Bianca's first egg

Bianca is 23 weeks old and joined us, and our other 6 chickens, 5 weeks ago along with her friend Imogen.

Today, Bianca laid her very first egg. It was easy to tell that it was hers, because it was tiny, and bright white. We knew she would lay a white egg because she is a White Star chicken.

There it is, along with her friends' eggs. Not Imogen's, we're still waiting for her first egg.
Strange thing was, when I went into the run this afternoon, Bianca, who is normally very shy and runs away as soon as you go anywhere near her, hunched up her shoulders and sat waiting for a cuddle. So she got lots of fuss and cuddles. Obviously very proud of herself. Clever girl.

And it was delicious. Thankyou, Bianca. 

Handmade Monday

This my first ever Handmade Monday.    (What's it all about?)
And it comes straight after my First Finished Object Friday. I'm on a roll.

So, I'm actually a knitter but I've chosen to show you cakes I've made recently. This is because I have no photos of current projects that I haven't already used, and there is no light now for photography.
I hope you enjoy the cakes anyway. There's a high percentage of butter in that buttercream. And the eggs in the cakes come from our own well-cuddled chickens.

New girls!

Much excitement here in Chickenland.

Two new girls have arrived.

This afternoon we visited Newland Grange Poultry for the first time.

Lovely place. Very well kept, clean and tidy.

We had a look around, at the fancy chickens, the ducks, (avoiding the little dog because of Ellen's phobia), and chose our 2 new girls.

Bianca is a White Star. She will lay porcelain white eggs, when she is ready in a few weeks, but she's only 17 weeks old at the moment.

Bianca, say 'hello' to everyone. She hasn't said much yet. She's a good girl, went to bed nice and early all by herself.

And here's Imogen. She's a Columbine and has an 80% chance of laying a blue egg. Nice.

Imogen seems to be very vocal.

After they've been here for a couple of weeks, we'll integrate them with the big girls and we'll be back to our 8 chickens again.

We look forward to our first '8 egg day' which we sadly never achieved previously, because the lovely Portia stopped laying before Miranda and Rosalind started.

Go on!

Who's going to have a go first? Go on, I dare you!

(Why did the farmer leave it here, anyway?)

Portia is considering corn.

Treasure Hunt

Today I went on a treasure hunt in the garden. I dug up the rest of the potatoes and googled how to store them. This is my first year of growing vegetables so I have a lot to learn.

The Bramleys are starting to fall so I'm collecting them a few at a time.

These are Ellen's carrots which she planted in the spring. She was pleased to see them come out of the ground and proudly carried them into the house. I told her that we'd need to wash them before we ate them.

The blackberries are growing around the chicken coop and I've already made a few crumbles.

5 eggs were laid today. Portia is retired and Missy was having a day off, so thanks go to Tamora, Desdemona, Juliet, Miranda and Rosalind.

When I brought everything back into the house, the carrots and Ellen were nowhere to be seen. I found them in the bathroom, where Ellen was washing the carrots, thankfully without soap.

We have been eating the carrots and Rachel said that they tasted like they had a dollop of sugar on them.