Foster Chicks

Seth and I fight a battle of conflicting desires. We would both love to live away from everything with a huge garden and animals. Little House on the Prairie in a bigger house with internet. Except, I can't imagine Seth surviving another long commute. The year he spent driving an hour each way was a killer for him. Two hours a day, five days a week, stop doing the math because it's really depressing. That's when he accidentally drank his own urine, if you remember that story. Plus, I love walkability. Did I just make that word up? I love walking to the store and the library. I would rather walk with the kids for 15 minutes than buckle those seat belts any day. So, we faced a real conundrum when we moved. Long drive to work, to store, to library, and possibly cool farm vs. living in town without the cool farm. Since the gentleman farmer idea is slightly far fetched we bought another house in town and decided to do the best we could.

I grew a pretty good garden last year. This year I wanted more and started dreaming of chickens. Not for eating, because I'm still too much of a city girl. If we are actually taking care of an animal then we are thinking of it as a part of the family. Around here, we just don't eat each other. Kudos to you if you can pull it off, I'm just really a sissy. I want those precious eggs! We scramble eggs and a dozen are gone. Poof, just one breakfast and I can wave goodbye to $5 in organic eggs.

Alas, we live in a slightly uptight area that won't allow "farm animals" unless you own 2 acres. It's their polite, uptight, way of saying, "Rednecks may live here, but we don't want you to flaunt it." I talked it over with Seth and convinced him that we should just try having chickens. If someone comes along to slap us on the wrist we can send the chickens down to my parents to live out the rest of their (due to the bird dog they own) short lives. Before actually making the chicken purchase, I decided it might be good to look at the penalty for civil disobedience in the farm animal laws. To my dismay they deem this serious enough to slap you with a misdemeanor. And that isn't worth even the best eggs in the world.

I tried to let my chicken dream die.

Until my mom mentioned getting some new laying hens for her house. It seems that the ones the dog doesn't get grow up to be roosters, so she's lacking in the egg layer department. I had a brilliant idea. Now, our children are currently foster parents to five little chicks. Shhhh, don't tell the city. I'm pretty sure it's okay for us to babysit a few chicks for a little while, right?

I'm pleased to introduce: Princess Leia,
PeckerNonaRose, Astrid, Fancy Nancy, and Super Grover. Fancy Nancy's 'caregiver' is not pictured. She only likes to look at the chicks in their brooder and occasionally tap Fancy Nancy on the back when one of the other kids is holding her during the super-supervised holding session once a day in which Momma Caregiver tries not to be a complete salmonella freak. Yeah, I'm so not built for farm living. This is pretty fun though.