And they're here

This post is delinquent - it's been a busy couple of days. On Thurs (March 8) the two eggs both hatched. And they are the cutest little things! Phyllis is a very dedicated mamma and everyone seems to be doing well. I've posted a couple of pictures below.

And a peep was heard

First off, it's my birthday! Yay me. This is my last birthday before I turn 30. I remember as a kid thinking wow - when I turn 30 it will be 2008! Not that I would be old, but more I can't believe it's that far away... but yet, there it is, 12 short months away. I told Mike that I want a big deal next year. Feels like something worth celebrating.

This year we played it low key. We went for dinner and then ice cream. Mike got me a new pink riding coat to wear for commuting and for my training to ride the STP this year. And a blinky red light to go on my bike rack. Also for biking, I finally took my dad up on his offer to get me an iPod and got a sweet little green nano last week. I've got it loaded up with 350 songs so far and am loving it for not only my bike but also tuning out the world at work.

But perhaps the best gift of all is that Phyll's last two remaining eggs started peeping today!!!! So cool. We should have chicks tomorrow. Just in time as I think she's way too skinny and hasn't been eating enough the last week or so. Now we can fatten her back up along with the chicks. I can't wait to come home tomorrow and peek in on them!

In other news, we had a snow day last week. No pictures, but let's just say that you know it's bad in Seattle when it takes me 2 hours to get home and I only work 5.5 miles away. It has since warmed back up and all the trees are budding out, the plants making their appearances and the hellebore (sp?) blooming.

My folks, in Minnesota got hit with snow last week too. Pretty close to a couple of feet. The snow did not make the early lambing any easier (last one born today) - but gosh are they cute in the snow!

Candling is fun!

So here we are, twelve days into the egg experiment and all is going fairly well. Candling is very cool - in all the chickens we had, and eggs we incubated when I was a kid, we never candled any of them. Of course, my method is fairly primitive - I'm using Mike's old dive light as it's about the right size. So while I can see what's happening it's not super bright. If we do this again, I'll have to make myself a better setup.

As far as I can tell we have 2 good eggs, and one maybe. I'm pretty sure that one Maran and one Dominique are progressing as planned, the other Dominique egg looks like it may have stopped maturing around day 6 (according to a handy photo guide I found online) which means that now it's just a warm rotten egg - yum!

Hmmm. A friend at work is thinking about surprising her kids with chicks/pullets on Easter. Her son Will is really excited to have chickens - they even came over a few weeks ago (did I mention that before?) to see my set-up. If she decides to, I may see if Denise is okay with me keeping her chicks (from the eggs) for a couple weeks so that I can tuck three feed store chicks for Darrin in with Phyllis as well. I think if I put them in at night after the eggs hatch that she'd accept them without question. Then at 3 weeks I can deliver Denise's chicks to her (sans Phyllis) and Phyl can keep Darrin's chicks growing until Easter (they'd be 4 weeks old then).

Fun! Here's some photos - Phyl's setup in the shed in Jake's old crate, and her in her cardboard box nest.

Chicks in progress

Well, to catch everyone up, here are the events of the last week:

Valentine's Day - Mike and I played it casual as we do every year. We exchanged cards, he brought me flowers and I made dinner.

Thursday - Phyl's eggs arrived at last. I put all 6 under her and she was happy as a clam - or perhaps happy as a broody hen?

Friday - I took two eggs away from Phyl as it was pretty obvious she couldn't cover them all as well as she needed to (the outer eggs were a lot cooler than the center eggs).

Saturday - we went skiing with some friends and their 3 year old daughter. It was a beautiful, warm sunny day. Had a blast! That night I discovered that Agnes has a cold, or perhaps bronchitis, either way she's sneezing and wheezing and generally not feeling too good. Likely why she stopped laying a couple weeks ago. I've turned the heatlamp on 24x7 again hoping to give her some respite from the cold.

Sunday - we had a lazy day. Ran errands, played with the dogs, then went to friends' house for "Thanksgiving in February". We do this every year. Buy a turkey when they go on sale, then have a dinner where we all bring our favorite dish.

Today - I candled Phyl's eggs just to make sure this grand experiment is working. 3 of them looked just fine - I could see the dark spot of the embryo and the beginnings of the blood vessel web. But one was cracked. So, that leaves her with 3. Hopefully she'll hatch at least one or two chicks. Otherwise I'm not sure what she'll do!

Lucy's the smartest

So, slowly, slowly my girls are becoming more friendly. Most mornings they come towards me when I go into the coop - looking for morning treats. But, Lucy is the smartest of them all. She's learned to eat cracked corn out of my hand. So sweet! Especially because she's the biggest of them all. Penny is "this" close to doing it as well, she's just a bit shyer than Lucy is. Pru and Agnes are interested, but not enough to come too close yet.

In other news, Phyl is all settled into the dog crate in the shed. She doesn't seem willing to come out of the nest to eat/drink/poop on her own even though she has clean water and plenty of food in the crate as well. So my new morning routine is to take her out of her nest, put her in with the big girls to do what's needed, then put her back in her nest 15 minutes later. Seems to be working so far - her eggs will arrive tomorrow or Thursday. I'm keeping a close eye on her to make sure that she's maintaining her weight and bright eyes.

Hopefully this will all work out - if not, I'm not sure what to do with her...

Hatching eggs are on their way

My friend Denise on the peninsula has agreed to take any chicks I can hatch. Yay! So yesterday we ordered 6 standard size eggs (about all little Phyl can handle, and maybe more (we'll see). We ordered 3 Cuckoo Maran eggs and 3 Dominique eggs. We're hoping to hatch 4-5 of them and then hoping to get at least 2 hens out of it.

I gave Phyl 3 golf balls to sit on last night to keep her broody. This weekend I'm setting up a broody box for her in the crate that Jake outgrew so that we can move her in there Saturday night. We're going to keep her in the garage. The eggs ship on Monday and I think will be here Wednesday. Then 3 weeks later we should have eggs! The way the dates fall mean the chicks should hatch on my birthday, give or take 24 hours - so much fun!

Once the chicks hatch, I'm going to meet Denise half way and hand off the chicks and Phyl to her to raise. She's got a small coop that she's no longer using and is going to put them in there for the first 4-6 weeks. I'll keep you posted on how this goes. What fun!