Updates From Our Chicken Farm

our babies are about a month old and they are getting big! all of them can fly. tillie cannot fly straight but she can fly a foot or two. the others can fly up to four feet! they are a lot of fun to watch. if one of them starts pecking at something the other four run over to see.

fillet in the outdoor pen wondering why the door is open

etheldore looking into her adult chicken home

the chicken's next home. i am planning to move them outside next week.

this is where the chickens will live when they are big and do not need a heat lamp

elizabeth telling etheldore what she should be doing...

tillie is getting big! she has a hard time keeping up with her siblings. when i am in the house i sometimes hear a horrible peeping sound. it is tillie calling me to help her catch up to the others. i run outside and carry her over to play with the others and then she is happy!

marguerite is losing her peep peep and starting to sound like a chicken! ben likes the adult noises but i am going to miss the peeps.

etheldore and marguerite pecking at something

etheldore, as of right now she is the smartest. she is the only one who knows how to get out and in the rabbit hutch.

Summer Fun

i can't believe it is almost august! where has the summer gone? ben and i are having a lot of fun on the west coast. we are riding our mountain and rodes bikes. we have climbed almost every hill on the peninsula! we are still milking goats on fridays and loving it! ari is having a lot of fun too. we go to the beach almost every day to play in the water. he loves running in the water up to his belly. my car is covered in sand from the wet dog. i vacuumed it again today but it will only be clean for a day or two...

ben milking fresca. she was in a good mood on friday and we were able to milk her without her dumping her bin of treats on the ground!

the kids!

ben milking fresca

fresca

ari and sophie running to play at pillar point

ari loves to play in the water!

my car has a new license plate! it was a little scary changing the plates over but i finally did it on the last possible day.

Chicks!

we have chicks! we decided to buy them instead of hatching them. rotating eggs for 21 days did not seem like a lot of fun to me. on tuesday evening we went to the feed store and picked out four adorable little babies. we named them tillie, queen elizabeth, marguerite, and chick fillet (ben named that one...). later that evening we noticed tillie was not like the rest of the chicks. she was not eating as much and moving around as much. we decided to keep an eye on her and call the feed store in the morning. the next day i took tillie back to the feed store to have her looked at. robert, the chicken man, said she was born with a crooked spine and sometimes chickens out grow it. he gave me another chick and asked if i wanted to keep tillie? i decided to give tillie a chance. we started calling the new chick tillie two but decided that we really wanted to give tillie a chance so we changed the new chicks name to etheldore. each of the chicks have their own personality. they are a lot of fun to watch.

the crazy twins - queen elizabeth and chick fillet

queen elizabeth

chick fillet, queen elizabeth, etheldore, marguerite, and tillie is under the pile

quiet tillie

strong etheldore

etheldore sleeping next to tillie

sleeping babies

4th of July in Half Moon Bay

ben towed ari, in the trailer, 10 miles to the parade

ari was excited for the dog parade!

this was the first float. instantly i knew it was going to be a fun parade!

my favorite store in half moon bay!

i think i moved to a farm town...

dog parade... ari loved it!

on the way home we stopped at the Brewing Company for lunch. this was the first time we have taken ari to a restaurant. he was well behaved and slept most of the time.

Potrero Nueve Farm

(http://potreronuevofarm.org)

every friday morning ben and i are vida verde goat milkers! "Vida Verde is a nonprofit that promotes educational equity by providing free, overnight, environmental learning experiences for students who don’t otherwise get the opportunity" (http://www.vveducation.org). part of the children's educational experience is to milk goats. on the non-education days, the farm needs people to help milk the goats. i decided to volunteer... and bring ben along for fun!

ben milking fresca

the goats eat while you milk them. they get excited to be milked!

preparing to clean squirts' utters

milking squirts

ben milking squirts

we get to keep the milk we get from milking the goats. ben is drinking it instead of cow's milk. i have not switched from soy yet... i am going to make cheese from it today!

Getting Rocky

rocky (aka mr. bun or bun bun) is our four year old outdoor rabbit! my rabbit, sadie, died a few years ago. i really loved her but she was a smelly little thing... i knew i would never want to have another rabbit in the house.

this is mr. bun's story:

this is our backyard. i felt like it was a waste of space so i decided i wanted to hatch my own chicks to live in it. in preparation for the chickens i posted a wanted add on freecycle (freecycle.org, if you have never tried it, you are missing out. it is a great way to get rid of your junk and get items that other people no longer want) that said "looking for a rabbit cage to put baby chicks in." kevin, one of my neighbors, responded and said that he had a rabbit and cage. when i saw the cage i was very interested! he had just offered me a chicken coop that came with a rabbit. ben and i were excited! we were getting a new furry friend and we would not have to build a coop.

ben figured if he got me pink gloves i might be more likely to wear them?

preparation for rocky moving in

ben setting up the cage

this is ben's first rabbit. he was excited!

me and mr. bun

he is really sweet!

Moving Amy

12 - 18 June 2009
my move across the country

matt loaded the trailer twice! he wanted to make sure we were balanced. because of his amazing job we made it across the country without any problems.

ari, all packed up.

ben, all packed up

all packed up and ready to leave my parent's house

ben driving

melvin, ben's dad, dog sitting ari!

pennsylvania

ohio

what should we do in nebraska?

have breakfast and brush our teeth in a walmart parking lot! somehow it seemed like a normal thing to do at the time...

eat beef. do you think we were in cow country?

how did they get ari on the hill?

wyoming

welcome to nevada, almost home!

it took us three days to get from rochester, NY to montara, CA. we spent one night somewhere in wyoming. ben, ari, my car and trailer made it safely our across our very large country without any issues.