Where We Are

Esme's yum-yum service

Our photo program is still out of commission, so I bring to you today another older photo. The story behind it is current, though. As soon as we started our spring work in the back yard, we discovered worms. Worms, worms, everywhere! I first found them under the past year's worth of chicken bedding that I had been tossing into a corner. When I scooped it into our "new" compost bin (i.e. first chicken coop turned upside down) , we found hundreds of them. Esme' decided to feed them to the chickens and we then came up with the title for her business: Esme's yum-yum service! Yes, this is a nod to the film "Kiki's Delivery Service", which we are very much in love with. I thought it would only last a couple of days, but when she said "Mom, this is the funnest thing I have ever done!! It's even better than my birthday!!!", I thought I could come up with more excuses to dig around in the yard. Now, we find worms as we're getting the garden beds prepared and as we're aerating the soil for planting grass seed. Yes, we even dig holes in a corner of the yard just to find worms. Just for the pure joy of it. Now, when Esme's starts to drift off at night she says, "I am starting to see worms in my dream".

Farewell Beatrice

It is a sad day here. I received a phone call from our very friendly neighbor saying that he was very sorry to find one of our birds dead in his yard (he doesn't mind them coming over the fence). We have decided that it was most likely a cat that got our Beatrice. This decision was made mainly because she wasn't eaten, which is what would have happened had it been a raccoon or an opossum. I am thinking of asking the other neighbor to put a bell on her cat's collar. That's fair, isn't it? Just a little fair warning for our girls, so they can get out of harm's way.

Esme' went to see Beatrice before our neighbor buried her for us. When she came home, she told me that Beatrice looked so cute and fluffy. Then she burst into tears and sobbed in my arms until I realized that she might like some feathers to remember her. Our neighbor collected some from his yard and Esme' smiled with relief that there was something to hold onto.

We will miss our only white chicken who was also our only yellow chick. We will miss how she always looked into the playroom from the hay bale by the window. And we will miss her ridiculous chicken dance!!

 

An egg show and tell

Don't these eggs look pretty on our nature table? I am not sure if they can be left out, though, so they are back in the refrigerator for now. We are now getting up to 6 eggs per day!!! Our two oldest ladies have been the slowest to lay, but I think the slightly warmer weather has inspired them. Yay for eggs!

Chickens in the snow

When I opened the door to the coop yesterday, Beatrice looked at the snow, bobbed her head a couple of times and headed back in! I decided to stay a while and watch what the other girls would do.

The fact that I was able to capture these photos really says something, because usually they scramble out so fast that there wouldn't be time for a clear shot. These chickens were clearly cold and confused! As the day progressed, they each came out and took to the porch.

 

Speaking of chickens, we made our donation of (the money towards) 12 baby chicks through Samaritan's Purse. Check out this link if you are interested.

Delighted!

Ecstatic and thankful are a couple of other words that I think of as I write this.

We have been blessed with our very frst egg!

I knew this day was coming soon, and I have to admit that I daydreamed of writing this post! I always imagined that I would have beautiful photos of the egg in its place in the coop, waiting for us in all its delicate perfection. As it turns out, I had almost forgotten to lock the chickens up last night and suddenly remembered when we were almost set to read our bedtime books. I jumped up shouting "chickens!!" and ran out to ensure their safety. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the egg sitting near the door of the coop. My heart literally danced. It looked as if the chickens had actually moved the egg close to the door as a gift to us. I carefully scooped up the cold egg (oops... must have missed it in the morning when it was warm?) and brought it inside. I called to Esme', "I have a surprise for you! Shut your eyes and hold out your hands". I warned her that it was cold and to be gentle with it. You can see exactly how she feels about the egg! And yes, you can also see our ragged old bedding and the paint peeling off the wall. Welcome to Where We Are!! We might not have a beautiful bedroom, but we do have eggs!!!

Just in case you can't tell how excited Esme' is about all of this, I will share the following: our lullaby for the evening was one of our classics with the lyrics switched to "eggs and chickens" repeatedly; our sweet nothings were all about who gets to eat which egg when; she tossed and turned for a good half hour with intermittent squeals of delight!!

 

 

Our yearly visit to Hickory Nut Gap Farm

This has been a wonderful Sunday. We had eggs, toast and bacon for breakfast. We did a new art project (I will write about it soon). Then we headed out to the farm. It was a bit warmer than I thought it would be today. Usually we go to the farm in October, but because I love it so much, I want to take them twice this year (and we might have Esme's birthday party there!!). We did our usual rounds- went in the shop for sausage, soap, honey; filled up a bag of apples; held the chicks. And this time, Esme' got an extra special treat. She got to feed a calf!!

Here is Asher, wildly chasing the chickens.

And, after I caught one for him, he said "I being calm".

Here is our loot!!! I can't wait to make Mom's potato sausage soup and apple crisp!!

Happy Sunday everyone.

Chickens, part 3

Wow, two posts in one day. Even two posts in one week is quite something for me! One of our chickens flew the coop this morning. She is a new one that I hadn't introduced you to yet, and I was worried that I might not get the chance before she became a hawk's lunch (she had last been seen on top of our house!). She is smarter than we thought, though. I just saw her fly back over the house, and after much chasing and wearing her down, she walked right back into the coop. So, without further ado.. allow me to introduce you to Caramel (left). Her and her sister, Sweet Sugar, are Bantams. Their mother was tiny and I don't expect these girls to get much bigger. I can't wait to see their petite eggs (they will make great candle molds)! Our flock is now up to seven.

Here is a photo that my mom took of Esme' with Honey (with a wonderful camera, I might add!). Oh how this girl loves her chickens!!

While I am on the subject of chickens, here is a photo of our first experience using Stockmar modeling beeswax. The kids loved to play with it, and we all pitched in to make these chickens and basket of eggs for our nature table. 

Chickens, Part 2

The day after Fluffy died, Stephen told Esme' that she could get another chick. We went to a different farm, and picked out three! We didn't want any chicks being lonely in the bathroom. We named them Honey, Beatrice and Fluffy #2. Here is a photo from when they were tiny. 

Honey is on the left, Fluffy #2 on the right, and Beatrice is in the back.
Very shortly after having these lovely girls, their names were all lengthened. They are now called Honey-bunny big butt, Fluffy fast white-belly, and Beatrice spunky big-foot. Yes, we get to know our chickens well enough to give them middle names!

The last bunch of photos happens to be all of Beatrice, but she holds and loves them all equally.

Welcome to the family, girls!!

Chickens!! (Dedicated to Fluffy)

We just got our "new" chicken coop, so I think it is about time to tell ya'll about our wonderful flock of birds. I have so much to say about chickens that I don't even know where to start. My dad and I raised chickens when I was young, and I think I always knew I'd have them someday with my own children. I didn't know it would be this soon, but after visiting a friend in Minnesota last summer (Hi Greta!!), and seeing Esme' fall in love with chickens, my mind was made up. I told her we would get them the following spring. My dad and sister, Angela, came to visit and help us get started with the chickens. Dad and I built a decent coop out of old materials we had lying around the driveway and basement. We bought nothing! Then we went out to a local farm to pick our chicks. We started out by getting 4 Australorps and 2 Bantams. We each picked a day-old chick. We named them Darlene (I named her after my Grandma who loves chickens), Esmerelda, Isabella, Fluffy, Dutchie and Ofie (which was kind of a nonsense word that Asher came up with for "his" chick). Isabella and Ofie turned out to be roosters, so we found a new home for them several months ago. Here are some photos of our original flock. In the first photo, our beloved Fluffy is on the far left. She was a very small Bantam.

 

Look at how happy Esme' is with the chickens (those are happy tears)!! This little girl is so sensitive... and I love her for it!

Below is a photo of Isabella, the Bantam rooster that went to a farm with Ofie. We miss you Isabella!!!

Everyone in our house became very fond of Fluffy. She was treated more like a cat or dog than a chicken. We held her every day, sang her to sleep in our arms, and sometimes let her come to different rooms (rather than just the bathroom where we kept all the baby chicks until they were ready to go outside). The following bunch of photos are of her. Our lovely Fluffy was killed by a raccoon after she was outside for just a few days. It still chokes me up to think about our sweet little girl, the chicken like no other.

The last three photos show Esme' with Fluffy on the day that she was killed. She had such a beautiful, loving last day. She probably experienced more love in her 3 months of life than most chickens do in their whole lives! You can see, in the very last photo, the very real and deep connection that Esme' and Fluffy shared. I think I will stop for now and come back soon for more of our chicken story.

Since I am dedicating this post to Fluffy, I want to mention, briefly, a few thoughts about her.

- She was so tiny, but she was the Queen of her flock! She showed all the other girls how to get around the coop. She was always on top of the water or food jars, trying to look bigger than she was.
- The skin around her eye used to turn pink. Off and on. Very cute.
- We like to imagine that her eggs were going to be pink. 

We miss you and will always remember and love you, Fluffy.