# 523 - Fluffy Chicken Sweetness!

I now have 26 chickens. There are a couple of Bantams that my grown daughters picked out, and one in particular has managed to capture my heart.

Yes, chickens can capture our hearts, even Howdy's.

Howdy is a big black fluff-ball, and Baby is a tiny black fluff-ball.
Two adorable balls of fluffiness.

This little one follows me around, hops onto my feet, and sits in my arms comfortably, sometimes falling asleep cuddled against me.

I call her "Baby" because she is the little baby of the group. Her breed will make her the eternal baby of the group because she is a small breed, a Bantam.

But, her personality is completely adorable. Actually, I would love to set up separate accommodations for this little chicken and the little flock that she grew up with because they do stick together, except when I go outside, then Baby runs over to me and sticks with me.

She gives me a guilt complex for living indoors and for leaving her outside. I have to keep reminding myself that she is a chicken.

Yes, at little piece of me is in love with this little chickie.

 

 

It is amazing how a little ball of fluffy sweetness can make you smile.



# 522 - Doggie Disappearing Act

This past week has been full of ups and downs. First of all, I had wanted to go see my oldest daughter and grand-daughter in the Fort Worth area, but things around our own place have been chaotic.

Auntie Stefie with Coraline. My youngest
daughter Stefie with my grand-baby Coraline.

I didn't feel well this past week...for those of you who are long time readers, you might know that I have jumped a few MAJOR health hurdles, which includes two critical Cardio-Thoracic surgeries that were a year apart. I also have a rare condition that actually makes my blood pressure plummet, which can create jello body. Since I have had trouble this week keeping my blood pressure elevated, I knew that driving one-way for 4+ hours might not be the wisest choice. When this happens, I just have to wait it out. Usually, it does happen more often during the summer months because I am outside to do this and that and it causes my electrolytes to get a little off-whack, causing me major issues. Not fun. I have medicine I take to elevate my blood pressure, but sometimes it is more complicated than a little pill can fix, so I have to kind of take it easy and wait it out. I have learned that patience is crucial to getting through the frustrating times. I still have so much to do, whether I am doing outdoor work or handling necessary paperwork and home business to keep things running at home.

So, there you go with that angle. Tough week as my blood pressure yo-yo's.

To top it off, the dog we had rescued from the deep forest a few months ago is scheduled to be "fixed" in about a week at our country vet's office. Apparently, the appointment was off by a couple of weeks because Gracie went into heat and everything went into chaos around here as Howdy entered a zone-of-crazy-dogness.

For days on end, I felt as if I were living around events that closely resembled what I can only refer to as "live porn" and it was fairly traumatic. Thankfully, Howdy could not figure out which end was what, if you catch my drift. However, there was a lot of kennel time off and on during the day with a sharp eye on both dogs to usher my "STOP THAT" command.

You would have thought my blood pressure would've gone sky high with all the constant attempts of the dogs to be "involved" that had been going on around me.

Howdy still has the jewels because we were hoping to one day get another full-blooded Aussie for him to breed with, especially because he truly is one of the best dogs I have ever been around...awesome farm/ranch dog that is great with the animals, a natural lead dog for walks and an excellent guard dog with sharp senses and an ability to follow detailed commands.

However, after these intense days of Howdy being in the zone, I was ready to neuter him, myself.

In fact, Gracie has been a dog that has been prone to give in to her wanderlust, but Howdy has always remained by my side, true blue. We have tried to handle her wanderlust, but on a lot of acreage, that can be a challenge. The good part, overall, is that the older she gets, the less often she wanders and the more often she loves to linger directly in our yard with the chickens at her side. Gracie loves to find a stick or a branch or a bone from the forest and chew on it for a few days in one of her favorite spots in the yard. With the summer heat, she is more prone to elect to stay inside next to the fan.

However, this past week, in the chaos of a dog in heat for the first time, Gracie decided to go on an excursion and the especially bad part is that Howdy followed her.

He has never left the homefront and he flat out left. That morning, I had been outside doing morning chores as the dogs were outside with me. I was keeping my eye on Howdy to make sure there wasn't any "funny business" happening. In fact, Howdy had been commanded to get onto the deck and to stay as I walked a few feet away to collect eggs. In the amount of time it took for me to collect ten eggs against me and turn around to face the deck, he was gone, Gracie was gone, both were gone.

 

Setting the eggs down, I began to walk around calling for Howdy because he is the one who will turn on a dime at a command. The problem was...he wasn't showing up. Highly unusual. I kept walking from one side of the acreage to another, walking for acres and acres, probably a total of pacing hit around walking a minimum of ten acres as I called out commands to him that he has never ignored before this time.

Finally, I decided to go back to the home-site to wake Sgt. Dave, even though he'd been working long hours and had not gotten a full night's rest, I could not continue searching by myself. He woke straight up and headed outside to start his own calls.

Sgt. Dave even fired the rifle and the .38 because Howdy does NOT like the sound of gun-fire. But, nothing worked. It seemed that Howdy was completely out of hearing distance.

Knowing that we are surrounded by THOUSANDS of forested acres made me feel hopeless. Also, rain was coming, so I feared that their scent trail to find their way home would be wiped clean.

Also, the roads surrounding the acreage are very dangerous to animals because nearly everyone around here drives a huge truck. Then, I was concerned that Howdy and Gracie would come up to a neighbor's acreage and either be attacked by one or more of the neighbor's dogs or that they would be shot by the neighbor trying to protect his own animals from rogue visitors.

No matter...I had terrible thoughts and the more time that passed, the worse the thoughts became.

Sgt. Dave went driving around, looking for the dogs, with no luck. Eventually, he had to leave for work. I began calling local places to see if they could keep their eyes and ears open for anyone seeing or hearing about our dogs being caught.

And, nearly eight hours passed. I knew they would never come home again. I tried to not be angry at Gracie for her wanderlust and for the natural conditions that made Howdy want to stick to her like a piece of duct tape.

Then, after 5:00pm, I walked into the yard to find the dogs coming across the acreage to the deck. Howdy looked like HELL. He was filthy, soaking wet with debris sticking to his fur, and he literally could not make it to the deck...he collapsed on our acreage, in our yard, about half way to the deck.

Better days the followed the doggie-disappearance day.

Obviously, they had also found something to eat because Gracie was dragging a piece of heavy foil with bits of charred meat stuck inside of it, so they had their fast-food with them...no telling where they got that from, probably another reason to almost get shot.

Sgt. Dave had three problems on his hand when he had left for work...Gracie missing, Howdy missing and his wife, me, who was beyond furious. In fact, after Howdy disappeared, I called to vet to also schedule him to be neutered. My husband asked me, "Isn't that premature...I mean...he hasn't even come home yet."

And I have to be honest, I responded, "Well, when he comes home, it will be to face a ball-less future because his following her is because he is not thinking straight and we CAN fix that!"

Yes, I scheduled Howdy for a neutering as he was missing. I had to do something since I felt out of control and scheduling him for surgery to remove the source(s) of the reason for him to stray felt like the right thing to do at that time.

Sgt. Dave has been bringing home wood pallets for us to recycle for
various projects around the land, such as when building a new
chicken run-coop.

Anyway, the dogs came back. I gave them water, then put them in their separate kennels until Sgt. Dave got home from work. I had no energy left to give to them since I had already been feeling like puke and had walked enough that morning to get in a week's worth of exercise. My throat was raw from going outside every twenty minutes to call for them and the stress of KNOWING they had met some foul ending had zapped me completely. I kind of felt like Howdy did as he collapsed, as if I almost did the same thing, weak knees and feeling overwhelmed with thankfulness that they were able to make it home after being gone for so many hours in the Big Thicket forest.

Picture taken on another day when the dogs weren't so worn out.

So, I know that we need to make fencing a part of our construction plan. Acreage needs boundary fencing, but that won't really keep in a dog that is determined to wander off the property. Even though this is probably a rare occurrence for Howdy, I need to make sure these dogs have a proper fenced-in yard they can stay in as I go to town. For now, I cannot leave for any significant amount of time because they have to stay in the RV, which means no potty breaks, so I cannot be gone long.

The lack of fencing has restricted my own freedom and my own ability to live life as I please, so that fenced-in yard area will be crucial to our new residential site. Also, the chickens were left unguarded with the dogs gone, especially since they are mostly free-ranging chickens.

Howdy even listens and jumps up toward swooping hawks and he has taught Gracie to do the same. But, the day they were gone, I realized that I have the animals living too interdependent of one another. It's great that all of our animals can be together, but I do need each to have their separate quarters and fencing.

And you guys already know that I am fed up with having chicken under my feet as I am walking back and forth with laundry in my arms, unloading groceries or trying to just do something simple outside...chickens are great, but not underfoot.

They also have access to get upon our deck, which is a constant battle and a problem that I can only describe as creating "nasty" circumstances that is not acceptable to me. Sorry, I don't want poop on my walkway, on my porch or in my yard.

This one little chicken I call "Baby" might be a chicken
I would let move in, give her a bedroom, and act
chicken-crazy about her. She's fairly adorable. Lol.

So, fencing has become another element of my construction process and it will be given priority over the outdoor kitchen because we cannot even enjoy an outdoor kitchen without the dogs and chickens having proper accommodations.

There are stresses in life that can be reduced with proper planning and action. For me, fencing is now at the top of the list and my priorities are in order.

Having acreage is different from our last few houses that were located in the suburbs and required a few wood picket boards between us and our neighbors to create a nice fenced-in space. The problem was, the space was limited, directly against the neighbor and we had neighbors who didn't want to share the load or expense of fencing. So, I am glad to be out of that situation, but that also means that we have a different scenario with acreage...I will have to make sure we put up effective fencing that is affordable and that will do the trick to keep the animals in the designated place in a way that looks attractive or that does not block our views.

On top of it all, last night, Gracie evidently had a sick stomach and began having diarrhea, inside the RV. She had cried out and I should have immediately let her outside. I have learned that when she communicates with me, she does it because she means business.

Regardless, this week has been eventful and a challenge to search for the "good" has been my task as I have encountered a lot of activity that would disturb anyone's peace.

One of my goals with the new house is to set things up so that I do have peace and enjoyment in and around my home, not to be run over by animals, but a home that I have under control. This year of lacking control has not been a pleasant part of this experience. But, I can change that, and I will.

Fences are coming.

# 521 - NO CHICKENS ON THE PORCH!

Are you ready for the next Farm Life Lessons segment for the rural country home construction process as we live in an RV for OVER a year?

Breathe deep...

This past Monday, Sgt. Dave and I went to an early dinner meeting with our builder. He has an office, but we decided to meet "after office hours" since we are all busy and wanted the option of fitting in dinner with the business meeting.

This builder passed all of the research hurdles I conducted, he passed the reference checks, as well as shined through the process of me contacting lenders/closers he has worked with to make sure that he, as a builder, did not add to conflicts regarding issued loans or with closing hick-ups due to inspections or other potential problems that could stem from the builder...I am pleased to say that the meeting with our builder went great and this final step gave this builder the seal of approval to build our home.

Fitting in with our country life, the restaurant where we met our builder was actually located next to a truck stop, just outside of town. I had home-made peach cobbler with ice-cream. Yum.

During this face-to-face sit down extended meeting, we learned that all us communicate easily with each other, and I LOVE that he is a straight-shooter and does not allow the lines to be blurred between what he is responsible for and what he is not responsible for during construction. Our builder will be building the "shell" of our home, which will be the foundation, the frame, the finished parts of the structure itself with the windows and doors along with the roof, then he will "builder-assist" with the other elements of finishing our house, as needed. He is loaded with proven vendors.

This is one of our trails near our build-site.

I am going to be building the house to be as similar to a Colonial Farm house look, as possible. We will see how it goes.

This means the overlapping clapboard will be white, the shutters black, the front doors will be gorgeous, the metal roof a dark grey for perfect contrast, the front porch deck flooring painted the same grey as roof and the porch beams and railing will be white. Can you picture it?

Here is a house that the builder is finishing right now...it's the engineered log-cabin look that many here in the country desire, but the point is to show his construction.

Since the soil in Texas can often be uncooperative with a residential concrete foundation and since we see most of our longer-lasting homes in Greater Houston built on pier and beams, we are going that route for our foundation. However, our garage is supposed to be built on a concrete slab because it will actually serve as a workshop with a corner to be my artist-studio. If the soil is not appropriate for a concrete slab, we will still build a workshop with a covered-carport area for the cars. This is an area that is still slab-undetermined.

Once we build our house, it will be necessary to move ALL of our chickens into a new coop area since our current residential site on the acreage is quite a long distance from where the permanent residential site will be located. This means we will have to select a site near the new house, get a new coop built, then haul all of our chickens to that area. That will be interesting. The new coop will have to be closed for several days so that the chickens become acclimated to their new home-zone.

Once we build, there will be no more chickens on my porch...sorry, but I have NEVER liked chickens on my porch, nor do I relish their poop on my walking path, nor do I like the trip hazard they invite as they flock around my feet, nor do I like the disgusting flies that accompany said poop.

Therefore, since Farm Life Lessons have taught me, at my last two residences, to not like chickens in, on, or near the porch, I will have our chicken coop be placed within a decent walking distance from the house, but not so close that the side effects of having chickens is negative upon our day to day outdoor life.

More importantly, when our home is constructed, I will be in MAJOR landscaping over-drive, and I have learned, the hard way, that chickens and decorative or functional gardens do NOT mix. Chickens devastate a garden, very quickly. The chickens even target my potted plants with aggressive destruction. The gardens around our house will not be subjected to a chicken assault...that is for sure.

We will also have an outdoor Café-Kitchen zone which will, of course, need to be kept free of roaming chickens so that space remains as healthy and as clean as possible, which would be impossible to maintain as near 30 chickens intrude upon that space.

I might have to include a small budget to get a chicken run and coop put behind the garage since we will be so busy with other tasks...we shall see how it goes.

I love my chickens, but I NEVER wanted to live WITH chickens taking over my residential space...when I sweep the porch, I don't want to walk back outside five minutes later to find chicken poop on the steps...just...hell NO. Lol.

It is my great hope that our house will be built with our new kitchen ready to be put into good use by Thanksgiving or by Christmas, at the latest. I am sure there will be details for us to finish, but I would like to be moved into the house by that point and this builder is organized and determined enough, according to his factual construction record, to make this possible.

Hell No!

I think I need to work on a sign for the next home to put into the backyard that says "ZONING ORDINANCE...NO CHICKENS ALLOWED WITHIN 200 FEET."

Consequences for violators...hmmm...OFF WITH THEIR HEAD.

Nawwww. I am just kidding. Maybe. Perhaps. Lol.

# 520 - COUNTRY HOME BUILDER MEETING!

I am tickled pink. Well, if I were actually tickled, I would be BLUE because I can't breathe when being tickled, and my husband learned LONG ago that such a silly act might shorten his lifespan.

However, I feel emotionally tickled because we FINALLY have selected our builder and have an official sit-down meeting scheduled this coming Monday - July the 14th of 2014! Ta-Da!

If you are a long-time reader of this blog, you KNOW the extensive journey we have taken to just get to this point. If you are a new reader, the synopsis is...Sgt. Dave and I have blogged while living in the Greater Houston area about how desperate we were becoming to move OUT of city limits and to our acreage. However we had nothing but woods waiting for us. We sold our house, bought an RV, packed up, put things into storage and towed the new "house" to our acreage and we roughed it...our electricity was even powered, initially, by generator, only.

It's been a long, eventful year of Farm Life Lessons.

Living in an RV this year has been interesting. For anyone wondering if it can be done, yes, it can be done. However, after more than a year in an RV, I am ready to be land-based again, minus the wheels and hitch.

Frankly, it would have been more fun to buy acreage with an old house on it and to renovate it, but we are having to build brand new construction, which is always concerning to me because today's construction does not compare to the solid construction of long ago.

So, let me tell you the reasons we selected our builder. First of all, he is not intimidated by me. Little ole me. As you might imagine, some men are indeed intimidated by a woman who has a business background and has no problem speaking directly about a topic without tip-toeing around it. I don't have to have perfect answers, but I do need to work with someone who is a straight-shooter and who will listen to our construction needs instead of telling me what he wants to build with our money.

There you go with that part.

This builder can do...
1) 10 Foot Ceilings
2) A Possible Loft
3) Matching Detached Garage, but on concrete slab
4) Install Any and All of My Custom Window Selections or Work to Solve Issues
5) Can Build a Steep Roof Pitch
6) Can Install a Metal Roof
7) Cathedral Two-Story Ceiling
8) Dormers
9) Pier and Beam Foundation or Concrete

So, we have scheduled a meeting with our builder this coming Monday to discuss the most basic of issues...the floorplan. Basically, since I want to keep my costs down, he will help me decide upon a cost effective structure that would meet my square footage desire, and then we will work on the internal floorplan for separate rooms and overall layout.

This week, I keep looking at different kitchens and am more drawn to a light and bright design.

The above kitchen is pretty fancy, but I like it.

I have had two white kitchens, those were my favorites due to their welcoming and bright environment, but I didn't like the constant upkeep required of them. Yet, my white cabinets were able to be scrubbed down and that did make it nice. I suppose they weren't any more difficult to maintain and keep nice than any other cabinets.

I had considered solid pine cabinetry, but I am not sure whether or not the look would wear on me too fast.

I also like the cream colored cabinetry with the stain in the crevices to give them depth, then a light colored countertop...I no longer want a dark countertop; however, I am hoping they can take our old fallen White Oak tree and make a kitchen eat-in bar out of it, with raw edges left unfinished.

 

But, I do know the appliances will be stainless steel and we will have a wall-mounted vent-hood. Actually, we will have the appliances as listed below:

1) Wall Oven with Above Microwave/Convection Oven (looks just like a double oven and is technically a double oven with the convection oven). This gives me double ovens, but I don't have to pay for, separately, and install, separately, a microwave.
2) Cooktop - Larger cooktop, not sure if I will be doing propane or not, at least five burners
3) Oversized Wall Mount Vent-hood to match the size of the cooktop that will be beneath it. The vent-hood is so large that we wont need to buy cabinetry overhead, so the vent-hood will cost more money upfront, but we wont be spending any money on cabinetry above the cooktop.
4) Kitchen sink: I prefer higher end stainless steel with double tubs, one deeper than the other. Sgt. Dave does not really like stainless steel sinks. I don't want granite, been there done that...awful.
5) Stainless Steel Dishwasher
6) Stainless Steel Counter-Depth refrigerator

The floor in the kitchen, dining, laundry room and probably the entry will be a spanish terrazzo tile. After picking and choosing certain elements that I enjoyed from past homes we owned, I know that terrazzo tile is a warm earth-tone color that is diverse and will go well with our pine wood floors. It is also very easy to maintain. For me, the flooring is EXTREMELY important.

We will also have a "Café-Outdoor Kitchen-Combo." It will be a structure separate from the house and will be very rustic, appearing something similar to this...

We also will install a rustic outdoor shower for those days when we are grimy and dirty and chicken poopy. We will place this outdoor shower near the end of one of the porches, out of the way, with a path leading to porch steps so that the shower will have privacy. This area will be multi-purpose and will be a great place to also bath the dogs.

The great thing about the builder we selected is that he has assured me that whatever I would like to do...he will do his best to get it done or be straight-forward about valid obstacles so we can discuss solutions or alternatives.

I hope the face-to-face meeting will be as great as I am hoping it will go. We have toured properties he's built or is building and I have checked on his references. Everything is looking great. Maybe we will be much closer to beginning to build our house within the next few weeks. We shall see!

# 519 - A Gracie-Update

Gracie, the dog found in the forest, has grown to be quite an awesome member of our growing farm. I was concerned about her having a "bullish" breed in her DNA, but she has become one of the best protectors a farm could have for their weakest and most vulnerable critters.

The vet said it appeared Gracie also has Aussie or Collie in her because of the speckling...regardless, she is a blessing to us.

She still has the itch to satisfy her wanderlust, but she's getting better about staying around the home zone, especially if she knows my eye is on her...she also wants to be close by me. Very sweet.

One issue we had with Gracie is that she loved to sneak into the kitchen area as we slept and dig into the trash. Often, we'd wake to discover trash strewn from one end of the RV to the next. Yes, we are still in our year of exploring our acreage to prepare for building our next house, and that means living in the RV.

Anyway, we solved the problem of her digging into the trash, other than putting it out of her reach, which is difficult to do with good-sized athletic dog, by putting a light sprinkle of SPICY chili powder across onto the trash. Magic trash-repellent powder.

Life is much easier when the dog is not getting into the trash every day.

Anyway, Gracie gets along beautifully with the chickens. Well, the second flock that we added after the initial flock were a couple of months old was a massive mistake on so many levels.

That won't ever happen again.

That second flock confused the older chickens and Gracie because we kept the youngest chicks separate for so long, inside the barn, and Gracie thought that the moments they wandered into the yard signaled a new intruder. So, she would start to treat the second flock of chicks as if they were like the moles she would dig up in the yard...and then "play" with until they could never play again.

It has taken a lot of extra training for Gracie to learn that the "barn" chickens are the same as the other chickens and to allow them access to the yard. But, the important thing is...she GOT it. We went through a couple of bad situations, but then she understood that we were okay with the other chicks mingling with the big chickens and that it was okay to give them free range in the yard.

Now, they are all with each other, every day. The younger chicks still go to the barn to sleep at night while the hens go to their chicken coop.

Gracie is a lot of fun. She loves to find "special" sticks and branches to play with...the photo below shows Gracie with a branch that she dragged around for a few days and when we'd walk outside, she'd duck low behind it, as if the branch made her invisible. It was hysterical. If she walked away, she dragged the branch with her.

A couple of weeks ago, we went to see Stefie in San Marcos, to get her moved into a new apartment for her last semester of on-campus classes for her Master's Degree. We brought all three dogs with us. Sgt. Dave and I stayed in the old apartment on an air mattress so we could disinfect and clean the old apartment so the most of the deposit could be returned. While there, our dogs slept in their kennel, and they were so well-behaved.

The road trip, one way, took about four hours, so that meant we were in a vehicle with the dogs for a long time, and we had to keep the child-lock engaged for the windows to remained locked since Howdy has learned to eye the controls and to put his paw on them to roll down the window.

He figured this out years ago...we would roll it up, he would look down, put his paw on the window control button and roll it back down...until we figured out that he was doing it on purpose. A typical Aussie. So, we are forced to keep the windows locked.

Howdy sitting on Gracie, in typical Aussie fashion to use any part
of their body to control and direct another animal into doing what they want.

As we got close to home, I had to roll down my window for a moment and we forgot to re-engage the window locks. Bad mistake. That created a scary incident that could have been the worst kind of experience for those traveling with dogs. As soon as we turned off of a busy highway near our house and finally reached the long road that goes through part of our own property, and as we were jamming to loud music, Howdy rolled down the back window without us knowing it at that moment. We were on our private road, still pulling a trailer down and we suddenly noticed the window was down, we both stopped to look at each other and then to be in shock as Gracie jumped out the window.

What the heck????

I guess she recognized the acreage as "home and decided she was getting OUT, at that very moment. Howdy seemed to have read her mind and worked as her co-conspirator for the great escape.

Actually, Howdy's eyes were huge as he gave us that "What the ???" kind of expression as he sat in the backseat, not knowing how to react to her jumping. The whites of Howdy's eyes were showing HUGELY...demonstrating that he KNEW something was really wrong.

Gracie jumping out the window, without any warning. was shocking to us, especially because we were still driving.

Thank God we were on our property, but Sgt. Dave slammed on his brakes as we went through shock at what had occurred. And then we again look out the front window to see Gracie running to the grass in front of the truck and she squatted in the grass to immediately begin peeing. I supposed she REALLY had to go.

I had already told Sgt. Dave that Gracie was an escape artist while in a vehicle and to be VERY careful because she WILL jump out HOWEVER she can, and if you are in a busy area, she probably won't meet a kind ending, which will be traumatic for all involved. Gracie does not like being trapped in a vehicle...she can appear to be sweet and kind, but she is really plotting her escape.

This trip, she was a much better travel companion; however, when she is ready to get out, she will act upon her desperation. Our trip to San Marcos had been so much fun, but Gracie jumping out of the window was a sobering end because we did not know how long we had been driving with the window lock disengaged, probably for at least 20 miles, down the highway. Thankfully Howdy didn't decide to roll down the window until he saw that we were home and thank goodness he didn't jump out the window to go after Gracie.

That dog Gracie. I love her. Window-jumping-warts and all.

# 518 - New Flock of Big Girls!

Having lots of chicks follow Sgt. Dave around is a dream-come-true for him. Of course, he never thought they would be the kind of chicks that have no control of their sphincter muscle and that eat with their face, but they are adorable! He's a lucky man!

My chickens are now laying eggs. They began laying over a week ago. I am concerned that some are wandering around the acreage to lay eggs in their own hidden nesting area, but we do have several going to the coop nests every day to do their laying. The best scenario would have been to have the chickens behind a coop fenced area for a bit, until they become accustomed to coming to laying their eggs in the coop nests, consistently.

Regardless, I am getting beautiful white and brown eggs. The eggs always start off small as the hen begins to lay, then the eggs increasingly become more large as the hens gain laying experience.

The back two eggs are the average size of most eggs being laid. The
larger egg in front was the first egg that was more substantial in size.

For now, they are rather small eggs, but the eggs will also help cut down on our dog food costs since I boil eggs and give them to the dogs, as a treat. I just cut the hard-boiled egg in half, and the dogs have a great time digging the egg out of the half-shell.

We have several kinds of chickens in this big flock of 26 remaining chickens.

Our chickens are entertaining. They are functional. They are producers of nutritious food for our table.

I have lost two chickens out of a total of 29. Not bad stats for getting tiny chicks that are only days old and nurturing them until they are egg-laying age and looking beautifully robust!

I love my Plymouth Barred Rock chickens...they are very interactive and chatty.

I went on a hike with the dogs a couple of days ago and the chickens always follow me into the woods for as long as they can, then once they hit their personal outer boundary, they turn back.

My chickens are now becoming big girls...full-fledged egg-laying hens.

I think it's about time for some Quiche with swiss cheese and freshly sliced mushrooms. Oh the yummy goodness of ultra fresh eggs from the coop!