Wild Turkeys

Yesterday, the local flock of wild turkeys decided to forage beneath my bird feeder. When all the "little" birds suddenly began looking down and flying off, I wondered if my neighbor's dog had made another appearance. Not. It was a flock of wild turkeys, checking out the spillage from the feeder. They stayed about an hour before wandering off into the woods again. So.......I went out on the balcony and "replenished" the dropped seeds. Lo and behold, they came back. An adult pair, with about 10 of this year's offspring. I think the adolescent turkeys are really cute -- all long necks and gawkiness. After a while, they left again, and I quickly "replenished" the seeds one more time. I was so amazed when they returned a third time in the late afternoon!

This morning, they were at the other end of the yard. Our chicken coop is at that end, and we have a large screened enclosure for the chickens to use when they are outside. It is about 10 feet tall, 24 feet square. Several of the turkeys had flown up onto the top of the enclosure and were trying to reach the crab apple tree from its top. One could, but those who couldn't actually flew up into the crab apple tree to eat. The tree is perhaps 30 feet tall, but the slender branches near the top were never meant to hold the weight of 15 pound birds. The branches swayed and creaked, and the turkeys flapped and shuffled while they feasted. What next?


I'm still in my sock-knitting phase and just finished this pair. They are made from one of the self-striping yarns that are so much fun to work with.

Ten minutes after finishing this pair, I had yet another pair cast on to my needles, to be knitted from OPAL yarn in a rose/cream/gray/purple variegation. I'll post those when I finish them.








Its not that I'm just knitting all the time, either. Yesterday, I decided to work on some fabric postcards and created two of them. The first is on a base of yellow silk fabric, to which I stitched down a flower cut from some printed fabric, then heavily outlined with machine stitching. On top of that, I added some bits of wool teased from leftover scarf yarn and a bit of thread. All were held down with tulle and machine quilted in waving lines. The variegated thread is a trilobal poly from Superior Threads.





I am determined to learn thread painting, so the second one of them was an exercise on a small scale. The sunflower and leaf motif is completely thread painted. The wonderful background fabric is a scrap from a vintage kimono. The only "tough" part is constantly changing the thread colors on the machine. The "painting" is all done with tiny zig-zag stitches, so close together that they overlap each other. I want to get to the point where I can thread paint birds.


The expected rain/snow/whatever never happened today, and I am very glad. This winter seems like it has been exceptionally long. Of course, the same snow that fell before Thanksgiving is still on the ground. With March just around the corner, and bits of muddy dirt beginning to show, I can finally believe that spring will truly come.