The journey begins...

It’s been a few years since I was bit by the backyard chicken bug.  A few years ago my daughter who was 4 at the time and I were watching a documentary and saw a glimpse of some backyard hens and my daughter said, “mom, why can’t we get some chickens?”    For some reason this always stuck in my mind.   Why couldn’t we get some chickens, we certainly had the space in our backyard, we are trying to be more green and after researching our local ordinance we could meet the restriction of having a coop 100 feet from our neighbors. How neat would it be to venture out to our backyard and gather up fresh organic eggs?   In addition, what a wonderful experience for our kids to care for an animal (I do realize that I will be doing the caring) that will in turn be a pet that provides us with pure organic food and the added bonus of entertainment.

I flip-flopped last summer on whether this was something I really wanted to do, gotta love my husband, he was all for it, but I knew that these would be ‘my chickens’.  Was I really ready to add to our zoo of a dog, a fish and a hamster?    It basically came down to the fact that I could not decide on a coop.  The wooden coop versus the English Omlet Eglu coop which has eaten more of my time than I care to admit.  Instead of the chickens last summer I focused on a garden that turned out a great yield for a total novice gardener.   As summer turned into fall, we decided to wait.  This unusual warm snap of weather we had this last month triggered the mother hen in me and once again I’m spending hours upon hours researching chickens and coops on:  Backyard Chickens, My Pet Chicken,  Omlet U.K. Forum all wonderful chicken resources.

My daughter who is now almost 7 now must be a mind reader because as I was thinking chickens she found my book, “City Chicks” and dumped it on my lap a few weeks ago and said, "can we PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE get chickens this year?"  My 16 year old stepson was just as anxious to finally get our chicks.

What the heck now is a good of time as any, right?  And so the journey begins…