Tuesday morning

madelyn and me

I really do enjoy these chickens. When I'm able to beat the kids in getting up, mainly the least one, I enjoy sitting out back and just watching them.  They're so restful.....well, until Anastasia or Piglet get rowdy. Sometimes when I stay in bed a few more minutes, after Gary's left to take fourth son to work, I get interrupted by the bok-bok-buh-CAH noise, that signals either that someone has laid an egg and they're proclaiming it to the world, or more likely, both nesting boxes are booked up and one of our Black Stars is antsy to lay. Anastasia and Piglet are famous for being very, very noisy.

Never a dull day 'round these parts.

When this happens, I grab my shoes real quick, go outside and just pick up the screamer.  Then we sit for a minute, me talking all baby-talk and whoever's in my lap will cock her head (while I keep my head back a bit to avoid her pecking at my necklace) and give me the eye. Yesterday I was holding Anastasia and Nora jumped up on my lap.  Sort of a blissful moment as long as it lasts.  Chickens are busy creatures, so the moment is usually brief.

Years ago I read Josephine Moffet Benton's book called The Pace of a Hen. Very glad to have my own copy. I really liked the book (about women at home) but look at it a tad differently now.  Wonder if Mrs. Benton kept chickens.  She talks about a woman's pace being slow and round-about because of so many tasks needing to be accomplished in a given day, leaving little room for advancement. A sometimes frustrating situation.  Now in my brief experience of chicken-keeping, they're not lazy AT ALL.  They move constantly, pecking the ground for almost the entirety of a sunny day.  They do rest, but only briefly.  They enjoy a sunbath during the afternoon, but are so high-strung that rest doesn't usually come until they roost at night in their coop.  I'd compare them more to honeybees or ants, than anything slow and plodding.

Just my thoughts.

{and have lost egg count---mostly four/day and that's just dandy!}