They grow up so fast...

 The girls are getting bigger everyday! Their baby fluff is coming loose and floating away like dandelion puffs, and their pinfeathers are coming in. I've been holding them more and more, to get them used to being picked up and held and hopefully to make them friendly, sociable hens. We're getting closer and closer to our urban chicken dream of our own small backyard flock.

Ada is very docile and quiet, I haven't noticed the others picking on her too much, she just seems to prefer to keep to herself.

 Marie is still the boldest of the bunch. She will protest loudly when picked up, but quickly adjusts and explores your lap.

 Rosie is maturing faster than the other girls. Her wings are feathering out nicely, and she's already getting pinfeathers on her tail. She's very sweet and will fall asleep in my lap.

Ruth, more than any of the others, hates being held. She's also the first to experiment with her burgeoning wings. I think she's going to be the most independent hen in the flock.

Ponyo is extremely curious and simultaneously afraid of the girls, which is really funny to watch. Butters is completely indifferent, as she is to most things. I'm having nightmares about losing the girls, which I think is due to my anxiety as a first-time chicken momma. I'll continue trying to socialize them as best I can, and hopefully soon they'll stop fleeing my hand.

October

I love October. The air gets crisper, it finally starts to feel like fall. There are pumpkin doughnuts at Greenbluff. I love it.

 We always make the drive out to Greenbluff to get apples and pumpkins. It's a wonderful tradition, it supports local farms, and the produce is better than what we can buy in town.
We ended up with two white pumpkins and a Rouge vif D'Etamps. I had tried growing these so-called "Cinderella" pumpkins in our garden, but what with the wedding and all, our garden was sadly neglected this year.

 I think that Ponyo's distaste for the out of doors is a result of her spending her earliest years with an animal hoarder who kept her inside. It's unfortunate that she only tolerates being out, but she's gotten worlds better than she was when we first had her.

 After the ordeal that was processing the bushel of peaches I came home with last time we were at Greenbluff, we were more conservative with our harvesting this year.

 We took home a quarter-bushel of these scrumptious Red Delicious apples, and another quarter-bushel of baking apples.

 We always get the best apples because Mr. Bear is so tall, he can reach the ones at the top of the trees that others leave behind.

I feel very lucky to have a farm community so close to home, it's one of my favorite things about my hometown.

On the homefront, our new girls survived their first night with us. We've been enjoying watching them scurry about, falling asleep into their food, climbing all over one another. Hours fly by without us noticing, I understand what is meant by the phrase "chicken tv".

 Rosie, Marie, and Ruth hit the buffet while Ada naps.

 Rosalind, our Rhode Island Red.

They're ridiculously cute and charming. In a few weeks they'll go through a truly awkward adolescent phase before emerging as full-fledged hens. I expect they'll start laying in the spring, which will be quite a wait for us, we're excited about fresh eggs from happy chickens!

Clucking Adorable

 Our (four!) little chicks arrived today! We'd set up our brooder over the weekend, next to Butters' hutch, so it was all ready and toasty for them when I brought them home.

The yellow chick on the left is Marie Curie, the fluffy red is Rosalind Franklin, the dark one with the white spot on her head is Ruth Benedict, and the chipmunk-striped chick on the right is Ada Lovelace.


Poor dears were cold from their journey when I put them in the brooder, and huddled together for warmth.

It wasn't long, however, before they started exploring. Marie, our bantam Easter Egger, was the boldest of the bunch and figured out the food and water first(I did dip all their beaks, one by one, in the waterer when I put them in brooder).

Marie and Rosie have been zipping about, exploring and working out their dominance, Ruth perked up and started checking the place out, but poor Ada is exhausted and just wants to take a nap. The others keep tripping over her and waking her up.

I'll be posting fairly regular updates regarding their development from these adorable balls of fluff into productive members of the homestead. Urban chickens aren't just adorable, they're practical! I can't wait to have chickens roaming the backyard.

Pastry Party 2012!

Celebrating non-heteronormative relationships with baked goods!

So, my good friend Matt brought this Jezebel article to my attention a few weeks ago. If you have no desire to read it or watch the video(and I completely understand), the run-down is that this man leads Christian-based sex education lectures, and has some interesting ideas about how gay people have sex. Now, while I respect everyone's right to their beliefs, I personally find the belief that homosexuality is wrong/shameful/unnatural to be abhorrent. So when I got to the part of the video in which the lecturer explained his views on homosexuality(using carrots and doughnuts as metaphors for male and female anatomy, respectively) by stating that men were not created to sword-fight and women were not created to have pastry parties, two thoughts immediately occurred to me;


A. Is that how he thinks gay men have sex?
and
B. A pastry party sounds like a freaking fantastic idea!

 Butterscotch and Peppermint Chocolate Meringues

 I invited a bunch of my queer, lesbian, bisexual, and ally friends over for a Pastry Party, where the wine flowed, cookies and cobbler were baked, and conversations about sexuality and heteronormativity were had. It was delightful.

 Making pumpkin snickerdoodles with pumpkin spice kisses on top.

 Chocolate-covered cherry cookies, pre-ganache.

 Just because we don't support dogmatic heteronormative gender roles doesn't mean we don't love aprons.

 I love my hostess apron. It is red, sheer, and covered in teeny-tiny white dots.

 Everyone went home with a cookie sampler plate.

 Mmmm...chocolate-covered cherry.

 Ponyo was pretty excited about all the food.

 

 Peach cobbler.

 

Of course, after everyone cleared out, I realized that all I'd eaten all day were cookies and cobbler...and also that "pastry party" is my new favorite euphemism for lesbian sex.

Edited to add: This post was featured on Offbeat Home, and there are some pretty fun conversations going in the comments. Check it out!