I Finally Have Chickens!

Yes indeed, I have chickens!  YEAH!  I've been wanting them for years and finally got 4 today!  This was my belated Mother's Day present.  My husband started working on the coop Mother's Day weekend and we finally finished it up yesterday.

It's not the fanciest coop.   It was our neighbors eight grade project from last spring that he never quite finished up.  It sat in their yard unfinished for the past year and my husband bought it from him for $50 and did a few minor modifications and now we have a coop.  We had some old wire fencing that we had taken down after moving into our house and we are using that for the day pen to give them some more room.  Eventually I'd like to figure out some electric fencing or some sort of portable coop so they can go out in the yard and also in the garden in the fall and spring.

I wanted to start with chicks, but my husband wanted instant egg layers.  It didn't take us long to find some people who had too many chickens and were looking to get rid of a few. 

We haven't come up with names yet, but the girl on the right is a Silver Laced Wyandotte, and the girl on the right is a Light Brahma, she is quite fluffy and even has feathers on her feet.

These two girls are Partridge Rocks.  I've already figured out how to tell the two apart! 
Luckily the people who we got them from have 4 kids, so they are used to children being around them.  My kids went running at the fence and the chickens didn't even flinch. 

They are also used to dogs being around too, which is nice.  Our dog Cosmo was intently watching the chickens.   Years ago she was an almost chicken killer, but was stopped very quickly while visiting a farm a few years back.  I already caught her stalking the chickens once today.  She is not to be trusted!

And look at this, we already got our first egg this evening!  What good little girls!  The kids were so excited to find this already, jumping around and singing with excitement!  Fischer doesn't want us to eat it, he thinks we should save it!  

Much of my afternoon and evening was spent watching the chickens.  I think I'm in love already!  My husband wanted to make sure that they were all tucked in for the night, very sweet, which is what I'm going to do before I head off to bed myself!