Cage Free Monkeys

Earning Your Wings: The Rites to Being a Backyard Chicken Farmer

So my sister now officially thinks of herself as a backyard chicken farmer. As I told her this morning: not so fast. She has had three 8 week chicks for all of 48 hours.

I have created this list of the rites she must pass through before calling herself an official chicken farmer.

Feel free to add ones I may have left out as we educate our novice fellow chicken raiser. Tally your scores and find out if you are a true backyard chicken farmer.

Give yourself 1 point for each answer of "Oh yeah, I have done that" and no points for "Huh? Really?"

1. You must slide and nearly fall from stepping on chicken poop. Bonus point if you fall.

2. A chicken must poop ON you. Bonus point if it is on your skin instead of clothing.

3. You must find yourself having a serious conversation with a chicken with no other human present. Bonus point if a neighbor points this out to you days later.

4. You transition from wearing boots into the coop (and scrubbing them down after entering) to flip flops or better yet, barefeet.

5. You have heard your chickens snore and can fairly accurately replicate this sound to your friends while drinking. Bonus point if you were sober.

6. You have washed a chickens butt in your home. Bonus point if it was in your bathroom sink.

7. You have cooked food for your chickens before cooking for your family.

8. Your husband points out that the chickens are fed more regularly than he is.

9. You have pried a warm egg out of the nest while a ticked off broody hen sits atop it. Bonus point if she pecks your hand. 2 bonus points if she pecks your face.

10. You have brought out fresh water and feed in one of the following: a snow storm with 3 feet of snow on the ground, a torrential rainstorm leaving you stranded in the coop, or a severe thunder and lightning storm. Bonus point for doing it in all three.

Scores:
0-5 points: Um, you clearly do not have chickens other than the nuggets in your freezer.

5-10 points: Maybe you have visited some one with chickens, or a farm but its doubtful they live in your backyard. If they do, you are clearly not the one who takes care of them.

10-12 points: You have backyard chickens but not for long enough.

13-15 points: You are a crazy rocking backyard chicken farmer!

16 or higher: You have some serious issues. Get some non-feathered friends and step AWAY from the coop.

Melt

Its Only Weird if You Have Never Done It

We are literally running out of creative ways to cope with the massive amounts of snow here in Syracuse. So for today it was Chicken Sleigh Ride day.

I ♥ Faces: Winter Wonderland

Go on over to I ♥ Faces and check out the other snowy entries this week.

Removing Amazon From Advertising on This Site

Occasionally we bloggers partner up with big business to advertise. Its usually win-win. The blogger gets a bit of cash through readers clicking on ads and the advertiser gets face time with our readers.

I allowed Amazon.com to advertise on this website. As of this morning I have removed all of their publishing rights and cancelled my accounts.

As the web rages with the recent Amazon Fail, I want to let my readers know that Amazon ads and promotions will no longer appear on this blog. Period.

I actually forgot that Amazon had ads on here.

If you are one of the many boycotters and have a blog with advertising - please be sure to do the same.

Independence? Maturity? Or Is It Something Else?

It started maybe a week or so ago.

My little girl was growing up. As she went to bed each night, she would tell me that I didn't have to check on her. I listened and gave her the space she wanted to that would prove to me she was growing up. Night after night, she would go off to bed and I would not see her chipper little face until morning. I was proud of her. I had no idea what spurred the sudden quest for her independence but was a proud mama bear nonetheless.



Yesterday while doing laundry I made mention that I needed to change the sheets in her room. She sprung to her feet from her TV induced coma and offered to do it herself. She insisted she knew how to change sheets and her words were, " I can do it mama, you don't feel well. I want to make it easy on you."

Wow. How did I manage to raise such a responsible and thoughtful little girl. She was suddenly independent and matue. My little girl was growing up. I felt the tears coming on.



As I thought about this over my coffee this morning, I gushed with pride and just had to go sneak in to look at my now 'big girl' who was surely slumbering away proudly.



Yeah, not-so-much.

Apparently her room was victim of some great natural disaster that even FEMA could do nothing for. A natural disaster so strong, it snapped off one of the posts on her four post bed.

She figured that if I saw what used to be called her bedroom, I would make her clean it. So the best way to avoid cleaning it is to avoid me seeing it.



Guess what she is doing today?