chickens, part one: incubating and hatching

Oh boy, it seems that I have taken about a million pictures of our little chicks. Really, it wouldn't be healthy to try and cram all of them into one post, so I'm splitting them up. We'll start at the beginning.

John has been asking if we could get chickens for two years now. His family had chickens while he was in high school (until it all came crashing down in a frenzy of floating feathers thanks to a frisky fox-- I was there that day and I still remember his mom running around the backyard in a sad state of semi-shock from trying to defend her poor chickens), and he knew he wanted to raise them again one day with his family. I wasn't too warm to the idea at first. There were a few very logical reasons for my hesitance, but I didn't want chicken poop all over my backyard, mostly. The more we talked about it this year though, the more I began to like the idea. We figured out the perfect spot in the yard to make a coop and a fenced off run for them so that their mess is confined and my kids can still play in the bulk of the yard without worrying about rolling around in poop. The thing that made our decision final though, was when I discovered that I could order fertile eggs and incubate and hatch them myself. I loved that idea so much. It was perfect because the teachers at school had wanted to do something like that for our students, too.

So without another thought I paid the $3.00 for each fertile egg (I got 4), rented an incubator for the week (only $5.00), and set up a little birthing (okay, hatching) station on my kitchen counter. I was actually really surprised to find myself feeling this wave of maternity as I gingerly transfered each warm egg from the towel that I had wrapped them in for the ride home into the incubator. I couldn't help but feel this womb-like attachment-- I know what it is like to incubate a living thing inside my body and I honestly felt a twinge of that same miracle-feeling as I handled each one of those delicate little orbs full of life. It was strangely inspiring and touching for me to think about the potential that was bottled up in those precious shells. And you guys, these are just chickens-- no wonder I am so crazy about the miracles of pregnancy and birth!

I knew that they would likely hatch on Wednesday (I had gotten them on Monday (April 25)), and is it embarrassing to say that I woke up several times throughout the night on Tuesday to check on them? One of them had started to crack the shell early that evening, and I didn't want to miss it.  I also felt this sense of responsibility like I needed to be there to make sure everything was okay. What would it say about my future abilities as a chicken-raiser if I woke up to an incubator of dead chicks, you know? This was the first sign of life from our chicks, and I was pretty excited to realize that we really were going to be hatching some babies:


I brought the eggs and incubator to and from the classroom every day because we wanted the students to be able to learn about the process (and possibly see a chick hatch), but I couldn't just leave the chicks there unattended all afternoon and night. It was a little nervewracking to move the whole set-up twice a day for three days (the temperature and humidity in the incubator need to be stable and I stressed myself out watching that blasted thermometer and tweaking the dial to try to get it to stay at exactly 100 degrees), but the kids at school loved it so much. I won't post school photos, but here is one of two of my favorite students observing our incubator in the kitchen :).


Who knew that chicken-hatching took so long? I had no idea how long (and exhausting for the chick) the process would be. After hours and hours of working (you could see the chicks little beak come up for a few pecks and stabs now and then), she had gotten it to this point:


Like I said, I woke up several times throughout the night to check on the hatchlings. I went out at about 3:30 AM, and there wasn't a lot that had changed, but when I went back out around 5:30 AM, this is what I found:


Well hello there little chickie. It was so exciting! And what was even better was that a second chick had really started working on her shell now and I knew I wouldn't miss that one. If you look closely in the above picture you can see the hole that she was making on the top of her egg (the far right one).
Here is another shot of it. You can see some of her yellow fluff inside the crack.


Oh! Here she comes! This was seriously so exciting for me. I was sad that it was so early in the morning and I was the only one awake. I did run back and tell John, but apparently he wasn't as into it as I was because he stayed in bed. I guess he figured there would be two more to hatch later that day when it didn't cut into his precious sleep time.


A few more pecks and some maneuvering by the chick and out came her wet little head. Seriously, I kept making parallels with chick hatching and childbirth and I would likely sound a little crazy if I kept going with them all here, so I'll just share the pictures. But how cool is it to watch life emerge from the space where it was first created, right? So cool.


Another angle of her working her way out:


Oh, I love this one. This slick little newborn so exhausted from all the work it took to be born.


This was about when Georgie woke up and I immediately called him out to the kitchen to see. I love his morning eyes and blankie.


And this one cracks me up. They hatched just a couple of hours apart (you can see how quickly the first one was already fluffing up), and they just collapsed like that and slept in the same position. So funny.


The third chick hatched later that afternoon, and the fourth, our little runt, had a little bit of a rough time. She had started cracking the shell way early in the day, but really seemed to struggle to get out. She would poke her little beak out and cheep-cheep to us, probably asking for a little help please.


That night John's mom came over to watch the kids while John and I went to a REAL game and we told her what was going on with the chicks and to call us if the last one hatched. We had read that ones who are late and/or struggle to hatch often end up dying once they do hatch so we were a little concerned. Janet was worried about it too, and decided to help our last little one out. John totally predicted it, too. When we got the text from Janet saying that the chick had hatched John's words were, "That means she helped it hatch." He knows his mama :). It worked out well though, because who knows if the chick could've done it on her own (she may have gotten dried out and stuck to the shell since she had been working at it for so long), and she has done just fine.

If you ever decide to raise chickens I highly recommend you start this way. Hatching them myself gave me a sense of attachment and ownership (and maybe even love?) that I know I wouldn't have felt for them otherwise. We added 7 other chickens to our flock (the only variety we could hatch were Leghorns and we wanted some other breeds as well), and those little ones that we hatched are definitely my favorites. It was a really cool experience, and I'm pretty happy I gave in and we went for it :). Lots more chicken stuff to come...

circa 1978

There is a post about our chickies in the works, but in the meantime doesn't this picture make you believe that it is 1978 and Pea and I are hippie swingers? (Swingers as in, people who like to swing, not the other definition, thankyouverymuch.) Perhaps it's the stripes, the green sunglasses, and the bellbottoms?

(Pearl and Mama at a park in Spanish Fork, May 10, 2011)

the hunted

When Pearl woke up from her afternoon nap on Easter Sunday it was time to hunt for Easter baskets. George was quite patient to wait all that time, and when we said he could start looking he was so thrilled. He remembered that last year his basket had been in the dryer so that is the first place he wanted to look :).


He found his basket in the bathtub and immediately started examining its contents.


I love his fist-fulls of Dum Dums.


After he had looked through his basket for a few minutes he left all his goodies on the coffee table so that he could go help Pearl find hers. The best part was that Pearl was not interested in finding hers; she had anything she could have ever dreamed of right there in front of her :).



She's like, "Woooww! Mom! Have you seen all these treats?!"


George was hunting for Pearl's basket in the kitchen and I decided I should probably have John bring her in to join the party. I seriously cannot handle how much I love her up on those tippy toes.


She sat down on the tile and watched over her shoulder as George discovered her basket in a cupboard. He brought it over to her for her to look through and she humored us by glancing down at its contents for a moment before speed-crawling back into the living room to attack George's treats.


We didn't know if we'd be able to do any Easter egg hunting with extended family this year since both of our families were supposed to be out of town, so we planned a mini hunt at our house with a few dozen eggs for the kids to find. George was loving it.


Pearl was less impressed, but she did reach out and grab a few colorful eggs as long as they were within about 2 feet of her :).


One thing she quickly learned to do was pop those little eggs right open and sample the contents.




This was our best attempt at a photo with both of them and their Easter baskets. Pearl could not be bothered to look up from her candy.


In the end, John's mom ended coming back into town to be with the family on Easter so she put together an Easter dinner and hunt at her house that evening. I feel really blessed to have all of this family; George only has one cousin at all right now, and I love that when we get together with John's extended family there are so many more "cousins" to play with. Most of them are actually John's cousins or his cousins' kids, but George loves them all so much and they have so much fun together.

Pearl was loving sitting on Grandpa's lap, especially because he was wearing glasses :). She loves swiping glasses off of people's faces and putting them on her own.


These pictures of Pearl with her great-grandpa (John's grandpa) are some of my most favorite photos ever. I think I love them so much because I know how much Grandpa truly delights in and adores his grandchildren, and that tender love is so evident to me when I look at these. Seeing these pictures makes me want to get photos of my children like this with each of our grandmas and grandpas so that I have them to show my babies someday.


Oh, they seriously melt me. Love these two people so much.


Logan had his basket all ready to go :).


Here are some of the younger kids sitting by the door waiting for the green light to go out and start hunting for eggs.


And they're off!






Aunt Lisa helped Pearl find a few eggs with some special things in them just for her like little hair bows. I love that Pearl totally looks like she should be Lisa's daughter-- so pretty with their dark hair and blue eyes!


Georgie was happy with his findings.


Pearl snuck a few treats that had fallen into the grass from someone's basket. Or, more likely, her brother thought it would be really thoughtful of him to give his little sister some peanut M&Ms to snack on.


After all of the eggs were found we decided it would be a good idea to have a little more sugar, so I made this cake for us to celebrate Grandma and Grandpa's birthdays.


I really like the perspective of these photos-- Grandpa's hand and the cake in focus with him blurred in the background. He was trying to block the wind from blowing out the candles before he and Grandma were ready.


There they go, only a few years old it would appear :).


The cake actually turned out to be pretty tasty, which I was happy about because sometimes elaborate plans to make fancy cakes end up being nice to look at but not so great for eating. Yay for a festive cake that was still worth the calories to eat :). (I cannot remember the website where I got the recipe and idea for this cake from, but I know I linked to it from The Pioneer Woman's cooking blog... if you are curious or want to make it I am sure you could find the link there.)



Mama and baby eating some cake. (This was a momentous occasion since it was the first day John and I had eaten refined sugar in quite sometime after giving it up for Lent this year.)


Daddy and his girl waiting for their piece.


John snapped a few pictures of people as we were eating on the porch and I especially liked this one of Spencer. He is so happy and cute.


And this one of Natalie and Prestley.


With cake and candy-filled bellies the kids decided to hit the trampoline for a little jumping. (I love Prestley's flying ponytail in this second picture.)


Pearl is just like her mama in that she doesn't ever want to miss a party, so she made a beeline off the porch to join the big kids.


Luckily Grandma was there to wrap her up in a blanket and take her out for some stories on the trampoline. Lucky for Pearl, but mostly lucky for me because I was getting cold and really didn't want to have to take her out there myself :).


Wowsers, that was a lot! My final Easter photo this year is just to document my stealth thieving ability. John thought it was totally mean of me to steal this many paint chip samples from Home Depot, but I say, they are free, that is not stealing! Who's with me?! I saw this linked to on lots of blogs this year and decided to make one for myself. I'm sure I could dig up the original site to credit it to if anyone wanted it. I love the cheery, colorful splash it adds to my living room and I still haven't taken it down. Easter egg garland year-round, anyone?