{Picture originally from this post in 2009}

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This week we put in our order for 15 baby chicks at our favorite feed store. It’s official! We’re getting chickens! There were so many different kinds we wanted to order, but we decided to narrow it down to three: Aracaunas, Wellsummers, and Marans. We’re getting 5 of each. We have never raised Wellsummers or Marans before, so they will be a first for us. We were inspired by our friends at Deck Family Farm to get Marans after we saw the gorgeous chocolate brown colored eggs! And Wellsummers have beautiful brown eggs too. Aracaunas are hands down Jeff’s favorite chickens. He loves the variety of colors of their eggs (they’re known as the “Easter Egg” chickens) as well as their friendliness, beauty, and how independent they can be. (Jeff requested I share a story here to give you an example. When I first moved here, Jeff had just had his entire flock of chickens killed by someone’s dog. He was so bummed. Imagine his surprise when months later a lone chicken from his flock wandered out of the woods! Talk about a survivor! She had survived on her own in the forest for that long and there are many chicken-eating predators around here. She didn’t want to return to the chicken coop and preferred sleeping in a bush in our front yard. She fell in love with our dog at the time and followed him everywhere. She also made friends with the cat and they could be seen walking in a line, one after the other, across the yard. Jeff loved Aracaunas before that, but ever since he had an even deeper respect and appreciation for them. So they were definitely at the top of our list.)

Placing our order has made it feel more real to us, we’re really getting chickens!  It seems like forever since we’ve had chickens here and raising them again just kept getting put off for many reasons. But now the time feels right and we can’t wait to have chickens here again. There’s still a coop to build (old one needs to be torn down) and fencing to put up, and preparations to be made, but we got them ordered…. so the first step can be crossed off the list.