our ladies are here!

We are now officially chicken farmers!  Well, we have 3 laying hens, anyway..... as of yet unnamed, but that will come.  One of them will most definitely be named Hazel.  Maybe a Pearl, as well~ we'll see.  They rode home with us in the back of my car in an egg box (I figured a little nudging in the right direction couldn't hurt anything~) They are fairly settled in in their new surroundings, a recently jazzed-up (thanks, Mike) chicken tractor with room to run around a bit and be sheltered from the cold.  Claire seems to like coming along for the chicken chores and watches them intently as I switch out frozen water for fresh, throw them a snack and sing them a little song.  They love being sung to.  Or at least they've not complained about it yet or pointed out casually that "perhaps, Amanda you're a bit tone deaf?" as someone around here does from time to time.  And remember, Claire isn't talking yet.  Ahem.

Our hopes are that soon, when Wolfie decides he's not really all that interested in them after all, they can roam the yard during the day and head back to their roost at night.  Someone needs to clue Wolfie in on this plan a bit though, because he seems to think that we are just playing keep-away with a few new squeaky toys and he's just waiting for that door to open!  I try to remind myself that he is a dog after all, and just acting on instinct, but that's making it harder for my idealistic little image of hens roaming around the yard (perhaps one perched on Wolfie's back since they're best friends...) to come to be.  Aahhhhhhhh, in time.  I hope.  Pictures (and names) to come soon!