Chickens and Quilts

The 4-H fair, otherwise know locally as the Southeastern Youth Fair, is going on this week.  It features the hard work of many kids around our county, some who live on farms and some who don't.  Kids who belong to the 4-H clubs pick projects to do, or animals to raise, and then they are showcased and sometimes auctioned off at the youth fair. (Try an $82,000.00 lamb- yes the zeros are correct!) It's a good lesson in life for these kids to learn, budgeting, costs of doing business, the circle of life, making amazing profits once in a while, etc, etc...   
I got to go two times this past week- once by myself and once with the kids.  The day I went by myself, they had cows in the livestock area.  I hadn't really planned to go to the fair that day, but found myself parking in the parking lot and then wandering the aisles.  Because I hadn't planned on going that day, I was wearing inappropriate shoes for perusing a cow barn to say the least! flip-flops- yeah, don't do that! I was fortunate enough to miss the cow patties, but it was muddy, and it's hard to miss that when there are very few paved areas....   The youths were doing a very good job also of keeping the aisles clean- THANK YOU! 
The next day, after I picked up the kids from school, we went again.  They have a couple friends from school that have chickens entered.  We got to see those- one even won a prize!- Grand Champion, Bantam division!  (Woo Hoo- GO CAMP!)  I didn't get a chance to photograph the big winner, but I did photograph his sister's chicken.  It should also win a prize 'cause it looks just like her brother's!

There were also many other kinds of chickens. Asain, Polish, old English, Silkie, and others I can't remember.  Roosters were cock-a-doodle-dooing like crazy, I guess in competition with each other?  It was hilarious listening to them all!  The hens were also funny to listen to, all talking to each other(the little gossips!) and scratching at the floor endlessly looking for something tastier to eat than the food in their cups.  

Here's photos of some of the other kinds of chickens:

This guy was pacing, pacing, pacing.  Love that tail!

This guy was one of the big ones, though there were some even bigger ones there!

HAHAHAHA  This is a Polish breed.  Diggin' that headress!

This is him proclaiming his fabulousness!

I don't remember what kind this was, but all the feathers, instead of laying down on the body, curl forward and are poofy.

This is a bearded silkie breed- the poor thing can't even see!  It looked like a cloud puff!  That pointy grayish-black thing is the beak!  ?????

This is an Old English breed, tiny little things!  Katie would now like to have chickens.

Fletcher wants bunnies, this one LOVED him! 

And now for the quilt section of this posting.  For those of you who have seen me feverishly knitting my heart out on some little, grey squares, the finished product is now available for your viewing pleasure.  

I finally finished it, and it came out too small.  What a joke!  I made it bigger and warmer by adding some edges and backing out of flannel with some sandwiched batting, to make a sort of quilt/knit blanket.  I started out by crocheting some of the squares together and then changed my mind and whipstitched the rest, henceforth the crazy look.  Oh well, there's a lot of love in it and I KNOW my Zman will LOVE IT!  He's only been waiting since Christmas for it, and asks me every time we talk if it's done yet.  He will have a surprise in the mail hopefully tomorrow! : )