G. and her friend are working on a service project for the Animal Refuge League in Westbrook this winter.
We visited the ARL last week so the girls could learn more about all the ways kids under 13 can help the animals at the ARL (you have to be 13 years old and accompanied with an adult to work directly with the animals).
Of course the girls loved every animal there - from the cats to the dogs to the bunnies, hamsters and gerbils. Apparently a larger than usual number of bunnies are at the ARL right now so the girls spent some extra time in that room cooing over them all.
G. absolutely loved Mr. Pipsqueak (who was anything but small). But after last summer's incident with a rabbit that leaped out of her arms, used her face as a springboard and scratched her cornea on the way to the ground (and required a trip to the ER), we have a ban on adopting bunnies at our house.
G. and L. liked the "kitty castle" idea they found online and decided to make some, not only for the ARL but also for their own cats.
We asked for boxes from the produce manager at our local Hannaford and were given as many as we could carry out of the store.
The girls decided to stack the 'castles' to make a kitty 'hotel' instead.
And although the cats are posing for this shot that G. took, our cats really do enjoy hiding out in those boxes.
If your kids like making crafts, the ARL has a list of fun crafts you can do at home and drop off at the shelter. Check out "Comfort Crafts"
The girls have been up to their ears in animal poop this past week.
L. helped me clean and lay new straw in our chicken coop the other day. It's amazing how much poop 30 chickens can create. And shoveling out the boxes is not so fun when the "glued" straw is half frozen. L.'s glad that we don't have to do this job every day.
And G. has been working at a local farm with a 6-month old heifer she's named Sparkles for her new 4-H project this year. She's been to the farm once a week since early November and really enjoying being around the larger animals and working hard to halter-train Sparkles.
And although G. didn't help clean the chicken coop this week, she did not escape poop patrol. It was just a different kind.
The whole foster thing was a sham orchestrated by Fino and the kids to soften me up about adopting Lupus. It took me a while to catch on and after a couple of months since his cast removal, he is now a permanent member of the family.
But I wonder how many times Dulce and Lupus might think living with two loving girls is a bit of a hassle.
Take their Christmas presents. They each received a catnip toy along with a couple of new outfits (the American Girl outfits were getting "boring" I was told).
Dulce in the new fisherman sportswear
Lupus (the boy cat) in the Mrs. Claus outfit
Feel free to caption these photos for us ...
BTW, Toddy the blind cat seems to be enjoying not being the focus of the girls' attention lately.
Mica the cat is diabetic and his caregivers needed someone with experience in caring for his special needs to take care him over the holiday. Fino checked with me first (which I very much appreciated) before he and the girls offered to bring Mica to our house for a couple of days. (I've been assured Mica will return home on Wednesday.)
Mica needs to be monitored closely and receives insulin shots twice a day, which is going to be an interesting education for the girls.
But, Fino also shared with me yesterday that Mica is apparently always on the prowl for food (his special diet kind as well as anything else) and has a little bladder problem. Fino, being the wonderful husband who knows I'm almost at my limit with cats in the house, decided Mica needed to be contained during his visit with us.
So he and the girls have devised a plan for Mica's Christmas holiday with us....
Dulce was checking things out once Mica arrived.
.. his own personal tent in the girls' playroom.
Of course our other cats are curious about this new visitor but Fino has decided against any face-to-face introductions, the better to keep the holiday injury-free for all our feline friends.
So after Mica arrived last night and ate his special diet dinner and had his insulin shot, G. snuggled down in the tent with him for the night.
Before bed last night though, the girls shot off a quick email to Rudolph at the North Pole to make sure it was clear that Mica was in need of a gift at our house Christmas morning.
We'll see what Santa and Rudolph can work out for tomorrow...
There is a reason why we have yet to decorate our Christmas tree.
Here is reason number 1 and 2.
We do however have our Santa's village up and running and the cats are not the least interested in that. And after 11 years of collecting pieces for the now very large - and illuminated - village display, it is the only reason the kids aren't really upset about the Christmas tree trimming delay.
Of course the girls could help get the tree decorated sooner if they didn't encourage the kittens' antics and they actually tried to get them out of the tree.
Mimi, the New York city area dog owned by our cousins came up for Thanksgiving (the people came too). Mimi was a little ripe and all the girls decided she needed a bath and some grooming in our bathtub.
I am certain the girls enjoyed themselves a lot more than Mimi.
Mimi offered a little payback with a very wet shake that got all the kids wet.
And just to make sure the cats didn't feel left out after all the attention Mimi received, the girls decided to make up a story about a rich kitty and a poor kitty, which included a horse-drawn carriage, various head gear, snow (thanks to quilt batting) and background music on the electric piano.
Dulce's Princess Story
Ahh yes, it was an eventful holiday weekend with our cousins at the Almeida homestead.
Friends of ours decided to take a break from raising chickens and gave us the remaining part of their original flock.
About 18 chickens of various breeds ...
... and a couple of guineas.
The guineas, which I was really on the fence about taking but Fino really wanted, make a lot of racket and are pretty good at scaring away predators. And even if they don't exactly scare them away, the humans will hear the racket and investigate. Apparently the guineas have alerted our friends to attacks and ultimately saved their rooster's life. Twice.
After loosing Sassy, the girls are happy to have the guineas around and have been checking in with the flock more than usual.
We now have about 30 chickens, 2 ducks and 2 guineas now which is about the maximum number of feathered friends we've ever had at one time.
Hear the guineas
Since our friends asked us if we had the space for all of them - and were up for the care (the girls offered an enthusiastic yes) - I thought I'd post a couple of photos of Chickenland (our chicken coop).
The first phase of the coop was actually the middle chicken wire portion, which Fino built lickety-split because he bought the chickens before he had a place to put them.
Then he built the enclosed portion the following fall/winter and includes glass sliding doors he found at the dump. It's great to have a full wall of windows for a south-facing coop (more light=more eggs and happy chickens). Then he added the other end of the wired coop when our flock grew to 30 a year later so they had space to spread out.
The red string is linked to a bent nail that closes the door lock. After years of losing track of that darn nail, Fino decided to tie it to the nearby tree. He's a smart one.
After the third addition, the girls dubbed the coop Chickenland because they think it's sort of like a fun house/playland for their feathered friends.
Last night two of our chickens were attacked by what we believe was a fox (although the PITA dog next door was also seen in our yard yesterday but don't believe she was the culprit this time).
One chicken didn't survive and the other was in rough shape. Fino and the girls wanted to do everything they could to save the chicken, which required stitches to close her gaping wounds.
Since Fino is a vet tech, he's familiar with surgical techniques (and not squeamish). But he needed a second set of hands and asked for G.'s help cleaning the wounds. She did that surprisingly well and without complaint. The chickens are after all her beloved pets that she works hard to take care of them everyday (even when the tasks aren't fun).
Fino didn't have the surgical supplies he needed so he had to improvise by using dental floss to make the stitches. And the sock was his idea too so G. and L.'s hands wouldn't be pecked mercilessly while holding the hen in place. She actually seemed calmer with the sock over her head.
The whole process took about 45 minutes and the chicken ended up with about 15 stitches. She's doing well this morning and we're hopeful she'll make a full recovery.
The girls have renamed the chicken "Sassy" after handling this ordeal so well.
During the 'surgery' the hen made some weird noise that gave us a surprise and had us laughing the rest of the night. It was definitely a YouTube moment.
G. had a dentist appointment this afternoon to have a baby tooth pulled that she couldn't wiggle out and was causing problems with an adult molar. After several incidents with her dad pulling out the surgical pliers to yank one of her teeth out (which she does let hang by a tiny thread for days before her dad gets to it), she's apprehensive about telling us about her loose teeth. And even though she admits that her dad's extraction technique has never really hurt, both girls beg me not to tell him about their loose teeth.
To be honest, I'd run the other way too.
At the dentist though G. was a trooper with the extraction and the molar came out without much ado.
When we arrived home L. informed me that Dulce lost a tooth too. I have never seen a kitten tooth fall out before but L. managed to find it and put it in the tooth fairy box.
G.'s baby molar looks huge next to Dulce's tiny canine. I'm totally amazed that L. saw Dulce's tooth fall out and managed to find it afterwards.
G.'s hoping for $1 from the tooth fairy but the question being pondered by L. at the moment is what the tooth fairy will bring for Dulce.
Since daylight savings 'fall back' isn't until this weekend (because of that darn new law), it took an extra hour for dusk and the girls were anxious to get out on the trick-or-treating route (I would guess other mother's across the US were cursing those lawmakers Halloween night). To pass the time, they decided to play with their new kittens outside and teach them how fun the swing set was.
You can guess who was having more fun with that.
And G. has been trying really hard to teach Dulce how to go for a walk on a leash. I don't have the heart to tell her about the reality of training a cat ...
I put a stop to the idea of teaching the kittens about the slide. I thought the swing was more than enough for everyone.
Once dusk set in the girls were in their costumes and out the door. We live in a good neighborhood for trick-or-treating with a low-traffic, one-mile loop.
G. was a Renaissance Queen and L. was St. Lucia, which was prompted by the latest American Girl catalog (Kirsten celebrates the Swedish holiday for the saint and had a page spread with a costume like this).
The girls like going door-to-door, not just for the candy but to also visit with everyone's animals. They know nearly every dog and cat in our neighborhood, most by name. So Halloween is a time to catch up on each of their animal friends with at the door chit-chat. I usually have to remind them to wrap up and get moving again, much to the amusement of my neighbors.
Of course, the girls can never remember any of our neighbor's names but that's clearly not part of their agenda. It's all about the animals for them.
It's been a slow week for the Almeida kids. And although I'm feeling better than I have been since my surgery, I'm still not up to climbing any mountains this week.
The girls, who are used to being busy and physically active, have been a little off-kilter with our quieter schedule these past couple of weeks and driving me a little crazy.
If they bathe the cats or give them any more attention, those cats are going to start biting and scratching their eyes out (a couple of times this past week I've had similar thoughts). Their latest antics for 'training' the cats was to teach them to sit still while being pushed around the house in the doll carriage.
I realized after this 'activity' it was time to give them a more structured project to work on so the cats could have a break from their loving attention.
Dani, a children's librarian at Baxter Library, gave us an idea for a craft project to make for the library's craft fair fundraiser in December -- pet-oriented toys and crafts.
The girls loved the idea and I thought it a perfect project to keep them busy for a couple of days.
G. wanted to make 'kitty beds' out of fleece and quilt batting so they were "soft and fluffy." L. wanted to make some mats like she'd seen at the pet store.
We opted to make all the mats 24" x 18" to get as many as we could from the fabric we already had at home.
G. sewed the batting for her mats right into to the fleece so that it wouldn't bunch up during repeated washings.
The fleece options readily available were diverse patterns but G. was sure there was a football fan cat owner who would like her Patriots' themed kitty bed.
Making the mats L. wanted required my help to cut and iron the border material into a long strip (like homemade bias tape) for her to pin and sew to the fleece.
And as she explained to the librarians when she brought her mats to them yesterday, she used the brown fleece for her cat mats instead of the original monkey costume she had planned to make for Halloween (another year, another crisis on deciding what to wear).
The cats were happy to walk around the house undeterred for a few hours and Dulce helped to confirm that making the mats out of fleece was a good idea.
Next week we have plans to go hiking and I hope until then this sewing project keeps them happy and gives the cats -- and mom -- a little more down-time.
Downloading pics from the camera was entertaining as usual this morning. The kids clearly love their cats and Dulce is closing the gap with the number of photos the girls have taken of her vs. Toddy.
Reading to Dulce.
Dressing Dulce up for the 100th time.
Dulce doing some dance moves I think ...
And a spin apparently (the photo was taken from this angle as best I can tell from how it downloaded).
Toddy up to his old tricks of drinking from the toilet.
And how a huge, blind cat can jump up and balance himself on the rim of a toilet is kinda noteworthy I guess.
At least they let the cats rest some of the time ...
Dulce the kitty hangs out by the door just begging to go outside. It's clear she has a calling but we're waiting until she's a little bigger before letting her get acquainted with the great outdoors.
As you can see, she's still a peanut even though she thinks she's ready to tangle with the chickens. She watches them all the time.
Of course, this is the not-so-great habit she has of letting us know she wants to go outside.
And yup, she does climbs on every screen in the house.
Yesterday we returned home to find the yard empty -- not a chicken in sight.
But after a walk around the coop we did find our neighbor's rottweiler prowling the area.
It seems the dog escaped her yard again (for the millionth time). We've tried for years to be patient with the rottweiler's owners and neighborly when returning the dog home.
Yesterday, after discovering a bunch of feathers (usually the sign a chicken has been killed) and facing the task of rounding up the flock (a time-consuming and not-so-fun job), I decided it was time to take a firmer hand with the situation.
G. and I caught up with the dog and guided her back home (she's a big dog with big teeth and although has never bitten us, I know she has never been trained properly so we don't get too close her). Fino on the other hand knows how to handle this dog but unfortunately he wasn't home at the time.
After ringing the bell several times the owner's girlfriend came to the door. I explained that the dog has been in our yard a lot (even more than usual lately) and was hoping she could keep the dog in their own yard.
I was told by the girlfriend that she and the owner thought the dog was staying in their yard all the time now and didn't need to wear the collar for the electric fence anymore (which was purchased less than a year ago, previous to that they didn't have anything to properly keep her in their yard).
The nonchalant delivery of that statement cinched my decision to call animal control.
A little while later we had all our cousins outside helping us round up the chickens. I assumed we'd find at least one dead chicken after discovering a bunch of feathers that definitely did not fall out naturally.
But it turned out that Napoleon was still alive; he just had a lot less tail feathers.
The girls insisted I post these "adorable pictures of Dulce, the cutest kitten" on my blog so I've decided to accomodate them. But I need your help.
I'd like you to 'caption' these photos for me. Just post a comment with your suggestions below.
#1
#2
#3
#4
And our New York cousins are visiting so their shitz zhu Mimi has been added to the wardrobe rotation as well.
#5
#6
And just in case some of you were wondering, the kitten and Mimi are sporting an American Girl doll wardrobe. And Toddy is happy to have been left out.
My day didn't really start yesterday until I pulled into the driveway after a busy morning at work and an afternoon doctor's appointment.
This is just how life is for most families ....
What greeted me in the driveway that was less than typical was one of our chickens walking funny (and no, it wasn't Lucy). After a closer look at Una, I realized the problem.
WARNING: Continue reading at your own risk. I would suggest putting down the food you're snacking on at your computer right now!
Una hadn't been taking care of herself and had so much crusted poop on her tailfeathers, she couldn't walk straight.
Bizarre but unfortunately, true.
I walked into the house, dumped my backpack and lunch box, rounded up the kids, changed into old clothes and grabbed some rubber gloves to set about giving Una a good soak in the water to clean her up.
She lost a few tail feathers in the end but she was walking more normally.
Mission accomplished.
Unfortunately the fun wasn't over at our house just yet.
Around 8 p.m. L. and I were sitting at the kitchen table reading our books and snacking on ice cream when something flew by us.
We both had a delayed reaction in coming to the realization that it wasn't an oversized moth or small bird.
Nope, it was a bat.
After she and I screamed, L. dove under the table so fast she did a number on her back.
She said she was so surprised she couldn't get under the table fast enough.
I went under the table with her (see I admitted it Fino!) while G. hid behind the counter. That's when Fino came fuming into the room yelling at me about the reason the kids are always so afraid of everything -- I overreact.
I mumbled some less-than-complementary words about husbands under the table before yelling at him to get rid of the (insert expletive here) bat.
Unfortunately the bat went MIA and the kids and I decided to take our reading material into the bedroom while Fino started looking around the house.
It turned out Toddy - the blind as a bat cat - found the bat hanging (literally) on the window in the kids' playroom and was meowing at it.
Apparently he has bionic hearing.
Our Hero!
Fino tried to catch the bat then gave that up and opened a window. With some active redirecting, the bat flew out of the house a few minutes later.
Some orphaned kittens needing a home came through the animal hospital this week and Fino and the girls decided they HAD to rescue one.
Meet our new addition to the family -- Dulce!
She has a little caramel-colored spot on her forehead so "dulce de leche" suited her and that is her 'official' name. But everyone's calling her 'Dulce' for short.
Of course, the girls took a ton of photos of her yesterday - 65 pics that I downloaded this morning to be exact.
I won't bore you with them all; these are the highlights.
One of several deer-in-the-headlights shots.
Dulce playing with a variety of stuff and some non-approved kitty toys, including L.'s new Webkinz charm bracelet.
She learned to navigate the stairs pretty quick. She's tiny but she doesn't have a problem jumping around on them.
G. fell asleep because Dulce kept her up most of the previous night crying about being in her sleeping box (Dulce needs to learn to use the kitty potty box before she's allowed to roam at night).
Toddy isn't so keen on having Dulce around just yet but we're sure he'll get used to her. Since Toddy can't see that she's about 1/4 of his size, he can't quite figure out if she's a threat or not right now.
But I think Toddy is going to like having Dulce around in the long run because now that there's a female cat in the house for the girls to dress up, the heat will be off him to do it all.
Drawing nature, creative license and staying still
Yesterday was a quiet morning for us so the girls and I decided to sit in our backyard and draw for a while.
L. likes to draw so I try to encourage her as often as I can.
G. thought the flowers were too hard to draw and she was tired of the drawing trees (after drawing one) so she took some creative license with the daisies and drew "pretty purple flowers because they are prettier." Apparently she felt the same about our white ducks too.
G. enjoys drawing too but more from her imagination that what she's looking at.
L. decided to draw the chickens but it was hard to capture much detail because they kept moving around or sitting in their holes.
So she asked her sister to help.
G. caught a hen and held her still while L. and I tried to draw her.
Next time the chickens will likely run away a little faster. L. wanted a full wing view and her sister helped the hen accomodate her.
And as I've mentioned many times, chickens are really entertaining to watch especially when they're digging their holes.
I guess the difference between dogs and chickens is that dogs don't lie around in their holes all day. The chickens use their holes to take dirt baths and sleep. Or maybe dogs do the same?
I'm thinking maybe it's a little weird that I don't know ...
Our new ducklings have moulted their baby feathers and are now looking like they're all grown up.
Our Indian Runner breed duck (on the right in the photo above) has had a few long feathers on the back of her head since she was a duckling. We just thought it was some uneven feathers moulting but after gently tugging at the stray feathers a few times recently, we've come to realize that they are there to stay.
The feathers looked kinda crazy when she was a duckling but as her body has grown, so have those feathers.
There's a story in today's paper about a 10-year-old South Portland girl who wants the city council to change the law that prohibits chickens from residential areas.
It's a sad day when a kid who really wants a pet chicken is deprived of having one. I'm certain my girls will be up-in-arms with the city of South Portland when I tell them about this story.
The good news is that most commenters on the story seem to be in favor of letting the South Portland girl have her chicken. And the Fair or Foul question today is leaning towards fair as well (note the photo on the question -- the Almeida family has the site's chicken stock photos). It's nice to know the general public is rooting for her.
The kids are back to their favorite summer night traditions.
The after dinner swim at Watchic Lake (which we try to do at least a couple of times a week when it's warm).
Building camp fires with their dad in the backyard to make s'mores.
The one who does not enjoy early summer is Toddy the blind cat. He had his annual summer shave the other day and as usual, he wasn't too happy about it.
Fino shaves Toddy every summer because he sheds fur like crazy this time of year (just like everyone elses dogs and cats!)
He needed some reassurances from the girls during his shaving session.
Fino did a better-than-usual job with the clippers in giving a fairly even cut this year.
Toddy was being a bit more vocal than usual for the girls to open the door to get back into the house. But he was happily snoozing on G.'s bed in no time.
If you ever wondered what more was possible to do with a pet chicken, here's another gem from the Almeida girls.
Taking your pet chicken for a bike ride.
And Carl, I'm sorry about Burley the Dog's envy about riding on - rather than beside - your bike. But I think the chicken would have gladly traded places!
Oh, and my favorite bit in the video is when G. catches her dad doing a wheelie and L. lamenting that he's such "a showoff." Their commentary while recording their various videos was worth the price of their digital camera.
You know that joke, "Why did the chicken cross the road?"
It's meaningless at our house. The Almeida chickens don't cross the road -- they stop in the middle of it.
They do not seem to have the desire to actually get to the other side.
And even after beeping the horn repeatedly and driving really close to them, they don't budge.
One of several fearless hens in the Almeida driveway.
It usually takes one of the kids jumping out of the car to shoo her away.
We're not sure how Lucky Lucy broke her leg last summer but recently we've speculated that maybe she was one of our half-way chickens we just didn't notice.
Well, I had to agree with the girls yesterday that the duck video they made was pretty funny. They recorded it the other day while the ducks were swimming in their little pool and dubbed it the "Disco Ducks" because the ducks "shake their booties all the time."
I think it could have been called, the "Funky Moves by L. and the Disco Ducks" because she's much funnier than the ducks.
The kids like to simply sit and watch our flock of chickens and ducks walk around (or swim). They find this highly entertaining and I too think they really are funny creatures to observe.
And since poultry is one of G.'s favorite subjects to photograph (the flying chicken photo was a keeper last year) she was at it again - but with the ducks this time. I guess they are the stars of her 4-H photography project this year.
And during the duck photo session, L. got laughing so hard doing her 'disco duck' moves she fell off her chair.
Well it certainly is an interesting way to spend an afternoon in the backyard.
We have some new ducks this week and when we brought them home, the girls decided to use one of their winter sleds for a pool for them. This isn't too odd for us though, the girls' old sand box is used as a water trough in the main part of the coop.
The ducks were hatched by some students at Magdalen College and turned over to the older brother of the girls' friends.
And then we invited one of our neighbor's dogs (the friendly, well-behaved ones) over and Cody just loved the other sled.
Other duck news...
We were saddened - but not surprised - that our other ducks were 'lost' last week. They refused to go back into the coop at night and after years of regularly chasing the ducks to get inside for their own good, we decided we'd had enough. It took about 2 weeks before one of the many predators in the woods behind our house finally caught them.
But now we have two new ones and the girls plan to "train" them (they think if they handle them more as ducklings, they will be "better listeners").
But I'm not sure I can say that's going so well. L. just emailed me to update me on something else she was doing and then wrote a "p.s." about the training.
p.s
my duck scratched me again but it not as bad as the one yesterday.
The kids are always snagging my camera and taking pictures (and incriminating themselves) but sometimes G. simply captures a great picture. I downloaded this one a few days ago.
No question Toddy is well loved and the most popular subjects in G.'s many photo albums.
We had some half-eaten pieces of ice cream from G.'s birthday party to throw out and Fino suggested we feed it to the chickens. It didn't take much to convince me to go outside in the snow storm with him to "record" the experiment. There were 9 girls running around the house playing games that required a lot of imagination and even more jewerly, shoes and accessories not to mention the "excited chatter" (a.k.a. screaming) that was going on.
So Fino and I braved the driving snow with the heaping plate of ice cream cake to the chicken coop to test our hypothesis that chickens will eat anything.
The experiment results were clear in about 3 seconds ...
They like it and they don't care what the temperature outside is when they eat it (about 20 degrees with driving wind and wet snow).
One variable we didn't take into account was the flying mess. It seems chickens feel the need to vigirously shake their heads from side-to-side to remove the ice cream stuck to their beaks. Yeah, being in the middle of a chicken ice cream feeding frenzy with all the splatter wasn't so great. But in the name of science, I guess it was worth an additional load of laundry.
Do chickens eat ice cream cake?
And if you're looking for more action, check out our YouTube playlist of chicken videos from the past year, including our first chicken feeding frenzy that involved one of the girls' gingerbread houses.
Someone asked the girls recently if our other chickens were having problems this winter (as if all our chickens were freezing like poor Flipper was).
Nope, they aren't. The Almeida poultry is quite comfortable out in the coop and don't seem to mind snow storms - like today's - at all.
And they even have a nice picture window in the coop (a glass sliding door recycled from the dump thanks to a very resourceful Fino) to watch the storm.
Our ducks are not too bright, which you are likely aware as I have lamented about this many times before. But still, I am struck by their dedication to the water. Even when the outside temperature falls into the single digits (or below), they still go for their morning swim. And when they jump out of the water trough (eventually the hens push them out so they can drink the water), they sport icicles all over their body.
Clearly I can't image having ice hanging off my body, particularly my mouth, worth this daily ritual during the winter.
The kids were doing their morning chicken chores when they found Flipper dead in one of the nesting boxes. Unfortunately for me, this happened on a morning when Fino was at work. I couldn't leave the dead chicken in the coop all day so that left me with the task of finding a resting place for him.
I didn't want to pick up the dead rooster in my hands - I was already queazy enough just looking at his dead body - so I found a shovel to use instead (I guess the upside of losing a chicken in the winter is that the body was frozen solid so he wasn't too hard to scoop up).
But then there was the issue of what to do with the body because in all the years we've had chickens (almost 6 years), Fino has always been the one take care of this part.
So there I was walking out of the coop with the dead rooster in my shovel and two upset children still trying to figure out what to do. I had the girls say a quick prayer and then sent them into the house. I then proceeded to walk into the woods several hundred yards behind my house and put Flipper under a big pine tree. I knew the wild animals in the backyard would 'take care' of him and told the girls what I had done and said it was probably better that way so those animals would have some food.
The girls didn't want to talk much about Flipper dying but the next day L. wondered what would happen to "Chickenland" now that "the king was dead." It seems that now Napoleon, our only remaining rooster has been dubbed the new king.
I guess he was aptly named for his new role.
Napoleon the rooster is tiny, even by bantam standards (he's on the left next to his sister). He looks like a 6-week old Rhode Island Red breed chick. But he makes up for his size in other ways by making a lot of noise and intimidating the hens by pecking at them. Little did we know that he would so completely be living up to his name.
Flipper, the almost frozen rooster, has a new strategy for staying warm -- sharing body heat. The girls are working on getting video of this but basically he squeezes his little bantam body between a couple of Rhode Island Red hens...
... then proceeds to tuck himself under one of their wings before going to sleep for the night.
After a rousing wake-up call yesterday morning (and I thought the crowing through the baby monitor was bad!) from our early bird camped out in the hallway (a.k.a. the rooster, his name is actually Flipper), he is back outside with his buddies.
But not before the girls and Fino decided to make him a fleece jacket to keep him warm.
The girls found a worthy use for that left-over Halloween fleece. Good thing there are no cats on it...
The jacket seemed to keep him toasty but then it was decided (by Fino) that it might not keep him that much warmer. Apparently chickens stay warm by fluffing out their feathers and he can't very well do that with a jacket on so it sort of defeats its purpose.
The spiffy jacket has been put away for now but might make a reappearance if the girls think the Flipper needs it again.
They certainly are putting their sewing skills to good use these days for all of their animal friends.
I got home from the office this afternoon and this is what I found inside my house.
Note the heating pad cord. At least Fino used it under a plastic bag and towel so it might be salvaged after the chicken is done with it.
Apparently the neighbor's dog ran into our yard (she really needs obedience training and spends almost as much time running wild in our yard as her own) so of course the chickens scattered. But it's mighty chilly outside and our smaller chickens have a lot less tolerance for the cold so usually stay inside the coop on days like this. But the dog scared them and one bantam ran quite a distance away from the coop. About an hour later Fino found the rooster and initially thought he was frozen to death. Turned out he was just really cold but still breathing. So he brought the little guy into the house and put him in a warm bath in the bathroom sink in hopes of warming him up quickly.
Afterward, Fino tucked him into a big box with a towel and heating pad in the hallway to keep an eye on him (and it was at that point that I walked in the house).
As we sat down to eat an early dinner, L. laughed and pointed to the hallway.
"Pop goes the weasel!" (She is the family comedian after all.)
It didn't take too long for the rooster to warm up start acting like his own feisty self again.
Then the rooster jumped out of the box and ran into the bathroom.
He sort of missed the toilet doing his business though.
Fino caught the rooster and put him back in the warm box. But then as G. was taking a quick video clip a few minutes later to put on her YouTube channel (have I mentioned how much she enjoys that website?), the chicken made another escape attempt.
The rooster is now in the box with some air holes and a closed lid. He'll hang out until tomorrow when he's completely dry and warmed up enough to join his feathered friends in the coop.
Today was yet another example of why it's a good thing I have a sense of humor. When you're the parent of a couple of animal-loving children who really do work hard taking care of their special pets, laughing at the craziness inherent with the task becomes a requirement. I really never ever planned on sharing my house with poultry...
The kids really do work hard to take care of our feathered friends, especially in the winter. It's a rough job to trek water into the coop every morning to replace the ice block that forms overnight in their water trough.
But the ducks like to do more than simply drink the water, even on the coldest days.
When you've moved the family's edible gingerbread house around the kitchen a thousand times and everyone's picked off and eaten their favorite candies, it's time to give it to the chickens.
And after we uploaded our short video clip to YouTube, we came across this gem (note the swinging cookie's shape)...
The girls have sent of their emails to Santa about what they're hoping for this year. Why email?
"Santa sends us a letter right back when we email him!"
I like emailing Santa too. The girls can only request three items (the email form has only three blocks to write in) and Santa emails them right back about their requests. Sort of an 'order confirmed' note, which I explain to the girls means that they can't change their minds about the gifts they want. Very helpful with kids like L. who can never make up her mind about anything.
After G. finished reading Santa's return letter she noticed a special section just for pets. Apparently Rudolph not only leads Santa's sleigh on stormy nights, he also organizes the elves to make gifts for all the special animals of the world.
G. helped Toddy at the keyboard to type in his requests and he too received a letter right back. Here's a little excerpt of it (of course the letter is hanging on the bulletin board in our kitchen as well).
It's always wonderful to get an email from you, Toddy! Öink baaa meow hiss roar squeãl!! So Toddy, have you been a good boy this year? (Of course, you won't mind if Santa and I do a little checking, will you? woof chirp? baaaa! neiiiiiighhh).
Did you have a hard time typing with your paws? Keyboards weren't really designed for us critters were they?! Tikki-tikki squawk woof!! Of course, don't forget to get your owner to email Santa too so Santa knows what they want for Christmas. Otherwise, you might have to share that kitty treats with them!! ARROOoooooo! ~sproing~ squeãl öink!!
Toddy the blind cat took a car ride to be part of Grandpa's annual Christmas card picture and ended up with an extended stay in the family vehicle. The reason: G. locked Toddy - and my keys - in the minivan.
But the trouble began when I asked G. to put our furry family member in the van so we could get a few pictures without him.
The second we were done, G. ran back to the van to check on Toddy.
I told her to leave the cat alone for a minute and come into the house to look at the photos.
She ignored me.
I called to her again but she continued to hug Toddy in the car and ignore me.
Then I yelled at her to get her butt in the house. She finally listened (Why must I be forced to yell? I honestly don't like to.) and took it upon herself to lock the car.
Apparently protecting Toddy from the evils of Grandpa's driveway - located in a nice, quite neighborhood - trumped her common sense.
The real kicker was that she opened the driver's side door to engage the automatic car locks. My keys were in plain view on the driver's seat. I left them there because I didn't have a pocket to carry them in while taking photos and didn't think we'd be staying long anyway.
But really, it's a mystery as complex as the building of the pyramids if you asked G. why she didn't see those keys, let alone what possessed her to lock the doors in the first place.
Then the realization hit me that my spare key to the van was in my wallet, which was in the backpack that was also now locked in the van.
After a short rant about putting on our "thinking caps" that I directed at G. (I am hardly a paragon of motherhood), I went inside the house to resume downloading the photos I had taken earlier to cool off.
And don't think I escaped comments for my role in this debacle. Several times Grandpa reminded me on the importance of a hide-a-key and leaving a window cracked open.
Thanks for the timely advice Dad.
But in the spirit of trying to help the girls, Grandpa took them back out to the driveway to try to jimmy the lock.
It didn't work.
I called Fino at work to explain the situation and after some snickering on both our parts, he agreed with me that it wasn't a dire emergency and that Toddy would be OK to wait a couple of hours until he could get to Grandpa's with his set of keys (it wasn't overly hot or cold out so at least that was running in our favor).
Because really, how was I going to explain to someone at AAA that my blind cat was locked in the family minivan at Grandpa's house?
I went outside a little while later to check on the crew trying to rescue Toddy and found Grandpa trying to stick a wire through the window, G. in tears and L. writing in the layer of dust on the van.
Everyone has their own special way of dealing with a crisis.
We left the van a while later to return home with the promise from Grandpa to check periodically on Toddy.
Fino arrived a couple of hours later in Grandpa's driveway to find Toddy curled up on the van's driver seat. He unlocked the door and drove Toddy home.
Toddy received a heart-felt homecoming from the girls who went running into the driveway as soon as Fino pulled into it.
I lectured G. that she was banned from ever locking the car door again. Afterward she reminded me that it wasn't nice that I laughed about Toddy's situation. Now that things were resolved I calmly reminded her that she was darn lucky her mom had a good sense of humor.
As I was looking through some old pictures to find a photo of one of our bird houses for my last entry (which I never did find), I came across a ton of Toddy (the blind cat) photos. He is after all, a very important member of our family.
But no, there is so much more to Toddy's life than that...
There are the various creatures from the yard he is expected to entertain.
The fashion modeling he's expected to pose for regularly.
The assistance he offers Fino and I while we're working on the computer.
The protection he provides for the third step. Apparently it is important to protect it from whoever runs up and down the stairs during the day since it is the highest traffic area in the house.
But I think his favorite time of day is when the girls are sleeping.
He does need some beauty sleep after his busy days.
Since my family all loves apples, and the kids love using our apple peeler, we've been on a pie-making kick. As it turns out, the human Almeida family members aren't the only ones who love the fruit.
Yeah, our chickens also eat egg shells. According to Fino, it actually makes the eggs they lay in the future stronger. I try really hard not to think about the whole concept though, it makes me a little queazy.
Take Toddy for instance. He's supposed to be the flying pumpkin. And boy was that an appropriate costume since he pretty much flew down the stairs as soon as we snapped a picture of him in his costume.
Yesterday L. tried to catch Lucky Lucy to see how her leg was doing. And as we quickly discovered, the slightly crooked leg (well, she was the first chicken leg cast Fino had ever done) is not a problem anymore. It took L. a few rounds of Walk Around the Coop before she finally caught her.
Lucy, of lucky chicken fame, had her cast removed today. Her leg is not straight and we really didn't expect it to be given we know nothing about healing chicken's bones.
She's not moving around so much right now without the cast support but she seems to be doing fine. We knew it was time to take off the cast when she enthusiastically got herself to the compost pile every afternoon this past week after I dumped table scraps there. She's sort of a one-legged, hopping, partly flying chicken who really can move fast with the right motivation.
G. took the photos below while L. held Lucy down. Fino did all the precision work and Lucy was back in the coop a short while later without a scratch.
This whole thing with Lucy simply cracks me up and provides endless entertainment for the kids, who offer Cheerios and apple incentives during their daily physical therapy sessions with her.
Fino's drammel worked like a charm to remove the cast.
The cast sans Lucy. G. plans to use it for her 4-H project about Lucy at the Cumberland Fair in a couple of weeks.
For a few weeks Fino has been repairing Chickenland (our chicken coop). There's a few places where the wire fencing has started to weaken at the dirt line (it's dug about a foot beneath the dirt) and there is a hole big enough for an animal to get through. Since we've been finding a few cracked eggs and a need to buy more chicken feed than usual, we guessed Chickenland might have a late night guest or two.
We didn't worry too much about it though since all the chickens were accounted for (every one of our 25 chickens has a name and can be identified by the girls). The visitor didn't seem interested in eating any of the chickens, just their feed and eggs.
Last night our suspicions were confirmed. Around 3 a.m. we woke to the sounds of loud chicken noises so Fino jumped out of bed, grabbed a flashlight and my camera and went to go check it out.
I saw him running towards Chickenland from our bedroom window before he came to a quick -- very quick -- stop. Then he did a very slow back-up.
It seems we have a new skunk friend regularly visiting Chickenland -- and he looks well-fed.
Now we have to find a way to encourage our friend to find another late night snack location. Any suggestions?
We had an eventful Thursday. Our blind cat Toddy protected us from an intruder while Lucky Lucy the chicken figured out how to escape a hose shower, broken leg and all.
Toddy was sitting in the middle of the steps leading into the kitchen yesterday, which is nothing unusual. Pick the most inconvenient spot in the house to be and that's where Toddy will be. While I was in another room, L. started frantically yelling for me to come to the steps.
"Toddy is fighting with something furry mom!"
It seems a squirrel had somehow found his way into the house (probably through the basement door that was left open most of last weekend while Fino moved his various tools into the shed).
Although we don't think Toddy actually injured the squirrel, he certainly scared it into hiding. Fino did a quick search of the basement last night without finding it. Now Chion, our other cat who loves to hunt (he's always killing and leaving dead stuff outside the front door), has been commisioned to find the squirrel. Well, basically we locked him in the basement in hopes he'll find the intruder and take care of it for us.
As for Toddy, he's standing guard on the steps - his new favorite spot - protecting the family.
Good times at the homestead.
The latest news on the Lucky Lucy the chicken is that she's getting physical therapy twice a day for her broken leg. That means we carry her out of the coop and encourage her to stand and walk around a bit. She's standing on her own now.
But her lack of movement has made her kind of smelly (well more than usual). So the girls attempted to give her a little misting shower with the hose in hopes of cleaning her back feathers a bit.
Amazing what a little motivation to get away from a bath will do for a chicken.
I asked L. to take some photos of the sunflowers in our yard over the weekend. They really are blooming now (thanks to all the chicken poop fertilizer) and as tall as last year. Although we liked the suggestion/comment from Nancy about making a sunflower house, we never did get our act together to plant them correctly to do it.
L. said this one was a "sunflower picture with Chion." She always finds an excuse to take another photo of one of our cats (like we don't already have about 1,000 of them). I suppose you can see that tiny flower in the background...
And we have an update on Lucy the Lucky Chicken that the girls wanted to share. Fino put a plaster cast on her leg yesterday and now she can hobble around the coop.
I'm always learning something new about my chicken friends - and my husband's many talents.
It has been a rough week on legs at the Almeida homestead, first L. and now Lucy our chicken.
Fino discovered the chicken's leg broken yesterday morning. Nurses L. and G. assisted with the splint and helped to secure it with an old sock from L.
When I got home from the office yesterday, I was told in great detail about poor Lucy's injury and how the nurses and Fino helped her. There was a lot of speculation about how the injury happened but Fino really wasn't sure.
Lucy was resting comfortably in the coop last night and the nurses have now given her a new name.
"Lucky Lucy the Chicken"
And I'm sure she's feeling lucky and the envy of her friends. She's probably the only chicken in Maine wearing a pink sock right now.
