it’s official, i’m a homesteader.

It’s been the running joke in our house that we are “almost” homesteaders. And that we will be officially someday, when we get chickens. I have been asking Patrick for chickens for 3 years now but none have come.

And this summer has been fuller than any to date. Two new add-ons : a bedroom and a mudroom/entry way, our biggest garden ever, a spot at the farmers’ market (that we have attended irregularly, yet fashionably), and my greatest (and most successful) attempt thus far at storing nuts for the winter (–my mom just visited for 5 days for a canning+freezing extravaganza! 18 pints of beets, 10 qts of veggie stew, 12 qts of salsa, 20 batches of basil and wild pestos, frozen broccoli soup, chutneys, berries, peaches, and more. And that was just in 5 days! A lot more before, and hopefully still…) SO, long story short. If you build it, they will come.

Or, if they come, you will build it.

Well, at least that was my reasoning. Patrick of course didn’t laugh as much when I brought home the 2-day old chickies, but when he saw Tulsi doing her lil’ chickie dance and saying “Baby!” over and over, he turned to a puddle of goo and agreed to help me build a coop. Because our “simple” life has been so busy lately (and admittedly, a wee stressful on occasion), I am especially excited about this joint project. I’m happy that it isn’t “a chore” for Patrick or we aren’t buying one from someone. We’re building it together, and we’ll end up loving it that much more — no matter how many mistakes we make or what it looks like.

So here is some of the gang…they are growing by the minute (in size and personality) and loving their temporary spot in the greenhouse. No names yet except for Roo-Roo the Rooster. Yes, I decided to get a rooster for my flock, to protect the flock from larger winged sky predators, and well, I’ll admit, I have always loved drawing roosters. The chicks are so fun, and they love Miss T. Oso still licks his chomps, but he loves eggs, so I told him to be patient and he’ll be happy. We are vegetarians, but we eat and bake with eggs. And now that Tulsi is nibbling on ‘real’ food more an more, I want to have our own chicken’s eggs to offer her.

So, here we go. I’m learning a lot, fast. Like, how it’s actually hard to find bugs when you are looking for them and that worms are ok to divide to share among the chicks but caterpillars aren’t. I’ll post some pictures of the coop when we get there! Until then, here is an old ink drawing I made of a rooster in Thailand.

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