Welcome to The Cherry On Top.
Have ya come back for more free chicken designs or the next pack of freebies from my book, The Walking Stick? Maybe you're here for more chicken tips? Either way, I'm thrilled you are. I have more designs and ideas on how to use them from Chai Eighteen Designs, too.
This is today's new freebie from the collection. Keep scrolling for the link.
See what you missed?! Scroll back and grab the freebies.
I get most of my designs these days from Design Bundles, Plus. Check'm out for free for a month!
This is one of my favorites. Scroll back and grab the second freebie.
This was the first free chicken design. Sassy!
We had a chicken get hit by a car. So, this would be great for around our home.
Here'a picture of our girls from a while ago. See! We still had a lawn with these girls. Our current chickens ripped out our entire backyard this winter. Ugh! It is slowly growing back and I will reiterate that is has never happen before. I thought I'd stick with the chicken topic and give ya some ideas for special treats that the girls love.
In a previous blog, I shared all kinds of plants that most chickens don't like. So, they might be safe in your yard scape. Maybe! Hehehe... All chickens are different, though. No promises! I did tell ya to consider wrapping a wire border around your newly planted plants and see how they react. The other great thing about the wire cage is the girls can't dig and scratch around your new plant and you can reuse them.
We save a ton of garbage by feeding the parts of food we don't eat to the girls or we use it as compost.
Chickens love any kind of squash and most veggies. Cucumbers are ideal for getting them some extra water, too. A great idea for hot summers. You can give them the entire thing. Just cut a big part out to get them started and let them work or pick at the cucumber. It's great for their brains and keeps them busy.
I had a pumpkin spoil at the bottom and seeds were all over the yard, somehow. Birds? The next year, I had pumpkin plants all over the yard. How lucky?! I'm sure if I tried to grow them, it would have never worked. This is the second time this happened.
I cut out the good parts and gave the girls the rest. I kept a lot of the seeds and toasted them. I'm an addict to spicy roasted pumpkin seeds. Mmmm...I shared the cut up and prepared pumpkin with some neighbors and put the rest in the freezer.
Of course, most birds love sunflower seeds. If the wild birds don't finish the seeds, I lob off the head of the plant and let the girls pick out the seeds. It sure is a lot easier than trying to get the seeds out myself. Often seeds fall to the ground and grow next year. I have tomatoes growing absolutely everywhere. Even in my indoor plants, because I water my plants with our dirty dish water. More free food!
Sunflowers are mega easy to grow and they are pretty as all get out.
Two people told me that radishes won't grow in such a small pot. WRONG! Hehehe...I grew huge radishes in these shallow pots in just a few weeks. Once, I purchased some radishes from Aldi and the green tops were beyond delicious. I'm yet to find those again and I'm on the hunt to find the seeds for them. If you know what I'm talking about, let me know in the comments.
These greens, to my disappointment, are ouchy! The girls love the tops as do the cabbage butterfly caterpillars. I had to pick dozens off my plants much to the enjoyment of the girls. They got a double treat. The annihilated greens actually grew back! I'm thrilled I gave them a second chance.
You can grow turnips all year long. They'll stay good for most of the year outdoor, in a green house or in a sunny spot in your house. I'm so super thrilled I've got enormous window sills all around the inside of the house. I'm growing stuff in every room.
Here, you can see the girls never mess with the hydrangea. They do dig and scratch at the roots, though. Put large rocks around the roots to help.
Behind Katey is my outside garden. I never have a lot of luck gardening. Darn it! I do keep trying, though. It's a super spot to throw some of their poop mixed with the wood chips from the egg house, grass clippings ... I use it as a compost pile in the winter. So when spring comes around, I'm all set to plant more yummies.
I'm showing off more beautiful designs from Chai Eighteen Designs. Check out how I played.
I designed papers and this tag with the cute bird.
This is what the collection looks like.
I loved these hats, too. I added some text and tweaked the design's color a bit. Then tried to find a font that went with the style of the design.
Save big time by getting the huge collection and design beautiful things. I have more ideas on how to use these designs on last week's blog. I just saw it was 70%, today! Hopefully it still is.
Changing the colors of the designs doesn't have to be difficult. I often just mess with the saturation and levels. I wanted a bit more traditional fall colors for this design. It matches the background pretty well. What luck?! If you'd like a tutorial on how to change up the colors quickly and easily, let me know and I'll put it in a future blog.
Look how gorgeous these pumpkins are. They'll make your crafts sophisticated.
I'm giving away my Catalonia Collection as I design it. It coordinates with a book I'm writing, The Walking Stick. I plan on sharing excerpts of the book, eventually. I thought I was finished with the book, but then thought it was too short. I considered writing a bunch of short stories with the same theme and putting them all in one book. I feel like I can go on forever with the story.
The characters are likable (so far) hehehe... and it's very realistic and positive, too. I need this! I don't know about you, but as an avid reader, I'm sick to death of dark, creepy, violent, evil books. A feel good book is what I crave. One that might bring a tear to your eye, warm your heart or at least bring a smile to your face. A book where you wish you were one of the characters or you knew someone like that.
Have you ever read a Maeve Binchy book? I just love her books. She's so awesome at character development. I'm nothing like Maeve, but a girl's gotta have goals, right? There were a few of her books that I just didn't want to end! I wanted to live in the neighborhood she was writing about and hug a character that was given a raw deal. Hehehe...If you've never read any of her books, start off with Circle of Friends. It's in my TOP FIVE all time favorite books. It's a page turner!
My team is playing with the collection. Here's a lovely page from Kait. I love what she did with the tiny blue flowers.
This is today's free pack. I'm a big fan of this deep red.
A big shout out to Mary from our group. She unlocked this week's freebie by designing something with the free parts you've downloaded so far. This time it's your turn to help. Pop over to the group and show me a picture or a page of some summer fun you had. If you're from the other part of the world, show us your winter shenanigans. When I get five images, I'll unlock next week's freebie for next week.
Thanks for hanging with The Cherry.
Happy scrapping!
