A Bird Sanctuary

On our small five acre property I have hung, built, and been given many different bird houses.  Now that it has been a few years, we have so many varieties of birds living on our property.  From, Regular little everyday birds to cardinals, turkey, mallards, wood ducks and blue birds.  Its so fun to watch them build their nests and see all their sticks and string hanging from the bird house holes.

Adding finishing touches to attach to a tree.

Hung about 7 feet above the ground near our pond.

One of the duck houses we built about 4 years ago.  No nesting inside but a male wood duck sits on top of it almost every morning.

One of the chicken wire duck nesters I made this spring.  No ducks yet, but it can take a couple seasons.

This is another duck house built 4 years ago and their is a wood duck hen that sits in there.  

Little momma wood duck, no eggs yet, but hoping to have some soon.

I have even made some not so normal bird houses.  This was an empty peanut butter container, I cut a whole, painted it gold and screwed the lid to a tree.  I put this up last year, and this year there is a nest in it!  

This is an old bird house I built years ago.  It is full of straw and sticks, but I've never seen anything nest in it.  It overlooks the pond in some trees.

A Christmas gift birdhouse, and some cute little blue birds house in it.

This is a regular nest outside of my laundry room window.  I was able to watch a mother cardinal raise her single baby.  The day I wanted to take a picture was the day her baby left the nest, so now it sits empty.  Hopefully she will nest in it again.

I am so happy to know that my property is comfortable and that the birds and wildlife feel safe enough to raise their families here.  I love to see them in the yard and in the woods.  I have had a couple turkeys nest on my land, unfortunately one was killed by a fox, but the other had a healthy family and we would see her walk out yard with all her babies.
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Starting up "Let A Girl"

I am on a journey of starting a small business of my own called Let A Girl.  It's mostly jewelry I make from antlers but also crafts I make using the theme of the outdoors and hunting.  I am prepping to sell for the upcoming Farmers Market in my area, and have a lot of positive feed back on it so far.  

This is my barn, my workshop.  The one place I can make a crazy mess and don't get into too much trouble for it.  I slide this big door open and I am lucky enough to over see the beautiful Shiawasee River.  The ducks and geese are so loud in the morning.  I love it.   

This is my little desk area that I sit and do the more detailed work and some of the thinking.

Here is my ancient work bench.  In the center is the oldest vice known to mankind (jk).  It does the jobs I need done though.  I use so many old and even antique tools.  I get most of my tools from garage sales.

This is a few of the displays I have made for my antler rings and bracelets.  I love "rustic" so I really like the looks of these. 

One of my most favorite bracelets I have made is this one I call "Hunting Is Forever".  It is wooden beads, with a silver feather and silver arrow with a silver womens wedding ring set hanging in the middle.  

Other items I make that I keep in the natural, rustic, hunting theme is pallet signs and wall displays for you to hang your stuff from.  Sometimes I put antlers on them to hang a coat or hat from. 

This is a bracelet I made that has a teardrop piece of antler with crossing arrows burned into it. 

And the antler rings I make.  This is my personal set.  I have made so many rings of all sorts of designs.  I was recently featured in Girls Guns and Rods magazine for my Antler Ring Crafting.


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Husband and Wife deer skulls.

For this project we found two skulls while out shed hunting.  One was a doe and one was a buck skull that had already naturally shed its antlers, but still neat.  I soaked them in clean water and peroxide for a few hours to clean them up.  They were old and had been dead for a long time, they were already dried out.

To mount the heads I had some scrap wood in my barn so I stained it a drove a 2 inch screw through the backside, so the skull can hang on the protruding part of the screw.  The back of the skull of the deer has a deep hole where the brain would've been so the screw slides into it perfectly.

This is the buck one  up close.  I added some small metal decorative corners to the wood

Here is the finished product with a small latch on the back to be hung on the wall. They are neat conversation pieces, and they were found while out shed hunting with our children.