I cannot even begin to tell you how happy it makes me that we got our chickens.  After a very rough few weeks, this gave me the boost I needed.  If you read the newsletter this week, you know that my mood has been very strange, almost a FLAT feeling.  I am blaming it on a combination of things.  The weather going from summer to winter a few weeks ago really affected me.  Throw in the full moon and the planet Mercury in retrograde and I was left feeling unmotivated and no creativity at all.  I know some people don’t believe in that stuff but I have really paid attention the last few years. When I have unexplained restless sleep and a feeling of blah, I usually find out the above.  Back to the chickens and the story of how we got them.

We got our Chickens

We have had chickens several times in the past but haven’t had any for years.  And boy have we missed them. Last year, we decided to put a chicken coop on our property, because we have the room.  And, we missed fresh eggs.  Do you remember when we got the free shed from my cousin last year?  We decided to turn that free shed into a coop by fixing it all up.  Man has it been a lot of work.  Ha! Deb and I have joked many times that buying a new coop would have been much easier, but easier isn’t always better, I guess.

We worked really hard on getting the shed turned into a coop last summer.  The season changed to fall. And we decided since moving into the new house was right around the corner, we would wait with the chickens until spring. Besides, we had already made up our minds to buy chickens that were already grown and ready to lay. And, they were already sold out.

Deb and I just started talking about getting this coop completed this year, and we got a call from our friend.  The friend who bought our old house.  She said she had been at a small animal auction and they were selling chickens that are just ready to lay.  But, she had to buy 15 of them and only wanted 7-8.  We only wanted 6-7.  She decided to buy all 15 and keep them for us for a few weeks until we were ready for them.

Of course, Deb and I worked frantically on getting the inside of our chicken coop completed enough to get them settled here on our property.  And, yesterday we went to pick them up.  I had visions of us running after these chickens and it taking forever.  But that wasn’t the case at all.  

If you want to see us picking up the chickens, watch this reel.

The Breed of Chickens

Our friend had to buy all of the same breed of chickens at the auction. You can correct me if I am wrong, but I think that these are all Rhode Island Reds.  If so, it makes me happy.  We have had a few of them in the past and I remember them being really great layers.  These chickens are so calm, which also makes me thrilled.  They aren’t jumpy when we walk into the coop.  After the 15 chickens got settled into her coop, she got 13 eggs one day.  I’m assuming it will take a bit for them to settle into our coop and start laying, too.  But we will see.

I will be sharing the design of our coop here in the next week with lots of photos. But I wanted to introduce you to our chickens first.  We don’t have them named yet, but I’m sure we will.  Ha!  And, I will for sure share.

Our chickens gave me the boost of serotonin that I have needed!

Check out these related posts:

Update on the coop!

Some “found” items for our chicken coop!

Punch list for the coop project.