3 hyper kids sitting still enough for a picture

Now go to bed, you hooligans!  It's a quarter to 11.

There's a hole in our cups

Lesson:  make sure dishes don't fall into the bottom of the dishwasher.

There's a hole in our hearts the size of a small chicken :(

Tears were shed.  Dogs were scorned.  Life goes on with a little less zest this evening.

Wounded chicken

Ethan is keeping little Surprise warm hoping it'll recover from a light chomping in Cedric's mouth.  I'm hoping, too.

Cousins in a Coop

This was an interesting day with lots of kids getting to know lots of
chickens and lots of chickens wishing they weren't getting to know the
kids quite so fast.

Nahni w/ Chickens

An Avery Series

Avery and the Garden Chickens

Avery

With a bunny and a piece of celery. Good combination

Nahni

Cheering the chickens

The kids are cheering on the chickens as they are exploring the ramp to their pen.

Dancing on tables

Ribbons at the fair

Ribbons for everyone.  Amber's entry won grand champion in the art category, so stay tuned for state fair pictures in September.

Belly dancing demonstratrion at the fair

And Nahni watching

Avery having a chat with a sheep

I'm pretty sure neither one really got their point across, but they did actually converse for a while

Belly Dancing at the fair

George and Olivia

Jesse avidly munches on wonderful weeds while two new 7 week old New Zealand Whites are pretty much petrified.  We need to tame them, so they are living in the porch for a while.

Shop time

Lessons include electricity, hand saws, brace and bit, clamps.

Avery dancing at the fair

Despite the cold wind, weeks of preparation culminated in a cute "Under the Sea" dance in front of packed bleachers.

Saturday morning cartoons with 3 chickens

So what do you do when you're sad about your mom going to work?  Two words: Chicken therapy.

Catch'er in the rye

Rest in peace, littlest robin

Unfortunately, the runt of the litter continued to get weaker despite careful attention and feeding.  Yesterday after I'd gone to work, the little guy called Amber over to it and then gave up the fight peacefully in her hand.   I had already decided that I couldn't do the relentless feeding schedule for the next 4 to 6 weeks that are required to help them reach independence in the wild.  This little guy reinforced the idea that his siblings would be better of with an experienced rehabilitator.

Turtle crossing

I escorted this huge snapper across the road last weekend and I'm only now posting the picture. 

Physics lesson

Here is the action shot to go with the previous post.

Silly boys

In a fit of physical learning about levers and catapults, the boys piled wood chunks on one side of the teeter totter here and then jumped hard on the other end.  The wood chunks were successfully propelled up into the air, and unfortunately, right against their faces.  First Ewan tried it and then Ethan reconfirmed the discovery.

Birdies from 3 days ago.

Since this picture was taken, the birds got bigger and featherier. 

Sorpresa the surprise chicken.

Last night we came home from fetching Ethan and the kids discovered that the egg we put in the incubator 3 weeks ago had hatched.  The reason it was such a surprise is that I had failed to turn it or check it for pretty much the last two weeks.   Normally we turn the eggs 3 times a day for the first 18 days, so this is particularly noteable.  I finally have 100% hatch rate, though.  We're happy.

4 baby robins

These ugly little things are sooo cute!  In the last 2 days we have found 4 baby robins that must've fallen from their nest high on a pole.  We can't possibly get up to put them back, so we are attempting to take care of them.  They seem to be about 3 or 4 days old.  They eat blueberries readily and we've been giving them some cooked up chicken feed from a syringe.  I'll be giving them some worms from the worm bins at work, too.

Kids in the lake.

Chickies in the coop

Little chickies in the big coop where they don't stink up the porch.

Patriotic Chickens

The two older chickens are celebrating Independence Day by having their first opportunity to wander around in the wide open yard.  After that, they were very happy to sit on Ethans and Konnors laps.

Quack

Other things

I forgot to get pictures of the bat we found in our laundry, the chickies out in the coop, now, and the kids selling lemonade at the duck races.

Dave's Turkeys

Dave Thomas has acquired 5 little turkeys to help in the garden.  I like them.