hen house happenings

the girls spent their first night in the hen house. i was a nervous wreck, absolutely certain we would come out this morning to find six dead chickens. luckily my worry was in vain (as per usual). hurray!

we had talked about getting chickens for quite a while, even at our old house. when we moved in to our home though, we knew this dilapidated shack in the back would be an ideal place to house our yard birds. i need to take pictures of the inside coop, which brandon has made quite nice for our little peepers. in the meantime, here is the run, where they spend the waking hours. 

the string to the left is my pea trellis, inspired by poppies in sisters.

it has a nice roof to keep them dry and brandon burried the poultry wire about a foot deep to keep predators (i.e., raccoon, fox, harvey, etc.) from digging their way in. brandon has poured many hours into this taj mahal of chicken love. my primary contributions were using the staple gun to secure the wire and painting the door like a good hippie. yes, it is brown and turquoise. yes, those are leaves stenciled across it. what of it?

harvey regularly entertains this pose.

off of the right side of the building shack (see above picture), there is another door. brandon set it up so we can access the nesting boxes (and eggs) without having to disrupt the birds too much.

the mottled one in front is the only one with a name: frankie.
mostly because she looked like a franciscan monk when we
brought her home, with a large white spot on her head
and a circle of black "hair" around that.  

we have three buff orpingtons (the orangish ones), one plymouth barred rock ("frankie") and two unknowns. we hoped to have three orpingtons and three barred rocks, but the feed store put two similar looking breeds together and we ended up with two of the others. we think they might be black stars. in which case we have a brood consisting of the left column below:

from my free-range chicken garden book

and lest you think our life has been taken over by chickens, i will share a photo of the sour cherry crumble pie i made last night. as you can tell it was a hit, with each of us going back for seconds. even my grandma would have wanted more than a "lil' sliver" of this pie! i am looking forward to having another slice tonight while i sit out on our back deck, watching the chickens peck around.

all creatures great and small

since the chicks have been consuming most of our "oohs" and "aahs" lately, i'm sure harvey is a bit jealous. or just thinks the fuzzy buggers would be tasty snacks. either way, he quivers whenever he watches the egg-producing machines chicks. 

looking quite stoned.

hopefully he is not licking his chops in
anticipation of eating one of the chicks!

we are hoping to finish the chicken coop this weekend and i will share pictures of the process and the coop when it is finished up. the girls won't go out there until the middle or end of may, so they continue to cause a ruckus in their half a cardboard refrigerator box in the basement. 

i got my garden starts planted last weekend and the first things to sprout are my basil and thai basil plants. i take this as sure sign of a great summer, as nothing says "summer" to me quite like basil! and homegrown tomatoes.

i plan to have a gargantuan garden this year with heaps of tomato, zucchini, cucumber, and pea plants. oh, and oodles of kale, lettuce, spinach, garlic, and onions. going from our postage stamp garden to our new backyard makes this gardening girl incredibly happy! 

stifle when necessary

i have come to realize that my compulsive drive to control things - work, people, harvey, brandon, the dishwasher, EVERYTHING - is counter-productive to pursuing peace. i read this quote today and it settled so true with me:

Don’t sign on for more problems than you must. Resist the temptation to involve yourself in other people’s zones of expertise and responsibility. Monitor troublesome situations if you need to, but don’t insert yourself unless you’re running out of time and a solution is nowhere in sight. In short, stifle your inner control freak. -- Twyla Tharp 

let it go. let it go that brandon puts the plates in the spot in the dishwasher obviously designed for bowls. let it go that people at work aren't getting along so well. let it go that the patient at the hospital doesn't want me to call his family. let it go that harvey tracked dirt in the house.

i have taken on an insane idea that i know how to fix, fix, fix. and yet, the world keeps on going whether i meddle or not, and sometimes it goes far more smoothly without my input. so i have determined that part of my path to peace involves stifling my inner control freak, loud and obnoxious as she may be.

we got chicks about a week and a half ago. they started out so cute and fluffy--we would spend evenings just watching their crazy antics. their little legs seemed to have a mind of their own and would go shooting out behind them without notice, often kicking one of their nest-mates. it was adorable how they learned to roost up on their food bin and get in fights at the water dish.

all the photos of the chicks are red-tinged due to the heat lamp.

it was a somewhat impulsive decision for brandon and i (who are otherwise quite cautious folk). yes, we were actively building a coop and planning to get chicks eventually, just not that night when we went to the feed store. i thought we were "just looking" (as one of my brother's is known for regularly uttering) but it was impossible to leave these little peepers behind. it felt good to do something on a whim and we were both so excited!

now, we have had them for a while and my inner control freak is showing more. i get so annoyed that i have to change their water no less than 5 times per day because they constantly fill the reservoir with wood chips and poo. and roosting on their feeder has turned into a nuisance, as i have to throw away much of their food because it is contaminated also. not to mention harvey, who has gone from obnoxious to total nut-ball with them in the house. he sits outside the door of the room they are in whining incessantly and then follows me around the house, trying to herd me towards the "chicken room" so i will let him drool over the little nuggets.

i keep thinking "i can't wait until they are bigger and we can move them outside." when i thought this today as i trudged to the basement to refill their food dish, i realized what an awful perspective i was holding. i was ill to think that i would just wish away time and wondered if this attitude would continue when i become a parent. i vowed to stop focusing on how this time could go faster and focus instead on how i get to have these little awkward buggers in the house, listening to their cute peeps, and can start and end my day by watching their crazy antics. the chicks are really working on helping me tame that inner control freak!