The Cat Door

     A few weeks ago I travel to Texas to visit friends and family.  While there I was telling Mema, my husband's grandmother, about the chickens.  She was surprised we were keeping them inside.  I explained that it was just temporary and that they would be moved to the garage then outside once they were old enough to handle the cooler temperatures.
     She said, "When I was young, my mom got some chicks and let me have one.  That chicken stayed with me all the time and would follow me from room to room through the house.  Until Mom got tired of it and it became dinner.  You let those chicks stay in the house and you will never keep them out of it.  Every time you open the door, they will be running inside."
     Although I loved the story, I didn't worry much about the chickens coming back inside because we are not going to let them free-range.  They will be confined to a coop and run most of the time, so they won't have much opportunity to sneak back in.
      Last week we moved the chickens out to the garage.  Less than 48 hours later I went to the laundry room and saw this....

     We don't have a cat and have never paid any attention to the cat door that is in the door to the garage.  However, the chickens have found it rather convenient.  The chicken wire we are using as a lid for their box doesn't fit as securely on the larger box tin the garage so every few days we find a chicken in the laundry room. Apparently, Mema was right and they will be sneaking into the house at least until we get the coop and run built.

Out of My House

   The chicks have been relocated to the garage.  Now that they are 6 weeks old the temperature doesn't have to be as high for them to survive and the garage is a much better place for them.  They are loving it because it tripled their living space and stopped most of the squabbling.  I like it because older chicks are messy and everything in the house has been constantly covered in dust for the last 2 weeks.  I could clean a table and a few hours later there is already a layer of dust back on it.  We had to put up several of the decorative items so that they wouldn't be damaged by the amazing amount of dust in the house.  Not to mention the fact that all 5 of us are battling colds that I believe were caused by breathing in so much of the stuff.

    This is obviously a temporary arrangement until we can get a coop built for them.  The boxes are only held together by a few pieces of tape so that I can easily take them apart to change the bedding.  I have also lined the bottom of the boxes with an extra layer of cardboard and several layers of newspapers.  The thought is that this habitat will be much more pleasant for everyone if the bottom doesn't become saturated with chicken poop before they can move outside.
     It only took the dog a few hours to discover that she could force her way between the box seems and into the chicken box.  I hear squawking and went out to find her happily chasing the chickens in a circle around the box.  We have been able to keep the dog from going out to the garage unsupervised, so we shall have to see how it goes.
 

What is the Best Christmas Gift You Have Ever Received?

    Last Sunday at church our Middle School leader asked the kids to name the best gift they have ever gotten for Christmas.  I was surprised by how difficult it was for the kids to answer this question.  I had assumed it they would come up with some new electronic device or big thing like a bike, but for most of the best gift was something small.  "A blanket with beavers on it that my grandma made."  "Slippers because that year all the grandkids got matching slippers."  The list went on but the common theme was that the best gifts were those that created memories.
    As a parent, I want to give my kids all the cool stuff for Christmas.  But I think it is more the memory of seeing their faces light up when they open the box that drives this desire.  When I think back over the 37 Christmas' of my life and the hundreds of gifts I have received, I have trouble naming more than a dozen or so.  I think it is important to remember that the gift will never be as important as the memory it creates for both the giver and the receiver.  As anyone with a small child can tell you, they would rather play with the box anyway.

Unlikely Friends

     One of my biggest concerns when we got chicks was how our dog would handle the new additions to our household. The dog is a 10 year old mutt.  Her coloring is that of a jack russell terrier but her muscle structure more closely resembles a bulldog.  Her personality is that of an OCD bouncing boulder that wants to sit in your lap as you paint her nails.  She has treed several cats and an entire family of raccoons.  She has caught countless birds and one rabbit.  So my concern over bringing chicks into the house was well founded.
     When the chicks first arrived, she was completely ambivalent towards them.  If the kids were playing with the chicks then she would come over to see them but otherwise ignored them.  This began to change as the chicks grew wing feathers and started flapping them.  A light came on and she realized these little things were similar to the birds she would wait under the tree patiently for then jump up and snatch out of the air when they approached.  I believe the fact that the chickens don't actually fly confused the dog and probably saved their lives.  Whenever we took the cover off the box the chicks would fly up and perch on the side.  Then the dog would come along and begin a game of knock the chick back into the box.  If a chicken happened to land on the floor then then game became herd the chicken back to the box.
     Two of the chickens (the Americaunas) have decided the dog is an annoyance and actively avoid her.  The other two (the Buff Orpingtons) have decided the dog is a part of life and can be useful.  The other day I came downstairs and the dog was standing in the middle of the living room with a chick unmoving between her front legs.  I immediately assumed the worst as started trying to come up with a way to tell the children.  As I got closer the chicken turned her head to look at me.  My relief allowed me to look closer and realize the chicken was soaking wet but could have moved away in just about any direction.  I reached down to "rescue" the chick and the dog licked her from back to head in one long lick.  Apparently I had interrupted her bath!
    This does not mean I am completely at ease with this developing friendship.  The dog is still a hunter and birds have very delicate bones.  We never intentionally leave the dog and chickens alone together.  The problem is that the dog can lift the chicken wire that covers the chicken box up enough for a chick to hop out and thus the antics begin again.

(This picture is of Omelet, who was bathed a few days after the first incident that I described above.)

Company Clean

    Every year as Christmas approaches, I go through and deep clean the house to prepare for the relatives that visit us each year.  I even have a special chore chart for the kids that starts 5 days out and has special tasks that must be done each day before guests arrive.  There are things like organize the pantry that can be done a week early and those like change the sheets on the beds that must be done the morning they arrive.  My kids hate the list and my husband thinks it is just part of my overly structured personality, but it is my lifeline.
    Domestic things don't come naturally to me.  We lived in a house with tile floors for 3 years before I noticed the grout by the wall was a completely different color than the grout in the middle of the room.  I have discovered that there are just a lot of little things that need to be cleaned that just don't occur to me.  My ADHD mind is usually so focused on whatever that there is no space in it to notice baseboards.  This is why I love hosting the holidays.  When we are going to have a house full of people, cleaning becomes a major project that demands my focus.  Yes it would be easier to spread things out through the year, but with three kids anything done more than a week out isn't noticeable anyway.
   Now I must get back to cleaning. :)


COMPANY CLEAN

Morning of Arrival

Kitchen - Counters

Dining Room - Table cloth

*Yahel Room - Change Sheets

*John Room - Change Sheets

*Keturah Room - Change Sheets

One Day Before

Main Bath - Counter & Sink

Main Bath - Toilet

Main Bath - Tub

Main Bath - Floor

Main Bath - Walls

*Yahel Room - Vacuum

*John Room - Vacuum

*John Room - Pick Up

*John Room - Dust

Two Days Before

Stairs - Vacuum

Wood Floor - Sweep / Mop

Tile Floor - Sweep / Mop

Downstairs Bath - Counter & Sink

Downstairs Bath - Toilet

Downstairs Bath - Floor

*Yahel Room - Pick Up

*Yahel Room - Dust

*Yahel Room - Vacuum

*Keturah Room - Pick Up

*Keturah Room - Vacuum

Clean out the Car

Three Days Before

Wood Floor - Dust

Tile Floor - Dust

Kitchen - Clean out Refrigerator

Kitchen - Organize Pantry

Dining Room - Clear off Hutch

Four Days Before

Fold / Hang Laundry

Put Up Laundry

Stairs - Wash Rail

Wash Baseboards

Check walls for marks

From Chicks to Chickens -

   The most amazing thing about chickens is how quickly they grow.  At this point they are consuming about 10 pounds of chicken feed each week.  The picture below was taken when the chicks were just a few days old.  My daughter loved to "snuggle"them and they would all fall asleep resting on her arms.

   In the following picture, they are 3 weeks old. Not only have they grown but they all have distinct personalities.  Mrs. Cluckers (top left) is the most gentle of them all, which is great as my 3 year old likes to carry her all over the house. Ninga (top right) likes to be the boss.  She will randomly pounce on top of any of the others that happen to walk by her.  Popcorn (bottom left) has a severe case of ADHD.  Omelet (bottom right) is significantly smaller than the others but still tries to boss them all around. In this picture she is going nose to nose with our dog.

    They are also in a very interesting and ugly stage of having about half their feathers in.  The combination of feathers and fluff isn't nearly as cute as the fluffy chicks we brought home a few weeks ago.  I have dubbed this the "awkward pre-teen stage".

A Place to Call Home Part 2

    For me a home is all about location.  Yes it must be so big and have certain features but the primary thing I look at is location.  This has become even more important as we are looking to buy several acres of land along with the house.  To get land at a reasonable price, you have to give up living in a city.  However, with 3 kids and all their activities, I believe it is important for us to be within an hour drive of the city.  To help evaluate this I created the following map: