Moving Already!

It didn't take long to figure out that the blog posts I wanted to write for Off-Grid(ish) were piling up while I kept up with my writing blog. So the decision was made to merge the two. If you're looking for updates on our little homestead, you can find them at www.heatherhuffman.net!

House Guests

I had a lot of things I was supposed to do today, and I had every intention of getting to them when I started my day.

But then I went to pick up these guys...

(they're Welsh Harlequins - aren't they cute?)

...because these guys were lonely and needed friends

 ... which they've obviously found because the six of them haven't stopped gossiping since they met each other.

But the friend I got the Harlequins from needed help transporting birds to an event next weekend. I was happy to do this, even if I'm a little nervous about keeping my new house guests happy and healthy all week. I have over 40 chickens and ducks of my own that I care for on a daily basis, but the thought of keeping someone else's birds alive for five days terrifies me. Still, they're sweeties.

The bonus? My friend gave me these guys as a thank you!

So, my chapters aren't written and my interviews are past due because by the time I got everyone home and settled, it was time to feed my children (the human ones). What can I say, though? I love baby ducks. :O)

Chicken Pics (and a Duck!)

I had a friend over for dinner tonight and she told me I didn't share enough pictures of my chickens. I promise, she really said this - it's not just an excuse to share more pictures of my chickens (and ducks)...

Juggernaut, my buff Bantam Cochin rooster, checking out a bug with my son's Mille Fleur pullet (young female), Jr. We'd intended to keep the Millie babies in a separate crate in my cochin pen until they were big enough to safely be with the bigger birds, but they kept slipping through the holes in the crate to be in with the big guys, and the older birds were being nice to them, so we gave up trying and everyone seems happier now.

Here's Juggernaut with the Mille Fleur cockerel (young rooster), Hot Shot. I really think Hot Shot is trying to learn from the big guy.

Skater, one of my Ancona/Blue Swedish mix ducks

Blue, one of my blue Bantam Cochin hens. I know, super creative name, right? It was getting hard enough to name characters by the time I got to my seventh book. Adding 40+ chickens to the mix, along with horses, ducks, dogs and cats has completely fried my brain. I called her "my blue" long enough that it eventually just got shortened to Blue.

Hot Shot. No, I did not come up with that particular super creative name, my 7-year-old did. Although it fits perfectly. He thinks he's a bald eagle or something. He's really young to be crowing, but that doesn't stop him from trying. It's not the most impressive yet, but he's working on it. The first time I heard him, I thought he was choking to death. It took me a minute to figure out that was his toughest "roar."

See the ruffled feathers around Hot Shot's neck? That's him, raising his hackles at Wild Child, my partridge Wyandotte pullet. She was looking at him like he was insane. He was ready to throw down.

Another picture of Skater, because he's just so danged cute.

My Wife is Awesome

In case the post title didn't give it away, this is Adam. And since Heather would never use this blog to talk about how utterly fantastic she is at this whole country living thing (and in general), I've hijacked the blog to do just that.

When we moved into our new house we had lots of chickens - and nowhere to put them. The chicken coop on the property was in shambles and - though we tried to rehab it - just wasn't going to cut it.

So what does Heather do?

She takes the whole dang thing apart and builds a new coop out of the usable pieces. But since she's awesome (as the title of this post makes abundantly clear and you know it's true because it's on the Internet), she doesn't stop there. See, she knows that as our herd of chickens continues to grow (is "herd" the right word? Gaggle? Flock?), we're going to need more coops. So she proceeds to build another coop out of the leftover pieces from the coop we tore down.

And another. And another.

We currently have 5 coops. And you know how much lumber we've had to buy? None. Each and every coop has been built using pieces of wood and other sundry items from the original old coop.

And not only has she planned out each and every coop and pulled a serious "loaves and fishes" kinda deal with the supplies, she's also done most of the work. I may swing a hammer or grab a saw or screwdriver every now and then, but she's the one out there making the magic happen. (In my defense, I usually go inside and make dinner while she's building, so it's not like I'm totally useless - just mostly).

I know Heather plans on blogging about the process at some point. She just hasn't had time yet because, well, she's too busy actually building the coops. Don't worry, though - the wood is practically gone so her post should come along any day now.

Of course, that's what I thought two coops ago...

Horses

I don't think I'll ever be able to express with words how much I love horses or just what it is I love so much about them - the gentleness of their soul, their presence, the clean lines of their back, the kindness in their eyes or the feeling I get when I know we've connected. I've broken through the walls of distrust and made a loyal friend.

We currently have two horses on our place. I have big plans for the future (think mustangs...), but with the drought, two are probably all I can feed through the winter.

I recently got a new camera, so I wanted to share a few of my favorite pics of my sweeties. The gelding (pics 1 & 2) is Casper. He belongs to my boys. The mare (pics 3 - 5) is my Dixie. That last shot is the view I have when I rest my head on her neck. She wraps her head around me, like she's hugging me back.

The Hard Part: A Tribute to Stormy

I had grand plans for my day on Wednesday. They changed the instant I looked out the back window and realized that someone had let the beagle out alone, and he'd used the chance to kill my favorite chicken.

I spent the rest of the day bursting into tears at random moments, as did my children.

For those who have never owned chickens, that might seem kind of silly. Maybe it is hypocritical of me. I mean, my oldest son, Dylan, was teasing me yesterday because I drove through the fast food line with a cage of chickens in my back seat and ordered chicken for dinner. In my defense, the chicken dinner was for my middle son. I still can't bring myself to eat it.

Stormy sat on my lap every morning.
If I didn't keep an eye on my coffee, she'd steal it.

Anyway, my point is, there are chickens, and then there are chickens. I delight in all of my birds. Well, most of them. I can sit and watch them for hours, or I would if my schedule let me. But Stormy was one of a handful of chickens that jumped in my lap every time I sat down in the backyard. She took it a step further, though. She loved to ride on my shoulder as I walked around outside. She'd try to sneak in the house every chance she got, and then look in the window at us when she was promptly set back outside. I think her shining moment in life was the evening she was allowed to come inside and sit on my lap during a Web interview. (The host had jokingly asked if I brought a chicken along, so I did.)

Stormy as a baby

When we first got our main flock of birds, we had 20 day-old chicks. Each family member picked four to tame. Dylan must have taken this responsibility very seriously, because Stormy was one of his four, and I've never met a friendlier chicken. He was crazy about her and she was crazy about him.


As much as it hurt me to lose my beloved pet, I know it hurt him even more.

That's the hard part of this crazy adventure we've undertaken. Part of life is death. Part of having this many living things on your property is that you must also face more death. It always bothers me, but some are harder than others. The deformed little duckling that didn't make it was hard, but even that didn't leave me crying for days like the loss of poor Stormy.

Dylan bent over to pick something up
and Stormy seized the chance to claim a new perch

So it only seemed fitting to give her this space as an homage to her short little life. I know that to most of the world she was just a chicken. To our family, she was a ray of sunshine that always brought a smile to our faces. We miss her dearly.

You can watch Stormy's Web debut here. I know it sounds strange, but she really got a kick out of it, if for no other reason than it was the one time she wasn't shooed outside!

Water and Fences

Sorry the blog has been silent for a while. We've been busy moving our family to a 10-acre homestead in the Ozarks. We started preparing for this move while living in the wild suburbs of St. Louis. We had a garden and chickens, we tried to build the things we needed instead of running to the store to buy them (like our chick brooder), and I started learning how to make as much as I could from scratch (like dog food, laundry detergent, soap, candles...).

As a child, I spent every summer and holiday roaming my family's 200-acre farm deep in the rugged hills of the Ozarks. I knew what snakes to watch out for, how to find my way home from the deepest of woods, how to tend cattle, and while I might never be as good at fishing as my daddy or uncles, I'm a pretty fair fisher-woman.

So  I thought I was ready.

The month-long silence on this blog should say something on that topic.

Our side pasture as it was when we moved in.
Things are much drier now!

We rented a darling little house with 10 acres that was mostly good pasture with a fair amount of woods. It's not the rugged hills of my youth, but gently rolling pastureland with enough woods to make it interesting. The property has apple and peach trees, a pond, a creek and an amazing wildflower field.

The house had also sat empty for a while, which means the fruit trees were in desperate need of pruning and had already lost half their crop to pests. The chicken coop was in dire need of repair. Fences weren't much better. The list went on.

We hit the ground running - finding temporary quarters for the chickens first. The garden we brought with us from suburbia had to be put in the ground. It didn't take long for my entire world to revolve around fences and water - two staples of farm life. (The water thing is becoming an even bigger issue now that the region appears to be gripped by one heck of a drought. I've never seen my beloved hills so brown this time of year.)

It's funny - I have a mile-long list of blog topics from our first month in our new home. It's finding the time to write them that's the challenge! I think we're getting our feet under us, though, so posts should start coming more regularly now. I can't wait to share how we taught our beagle to respect the fence or to show off the small chicken coop I built for my bantam cochins - completely out of spare parts I found around the homestead!

Hopefully, I'll be back with another post soon. Thanks for your patience during our silence!

~Heather