National Afro American Museum

Ohio History

Signing of the Civil Rights Act

And now it is time to pay a visit to another Ohio historical site. The National Afro American Museum and Cultural Center in Wilberforce offers a unique combination of arts, culture, and history for a diverse visitor experience. The museum's main display focuses on the Afro-American experience in the US during the Fifties (1945 - 1965). This era was characterized by demographic and social changes in the Afro-American community. These events are chronicled throughout the museum through wall-size photographs, such as the one above, a historically-furnished house, and many period artifacts such as the poster below. This sign from the Freedom Movement stresses the fact that racial freedom is economic as well as political.

Civil Rights Sign

 

Jewelry Set

Do-It-Yourself Decorating

Bracelet Revisited

Finally, the jewelry set was ready to put in the mail for my pen friend's Christmas gift. I couldn't resist one more picture of the bracelet before seeing how the set fit together. I thought it looked just beautiful! I was sorry to have to part with the set. The funny thing is, I did not even know at the time that teal was my pen friend's favorite color. She sent me a knitted scarf the same Christmas, and it was just the same teal color as the jewelry. I was so tickled that I chosen her favorite color without knowing it!

Teal Set

 

Teal Necklace

Do-It-Yourself Decorating

Necklace Close-Up

Of course, a bracelet is not complete without a matching necklace. I used the same teal beads and silver fillers to make a medium-length necklace. In addition to the little clear diamond beads, I also added some multi-faceted rectangular  clear beads. I love the little silver "LOVE" bead I added on - it adds both personality and interest to an otherwise symmetrical necklace. I'm sorry, I know the background is a little weird; it turned out to be unexpectedly hard to photograph these sparkling beads.

Necklace

In this full-length shot, you can see how I graduated the bead size from front to back. I found smaller blue-green beads that almost matched the large teal ones, and mixed them with smaller clear beads. Stringing those tiny translucent beads was not easy, to say the least. It took a lot of patience and a steady hand!

Teal Bracelet

Do-It-Yourself Decorating

Bracelet Gift

This lovely little bracelet was a labor of love for my pen friend in Maryland. As soon as I found these sparkling teal beads at the store, I knew I would be taking them home. Ornate silver bead separators and clear crystal-like diamond beads made an elegant combination. I combined silver stand-alone separators and tapered ones to frame the teal centerpiece beads. I also used a silver clasp on the ends, although it is difficult to see. The length of the bracelet was a little tricky since I had never met my pen friend. Usually I take measurements and figure it as I explain in this post. However, I made a guess as to a standard length and added a little extra to make sure.

Outgrowing the Box

Backyard Poultry

A Unique Flock

Can you believe how this box has filled up since I brought the chicks home a month ago? Yes, it's going to be time to move them outdoors soon! But aren't they all so beautiful? I'd really enjoyed watching their feathers come out over the last several weeks. Starting at this end of the roost, the Buff Orpington on the outside has turned a golden yellow, while beside it the Golden Buff (totally unrelated breed) is streaked with brown and white. The Barred Rock to the right is beginning to show the white speckles of the adult hen, while down at the end, Birchie the Araucana is a beautiful white. Down on the floor underneath the Buff Orpington is another Araucana, Pinecone, with a beautiful display of gold and black feathers. And spread across the floor in front are the Rhode Island Reds with a character of their own. It is truly a unique flock!

Little Reds

Backyard Poultry

Playing Grownup

The little Rhode Island Reds were doing their best to act grown up with their older coop-mates. Above, one little chick is trying to take a dust bath in the wood shavings litter! I'm not sure how effective it was. But if you look closely at the Red standing beside it, you can see the whole wing-full of new feathers coming out. You might be surprised at the amount of black and white on what is supposed to be a red-brown chicken. Well, Rhode Island Reds actually can have stripes of black show up in their wing or tail feathers.

Pinecone and Chickie

The older chicks, like I said, almost became like little mothers for the Rhode Island Reds. In this picture, a Red chick appears to almost snuggle up beside one of the elegant Araucanas, Pinecone.

Raising the Feeder

Backyard Poultry

Lunch Time

As the chicks grew bigger, there were constant changes. Raising the feeder was the first challenge. Having the feeder at floor level worked fine for small chicks, but as they got bigger, they were able to kick large amount of litter into the feeder. This got to be very inconvenient to clean out, as well as wasting food. So I found some small flat rocks and cement blocks to raise the feeder just a few inches off the floor. I also had to remove the hinging top with holes from the feeder (you can see it here) since the chicks' heads were nearly too big to fit into the holes. As you can see, they took full advantage of that fact and shoveled plenty of food out onto the rocks and floor.

Combination

Backyard Poultry

Joining the Roost

Did you spot the newcomer on the roost above? Yes, it's the little brown Rhode Island Red! Finally, it was time to combine the two little flocks of chicks. The Rhode Island Reds had grown big enough that I thought they could hold their own in the older flock. Anyway, they had certainly grown big enough to be very crowded in their little pen. Also, and just as importantly, they had graduated from chick feed to grower feed, and thus could eat the same thing as the larger flock. The chick feed has a higher protein content, needed for the extraordinarily fast growth the chicks experience in the first few weeks of life. At around 3 weeks, they can move to grower feed with a lower protein level. The combination went quite smoothly: the Reds were happy to explore the living quarters they had only been able to see for so long, and the older chicks seemed to take the Reds right in as part of the flock.

Sleepy Time

As you can see, the Reds seemed to fit right in. In fact, they seemed to almost see the older chicks as some sort of surrogate mothers!