Clothespins

There is a rediscovery of clothespins.  We bought a bag  of them at Wall-Mart when we first moved to Kona to use on the clothesline, which, oddly had no clothespins.  Ours are two cheap pine 2 3/4 inch long pieces of wood attached in the middle by a metal spring.  The first clothes pins were invented in the early 1800s. The spring was added in the 1850s, which is the same design still used today.  Here is a link to a video showing how clothespins are made.  Surprising that they cost so little.  Available for sale are larger ones, ones with no spring, ones with just the long slit inside, plastic ones, tiny ones and ones in different colors. 

Our clothespins  sometimes make their way into the house and have even found themselves attached to items, not necessarily clothes.

Are clothespins the new duct tape?

The realization of the usefulness and ubiquitousness of clothespins in my life happened last week in pottery class at the Donkey Mill Art Center.  Claire Seastone, our instructor,  was demonstrating to me how to throw a pitcher.  She deftly placed a huge hunk of clay on her wheel and began to center it but complained that her bangs were getting in the way of her view of the wheel.  Of course her hands were all slippery with clay, so someone reached to a rack behind them and saw a clothespin and used it to pin her hair back so she could finish the pot.  The question was then asked, “Are clothespins the new- ?”  And then it dawned on me, an Alaskan refugee, that the most universal and essential item was duct tape.  We had to ask the rhetorical question of whether or not clothespins had taken its place.

Since then I have begun to notice how we use clothespins in today's world.  I also realized that I have tried to use duct tape for a couple of projects, but it doesn’t stick as well here in Hawaii in the humidity.  But clothespins, until the metal spring rusts away, are very useful.

Obviously we dry clothes on the line with them, mostly reef shoes and bathing suits.  I can use a pin to hold up an orchid spray.  My music stand came with four clothespins, carefully counted out, to be used to hold the music to the stand.   I just saw some better, large, long clothespins that ukulele players use to hold their music.

In Hawaii, we must keep food packages absolutely closed after opening.  Clothespins are perfect and much easier to attach than the twist tie or bread tabs. 

You can use clothespins to hold things together while the glue dries.  You can use one as a paper clip.  It will hold a thin number of pages or a lot of pages.  No need for different sized clamps.  I bet Kingergarten teachers use a lot of clothespins.

They are popular to paint as different creatures.

My hotel shower cap has lost its elasticity.  We don’t go to many hotels anymore to replenish my supply, so I have to conserve my cheap shower caps.   I remembered the clothespin and just attached it to make it tight.

In a recent spell of creativity, I envisioned painting clothespins different colors and arranging them in patterns as sculptures or wall art.  this will require a lot of clothespins and a lot of colors of paint.  I'm not prepared to do this project yet, but it sounds like fun!

I now make lauhala bracelets with a group at the Amy Greenwell botanical gardens here.  Clothespins are a necessary tool to hold your work when you have to put it down.  I even put my name on my clothespins because everyone's are all strewn on the table.

Please reply:

Do you own any clothespins?  In what way have you used a clothespin other than to hang up clothes on a line?  What other way is there to use a clothespin? 6/18/2012

Hen with Ten

As David backed in to the farmhouse parking space there was a back up warning beep when none had been there before.  We were about to stop anyway.  I got out of the car on the mauka side next to the front door to check it out. 

OK kids, we gotta go

Cheep, peep, cheep, peep, peep

A fat brown hen was silently and slowly making her way across the front porch area.  The ten newly hatched chicks were not silent, however.  Their peeps were loud and continuous.  Peep, peep, cheep, cheep, peep, cheep, peep, cheep, cheep, and a peep.  Five light brown and five black.  They were falling down, bumping into each other, and trying to follow mama.  Several went under the board beside the shed and had a hard time figuring out how to get out.  There was a big step up to the shed floor that required jumping/flying.  As they moved, Mama let out a soft regular gutteral sound which I understood to be a way of letting them all know where she was.  They slowly made their way to the back of the shed and then she sat down on the ground next to the compost pile.  Soon all the chicks were settled underneath her feathers.  She sat contentedly for quite a long time while David and I worked in the garden nearby. 

David and I watched her march her scattering, clumsy chicks from the house to through the shed.  She never fluttered or squawked.  She kept them all in sight and made sure they followed her.  Other hens we've seen run away as soon as we are near.  The roosters are a bit more fearless.  This hen was calm and confident and maternal.  She looked fatter than other hens around the yard.  I almost wondered if she was going to lay more eggs.

Yes, all 10 chicks are under there.

Under natural conditions, most chickens  lay only until a clutch is complete, and they will then incubate all the eggs. Many domestic hens will also do this–and are then said to "go broody". The broody hen will stop laying and instead will focus on the incubation of the eggs (a full clutch is usually about 12 eggs). She will "sit" or "set" on the nest, protesting or pecking in defense if disturbed or removed, and she will rarely leave the nest to eat, drink, or dust-bathe. While brooding, the hen maintains the nest at a constant temperature and humidity, as well as turning the eggs regularly during the first part of the incubation.

The hen will usually stay on the nest for about two days after the first egg hatches, and during this time the newly hatched chicks live off the egg yolk they absorb just before hatching. Any eggs not fertilized by a rooster will not hatch, and the hen eventually loses interest in these and leaves the nest. After hatching, the hen fiercely guards the chicks, and will brood them when necessary to keep them warm, at first often returning to the nest at night. She leads them to food and water; she will call them to edible items, but seldom feeds them directly. She continues to care for them until they are several weeks old, when she will gradually lose interest and eventually start to lay again.  I am guessing that these chicks are at the most, two days old.

Last week two or three times we heard hens squawking continuously for over an hour.  Mary said they were protecting their eggs or nest from the mongoose.  Well, if it was this hen, she had reason to be protective.  Ten chicks is the most I have seen.  Feral chickens are lucky to raise even one that will survive.  This hen seemed to know what she was doing, so it will be interesting to watch how many she is able to keep alive.

Two days later we drove up the driveway and encountered two more hens with chicks, both of whom did not want to give up the road.  They each only had 4 chicks.  They were black hens, very thin.

I write blogs quickly just to give my impressions and basic information.  However, the following is a quote from Garrett Hongo's memoir "Volcano".  He is a poet who found a whole book.  I love how he describes Hawaii chickens:

"The hens were black bantams, reds, and Japanes whites.  Their feathers sometimes shone iridescent in the Volcano drizzles, their beaks yellow as light breaking through a fault line in the clouds."