Funky Chickens and Other Fair Phenomena
Fancy chickens in the poultry barn. Sometimes, sometimes it was hard to tell which end was which, if you know what I’m sayin’.
Required eating at the fair, pierogies and kielbasi for me, and chili in a bread bowl for A-man.
My crazy kid road this thing!!! What’s worse is that I let her!!
I take this picture every year, and the jeep keeps getting smaller. How does that happen?
To See and Do in Charleston, South Carolina
I do not intend for this to become a travel blog. but I know I’m always interested in personal recommendations, so I thought I’d share my thoughts on some of the things we did in Charleston.
Wyndham Vacation Rentals – The goal of this trip was to relax, reconnect with friends and see some sights. We knew that more than anything, we just wanted to hang out, kick back and relax. So we needed someplace with a living room. We were only staying a few days, so maid service wasn’t crucial. We ended up at a Wyndham time share on the Isle of Palms (a beach community just outside of Charleston). The downside was we had to drive to everything, but the upside was a comfortable place to hang out (decor not withstanding). If you find yourself with similar lodging needs, I’d recommend this and would consider staying at a time-share resort again.
The Old Slave Market – An open air marketplace where vendors sell their wares is not an uncommon tourist attraction, but what set this one apart was the quality of the items for sale. In my experience, these types of markets tend to have either kitschy touristy junk or fine art that is out of my budget. At The Marketplace in Charleston, you could find magnets and shot glasses, but those stalls were far outnumbered by local vendors selling beautifully hand crafted wares many of which were very affordable. I started my Christmas shopping for those people on my list who are hard to buy for. I even picked up a hand thrown pottery bowl for myself and a hand painted sign that is oh so apropos to our family.
For lunch that day we ate at The Charleston Crab House The roof deck was airy, the iced tea (ordered half and half) was cold and frequently refilled and the crab cake was full of lump crab with just the right seasoning. My mouth is watering as I type. There are several locations around Charleston, go fourth and enjoy!
Segway of Charleston – Segways are really fun to ride and require minimal body exertion to participate (you must be able to stand for an extended time). Two of us had ridden Segways, two of us had not but they picked it up really quickly during our training session. Unfortunately the City of Charleston had outlawed the use of Segways in the city limits. so we were relegated to Mt. Pleasant the next city over. Tack (the owner) was a fun and personable tour guide and showed us the sights of Mt. pleasant including gorgeous architecture, a few historic sites and the location for the shooting of the movie adaptation of the Nicholas Spark’s novel The Notebook. While fun, this is not a tour of the sights of Charleston proper. That said, Segways are a blast to ride and we had a great time. We definitely felt it was worth the money and it was fun to do something different that your average canned tour.
Saturday for lunch, we enjoyed the Charleston Farmer’s Market in Marion Square in downtown Charleston. The Market borders the park on two sides. You can find anything from fresh fruits and vegetables to hand made tables and hand bags. There were a number of vendors preparing food for immediate consumption and the offerings varied from vietnamese to crepes, greek and even gourmet grilled cheeses. I had greek from My Big Fat Greek Food Tent and it was great. For dessert, I had a peach popsicle. From The King of Pops, that was just amazing! It wasn’t too sweet and had pieces of peach mixed in.
The Wreck – While on the Segway tour, Tack took us by The Wreck of the Richard and Charlene known to the locals as just The Wreck. It’s basically an oversized screened in porch that overlooks Shem Creek and includes a dock for guests who wish to arrive by boat. The building is scrunched between a boat storage facility and a shrimp processing company (can you say FRESH seafood?). The name memorializes a boat (the Richard and Charlene) that came to rest on the same spot during hurricane Hugo. The food was fantastic. The service was meh, but to be fair, we arrived half hour before closing on what had clearly been a busy Saturday night. You had the feeling that you’d stumbled on to a secret held dear by the locals. I had a she crab soup that was to die for. I also had my first taste of fried green tomatoes and they were just delicious. The beer was cold and given the chance, I would definitely return.
Sunday afternoon after The Waffle house for breakfast and a quick stop at Trader Joe’s. We made a trip out to Memorial Waterfront Park. There is great play ground for kinds and a long pier for fishing. It also features oversized front porch swings for well, swinging!
Afterwards, we had some time to kill before heading home, so we headed to Kudu. I knew we’d hit the jackpot when the sign out front announced fresh coffee and local craft beers. We picked up our beverages found a table in the adjoining courtyard where we could enjoy them. The fresh brewed iced Tea was perfect. The only downside was the cigarette smoke. It’s a jarring encounter when you rarely encounter it in your daily life. But, this is the South, so I guess it is to be expected.
I enjoyed our trip to New Orleans last year, but felt like I just didn’t connect with the city. Charleston was all together different. It brings together Southern Charm and hosptialty, with a funky side and some high tech thrown in for good measure. We really only scratched the surface of New Orleans, but I feel like I’ve seen enough. Charleston on the other hand feels like there is so much left to see.
Have you ever been to Charleston? What did we miss?
Decor Discord
When we visited Charleston we knew we wanted more than a pair of hotel rooms but between price and availability we weren’t able to find what we wanted in a hotel property. So eventually we landed at a Wyndham Vacation Rental on the Isle of Palms. It was laid out perfectly with two bedrooms, two bathrooms a small kitchen and a living space with enough comfy chairs for everyone AND free wireless internet. The unit over looked a pool, was a short walk to the beach and was part of a larger resort that offered bike rentals and other amenities. In a word, it was perfect.
Well, there was this one thing. Um, whoever decorated the space had some REALLY interesting tastes. The overall theme was Key West Modern which really makes sense given the location and the setting, but the execution was well, kitchy.
The bedroom I shared had a nautical theme. IN YO FACE, OVER THE TOP NAUTICAL YO!
These gems hung out in the kitchen, I’d hate to disturb this lovely just to get a cookie.
They looked out on the living space, inhabited by a wicker couch with cushions in a loud Hawaiian shirt pattern. Sorry, not photo as it was usually occupied :).
This? This is the piece de resistance. It is hung just outside the kitchen door, so I suspect it is an attempt at preventing vacation over indulgence (as if the cookie jar wasn’t enough), but it kind of gives me the creeps especially since I kept resting my hand on her bum as I looked for a light switch (turns out the switch was on the inside).
There was one item I just loved.
Because really who cares about time when you’re on vacation?
Charleston, September 2012
“Mom what was your favorite thing about Charleston?” Mim asked. “The laughter.”
Four women, three nights, four days in Charleston, South Carolina and the surrounds. At one time, our only connection to one another was work related, but over time we grew to be friends which is good because eventually our work paths diverged. With one exception, we stay in touch via Facebook and Twitter. We know enough about each other to be concerned if one of us drops out of sight for too long (yes Scottie I’ve checked up on you), but there are great stories to share when we see each other.
The weather was warm, but not too hot. The food was fabulous and Karon took it upon herself to introduce the Yankees to some of the bounty the South had to offer. Bless her heart 😉. We experienced, she crab soup, real crab cakes, fried shrimp (that tasted like shrimp, not breading), fried green tomatoes, grits, muscadines, and boiled peanuts.
I learned some of the local dialect too.
- “Iced tea, half and half”, results in a beverage that tastes good, but won’t put you in a diabetic coma after the first sip.
- “Nakin, nakin, nakin” means “Do you want a napkin for the blob of muscadine that is on your chin?”
- “Boyld peanut?” roughly translates to soggy, cold bead that has the texture of an undercooked potato.
We went on a Segway tour, saw Patriot Point, visited The Marketplace in downtown Charleston and experienced a fantastic farmers’ market. We shopped at a Piggly Wiggly (a.k.a. The Pig), ate breakfast at the Waffle House and enjoyed afternoon refreshment at Kudu, a local coffee house that also served craft beers and had a lovely courtyard. We rode the trolleys, got completely confused about who was meeting who, and where, ate lots of food that went straight to our hips and even laid a myth or two to rest. But, most of all, we laughed and that was indeed, the best part of the time I spent in Charleston, South Carolina.
Maximum Opportunity for Advancement.
Back in the days when we were DINKS (double income, no kids). I STRUGGLED to fit exercise into my daily routine. It was much easier to take off on a Sunday and ride into Boston to the Museum of Science (and back) on a 25 mile bike ride.
These days, I’ve still got the husband, but have added two kids and their activity schedules, and a fledgling writing career. Now? Now I REALLY don’t have time to exercise. I’ve made some attempts along the way, but have not been consistent. I don’t mind exercise and I truly do feel better when I’m exercising regularly, but it honestly has to be in my way to happen. If I have to make room for it, no way, no how it’s gonna happen. Sad, but true.
Last spring, Fish was promoted in karate, so our time at the dojo went from 45 minutes twice a week to 90 minutes, twice, sometimes three times a week. As I waited for her class to finish, I watched the BagFit class going on in the second dojo. BagFit is part cardio and part boxing, and from what I saw it also included a lot of sweat and laughs. The class was made up of women around my age, many of them karate moms. They finally razzed me enough about being a lurker that I decided to give it a try. I have zero upper body strength and am prone to tendonitis in my shoulders (I’d just come off 3 months of PT for my left shoulder when, with permission, I started BagFit). No problem. The instructor (one of the co-owners of the dojo), modified the workouts so I didn’t strain anything. After my two demo classes, I was hooked.
I tell people, I hate it when I start but by the time I’m done, I love it. I sweat like crazy, I get my heart rate up and I truly have a lot of fun. There is a lot of camaraderie in the class and we cheer each other on. I love that I can burn some calories rather than warming a seat. Like other martial arts programs, there is a belt system to keep you challenged and motivated. I started as a white belt and worked my way to a yellow belt by the end of the summer. I’m now working towards my orange belt.
My kids are into karate but with summer comes camps and vacations and other schedule busters. To keep attendance up over the summer, The dojo ran a program called MOA, Maximum Opportunity for Advancement, for all their classes. Any student that attended 18 classes June 25th and August 25th earned the opportunity to test early for their next belt promotion and they got a special t-shirt. My kids were into MOA. I was regularly quizzed about how many classes they had in the MOA count and if we missed a karate class on a given week they wanted to know when they were going to make it up.
When we were getting close to the August 25th cut off, the kids had more than enough classes, but it was unclear if I would make the 18 classes. Since, I’m a newly minted yellow belt, I wasn’t interested in testing, I just wanted the shirt! A miracle came through and I did indeed get the t-shirt. The belt tells my peers in the class I’m progressing, but the t-shirt? The t-shirt tells the world hey! I kicked some butt and took some names this summer, what did you do?
Killer Instinct
Don’t let the innocent faces confuse you. These are the faces of killers.
Three chickens in three days!
When we came home Friday evening, we closed the chickens in and tried to do a headcount, but as they are literally a moving target, I didn’t worry too much for absolute accuracy. I was aiming to be sure I hadn’t locked half the flock outside.
It was as I was backing out of the driveway headed to my house that I saw the brown lump out of the corner of my eye. Yup, a dead chicken in the middle of my Mother-in-law’s front yard. I sent the kids home and instructed them to call both dogs in. I’ll admit it, my city kid roots showed through as stood there wondering “what the hell am I supposed to do with a chicken carcass?” I called some of my experts but no one was available, so I just left it knowing A-man would be home soon.
As for what killed it, the dogs were barking their heads off when I pulled in (something I’ve become remarkably adept at blocking out). So my theory at the time was they had scared a predator off, but it was too late for the chicken. Heh, innocence is bliss ain’t it?
Saturday, I was at a karate tournament and A-man was in the barn working on a chicken door for the pen. A chicken door in the pen would allow us to leave scraps for the chickens without the fear that the dogs would nosh and make themselves ill.
Sunday we were all set to tackle some nagging chores. When we heard the dogs screeching and growling outside the back door. As I rounded the corner on the deck, I saw the telltale black and white feathers. As I texted to the other co-owners “We forcibly expressed our displeasure with their behavior.” Then we put them inside and A-man went in search of electrified poultry fencing.
!%$#@!!! Dogs!!! I can hear the critics nodding their heads saying “Ay yut, coulda told ‘ja that’d happen”. I know it is instinct, but they are herding dogs. Can’t they just herd the chickens? Everybody gets a little exercise, no one gets hurt right? Yeah not so much.
We spend the afternoon installing the chicken fence. Chicken fence that is meant to be installed on flat land when we live on anything but flat land. We finally got it all set up and let the birds out to “play”. They seemed to figure out pretty quickly, not to touch it. I went home to let the dogs out and in search of caffeine. A few minutes later, I heard A-man yelling. A-man doesn’t yell. He is not easily ruffled. As I bolted down the trail between the two houses, Mork, the older of the two dogs, met me half way. I grabbed his collar and dragged him back. Seems he plowed right through the fence and snagged another chicken without even batting an eye. I guess our previous expression of our displeasure didn’t settle in. Like I said !%$#@!!! Dogs!!!
For the short term, we’re on a rotating schedule. If the chickens are out, the dogs are in and vice versa.
!%$#@!!! Dogs!!!
For those who are counting, between this incident and the three we lost last weekend, we’re down to 20 birds.
. . . and Then There Were Two
Our flock is a mixed flock. I’d love to tell you that the breeds were picked for their superior laying ability, but the truth is it came down to appearance, availability and egg color. Yes you read that right, egg color. You’re probably most familiar with the quintessential white egg. Here in New England we have brown eggs (sing with me now, brown eggs are local eggs and local eggs are fresh). Some of the fancy breeds lay beautiful pastel color eggs, but A-Man and eggs have not always had the best relationship. In college he experienced salmonella poisoning and a reaction so severe it required an ambulance ride and hospitalization. It’s only been relatively recently that he started eating eggs again.
Despite the fact that the perpetrator of his illness was a western omelet, something about the fancy eggs brings back bad memories. So our girls will only lay white and brown eggs. The majority of our flock are reds 6 New Hampshire and 6 Rhode Island. Our next largest population are the barred rocks then we have 3 Leg Horns and 3 sex-linkeds. well, we had 3 sex-linkeds.
Last week the circle of life continued. One of our flock became another creature’s lunch. One of the other Mother Hens (the human kind) was nearby at the time, but the exact details of the demise are unclear. The girls were out and about foraging for bugs and at one point there was a big kerfuffle that involved the dogs throwing a ginormous hissy fit, a flurry of feathers and lots of squawking. Things settled down pretty quickly, so no one thought much of it at the time. When we did our nightly headcount we discovered that one of the sex-linkeds was gone. A search was conducted but every other hen was in the pen and the saying “birds of a feather stick together” is true. Not to mention, that no bird EVER misses out on a bowl of dinner scraps. Holding out just a smidgen of hope, we waited 24 hours before before we broke the news to our respective flocks, but she didn’t return.
So now we’re down to 23 birds. I suspect this will not be the last time this happens, nature of the beast as they say. The birds go off in the woods to forage. The collies have decided that the birds occasionally need to be herded. If the hens move too far away from home base, Mork, the older one will circle them back in with calm and patience. Dory, the younger one demonstrates no finesse whatsoever and just runs at them barking until they move back to where she thinks they should be. However, the dogs are limited by an electric fence. If a chicken strolls beyond the fence they will lose their protection detail. “Oohhh I’ll take a jolt in the neck to chase a chicken”, said no dog ever.
Sending Summer Off with a Giggle or 8
This past weekend, we sent summer on it’s way. “MOM! Summer’s not over until September 21st.” Mim emphatically reminded me. Summer may not be over in the meteorological sense, but after Labor day our lives are once again filled with homework, karate and Scouts. So, we try to live it up in a summery (read relaxing) way for Labor Day weekend.
We managed to pull off an impromptu get together with friends. There are four of them and four of us and there is always laughter when we are together, so by riffing on parts of both last names, I have dubbed us 8 Giggles. With four careers, four kids and the associated scheduling, our face to face get togethers are few and far between and always planned well in advance. This time, the odds were ever in our favor as we pulled off a get together at the lake with just 4 days notice! By 6pm on Friday my house was filled the laughter of friends who had some catching up to do. We ate and then divided by gender for the ride North. As we rode, there were stories and giggles from the back seat and my friend commented on how cousin like the three girls are. It’s true and ’tis a good thing indeed.
Saturday was my idea of a perfect day. We all slept in, then noshed on rarely consumed Pop-Tarts and assorted forms of caffeine. We packed up lunch and took to the water, anchoring the boat on the sand bar with about 100 of our “close” friends. We turned up the tunes and broke out the frisbee.
All images Copyright, 2012 Julia Lafererra
Eventually we made our we back to the camp for a delicious dinner of steak tips, large print chicken tips (a.k.a marinated chicken breasts), salad and fresh corn on the cob. There were s’mores for dessert and a relaxing end to the evening with glow sticks and roaring fire. It was just one of those days that rejuvenates you body and soul.
All images Copyright, 2012 Julia Laferrera
I’m so grateful we have a place to get away to and wonderful family and friends to enjoy it with.
Learning As I Go
A-Man gifted me with a fantastic DSLR camera the Christmas before last. I’ve taken some great photos with it, but most of those have been luck combined with the camera’s automatic settings. I decided it was time to learn how to get the shots I wanted rather than snapping 100 pictures in search of the one good one.
I’m reading Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson. I like the book at times it’s very beginner and at other times, I feel like I walked in the middle of a topic. However, I suspect that is my non-numeric brain more than Peterson. I can’t remember a time since I finished college where I actually took notes while reading a book. The relationship between aperture, shutter speed and ISO is taking a while to sink into my head, but I’m really enjoying the process. there is nothing quite like the thrill of snapping a shot and realizing it came out exactly as you intended.
Live Fearless Lee 