decided that if/when we got chickens, we were going to name them after strong science fiction female characters whose names start with a "k" sound.

This is one of the Araucanas. She quickly asserted herself as the dominant chick, so she is Captain Kathryn Janeway (Star Trek Voyager).

The other Araucana. She is named Clara Oswin Oswald (Doctor Who). She's already proving herself a handful, loves to try to fly whenever I'm cleaning the brooder and wants to be in the middle of all action.

This is the Welsummer, Kaylee Frye (Firefly). She's a sweetie and loves following Kathryn around.

Surprisingly, Fleck has adapted to the new residents fairly well. The first day she was a little freaked out by all the cheeping, but the second day she hung out on the guest bed most of the day listening to them. We have a baby gate up between the guest bath and the guest room, so she couldn't get in. I also closed the bathroom door if I couldn't be in the room with the animals. I don't think Fleck would do anything, but she is a cat so I don't trust her completely with my chicks.

The chicks are so much fun to watch! I'm looking forward to the weather warming up so we can get our coop built and move the girls outside. I'll try to post somewhat regularly about the chickens, it shouldn't be too hard with all the pictures I'm taking of them!

****

Linked up to:

The Chicken Chick

Weekly Meal Plan 3.13.16

It's been busy here, so my meal planning has been a little haphazard. Even this week, I have two meetings at 6 pm, meaning I take dinner with me and Sean eats leftovers. But, I'm trying a new produce delivery box (it's similar to the CSA we were part of back in California, where it's a biweekly thing and I can cancel or reschedule delivery, not the traditional CSA model -- I'll talk about it when I've eaten more of the food so I have an opinion!) so I'm working on meal planning for the week even if it is a slightly crazy one!

Here's what we're planning to eat this week:

Sunday: leftovers

Monday: dinner at rehearsal, leftovers for Sean

Tuesday: slow cooker pasta fagioli

Wednesday: leftovers

Thursday: whole chicken and beet greens with bacon

Friday: chicken salad

Saturday: beet pesto pizza

Newly Opened Etsy Shop!

I've been on a major crafting roll lately, so I decided to open up an Etsy shop. HERE Sean helped me come up with the name "To Boldly Craft" since I have also been inspired by Princess Awesome and other crafters who make fantastically nerdy things for girls, for all kids, and for adults.

I have both this sweater and this hat listed right now

I imagine it will be fairly eclectic as my listings grow, as I love trying out new techniques all the time. But right now it has a number of knitted baby projects, since that's been my main stress buster lately. I've also made up some pot holders using leftover fabric from Sean's Dalek Dice Bag, and those amazing rocket ship baby gifts from last summer. Because everyone needs a little space nerd in the kitchen, right?

I'll still post some of my crafts here, and I promise not to post links to the shop too often, since that isn't what this blog is about. But I'm excited to be able to (hopefully) continuously fund my crafty hobby!

Grey and Black Baby Hat

I've held off on sharing this little project because it was a gift, but now that it's been given to the new parents I can share this cute grey and black baby hat!

I had some odd amounts of grey and black yarn in my stash, and I've discovered that baby projects are the best way to use up those small leftovers! I borrowed the book 60 Quick Baby Knits from the library, and used one of the patterns to make this hat. It's made from yarn that I'm 90% sure is wool, though I lost the wrapper to it ages ago.

This is actually my first project doing circular knitting. My awesome in-laws got me a nice new set of knitting needles for Chanukah, so I've been experimenting with trying out new techniques. I'm a little hooked on circular knitting though, so there will likely be more little hats in my future!

Quick Knitted Ear Warmer

This winter has been rather snowy here! On one of our snowy afternoons, I whipped up this quick knitted ear warmer using some leftover chenille yarn. I found this pattern, which I mostly followed. Since my chenille yarn was thicker than the yarn used in the pattern, I cast on as if I was doing the kid size, but did the length about halfway between kid and adult size since my head runs on the small size. I think I actually could have made it even shorter. If you try the pattern, I recommend measuring often!

Since I have some leftover chenille in grey I may try the pattern again and make it smaller to see if that fits me better. I do like the ear warmer for days when I don't want a full hat but need something to keep the chill off my ears when I go for a walk!

Dalek Dice Bag

Yikes, a month since my last post! That's what theater does to me, but I wouldn't change it for the world! I have a few recent projects that I'll be sharing over the next couple of days. The first is this dice bag.

Sean recently started playing D&D with our friends, so of course he had to get his own set of dice. And when you have dice, you need a dice bag. One of our friends gave me this pattern that she adapted to make dice bags for both herself and her husband. The original pattern is for a travel jewelry bag, and it has 8 interior pockets. My friend eliminated the interior pockets completely, but when Sean saw the pockets he thought it might be nice to have a few so I changed the pattern to have 4 little pockets rather than the original 8.

Sean's very happy with the results!

 the completed dice bag

Daleks on the outside with navy thread

The pattern was very simple to follow. It tells you to print out 4 copies and tape them together, but I only printed 2 and then folded the fabric, placing the center line of the circle along the fold.

stars inside with yellow thread

For the pockets, I only had to make a half circle instead of the full circle in the original pattern.

I used a black satin cord, and knotted on some blue plastic beads that I had in my bead stash.

This was a really simple project that I was able to finish in only a couple of hours. Now that I have the pattern, I might make one for myself for jewelry travel like the pattern was designed for! The only problem is that I probably shouldn't use Daleks or I might end up with dice instead of earrings by accident -- or Sean could show up to D&D night with the wrong bag! Hmmm...I guess this calls for a trip to the fabric store to find some more awesome fabric!

Weekly Meal Plan 1.10.16

We are on to our second week of Whole 30. Sean is getting into helping me with the meal planning (the Bacon Wrapped Guacamole Stuffed Chicken Breasts for this Saturday's dinner were one of the first things he pinned onto his Whole 30 Pinterest board). Here's what we're eating this week:

Sunday breakfast: Egg Foo Young-ish
Sunday dinner: Boneless Pork Ribs and Garlic Spinach (Paleo Slow Cooking)

Monday breakfast: leftover egg foo young-ish
Monday dinner: leftovers

Tuesday breakfast: Italian sausage, egg and spinach bowl
Tuesday dinner: Asian meatballs and Black Sesame Green Beans

Wednesday breakfast: banana chia pudding
Wednesday dinner: leftovers

Thursday breakfast: bacon butternut squash quiche
Thursday dinner: Carrot Ginger soup & salad

Friday breakfast: leftover bacon butternut squash quiche
Friday dinner: Grilled Steak with Garlic-Shallot Purée and Avocado, with leftover green beans

Saturday breakfast: Smoked Salmon Frittata
Saturday dinner: Bacon Wrapped Guacamole Stuffed Chicken Breasts and roasted vegetables