summer got SO hot that we quit going over to see the chickens.
it was just not fun to be outside for long…the grass was crunchy & dead.
it was just gross by the end of summer.
now that it has cooled off we strolled over with old bread and said hello.
chickens move really fast…
it is actually really hard to catch the brown ones….way to go talby.
🙂
we got some free eggs because annie said "CAN WE HAVE THESE EGGS FOR FREEEEEEEEE???"
people have a hard time saying no to annie.
she was able to catch three of the orangey ones.
she would pet their backs and say "ahhh….do you like this massage?"
but i wish you could hear the way she says massage…. it's like Ma-shaaaug…it's so cute.
i am still thinking about getting our own chickens.
spring time?
isn't that when farm people do stuff like that?
baby chicks and all that?
at least i have a few months to make some decisions.
we need to research what kinds we would want.
(by WE i mean me and my little girls only…no one else would want to be a part of the chicken adventure)
and we would need some good names of course.
SIDE NOTE:
i have very rarely even bought halloween costumes…
and if i did it was on clearance after halloween a size up for the next year.
well….i just ordered my girls costumes from walmart.
i didn't even go in the store.
they have free shipping.
i feel like i have given up in some way… BLAaaaaH.
but you gotta do what works and this year THIS works.
i am feeling like it was the easiest way to go… no kids begging for other stuff at the store…no pouting.
and i only have to get a few costumes instead of four or five now since my kids are older now so buying didn't seem so painful this time.
what do you do?
do you buy from the store? do you make your own? do you use the old ones you have already?
Lori - This is totally changing the subject but over a year ago I learned about the musician Marcia Ball on this site. I am so excited that she is going to be performing this Saturday in Newton,KS. I wonder if Meg had anything to do with her coming to this area??? If so, Thank you!!!
Juanita Johnson - We’ve had a variety of chicken breeds over the years, and my favorite breed is the Barred Rock. They have black and white stripes and are very calm and will follow you around like a shadow, and easy to catch. They are good layers, too, nice brown eggs. Ameraucana’s have beautiful blue/green eggs, but are a bit more suspicious of people and other animals. A rooster is good to have if the chickens will free-range, but they will terrorize anything and everyone that enters their ‘zone of patrol’. Roosters have made for lots of funny memories for my girls, but they still tell the stories with a tremble in their voice! NEVER more than one rooster, just sayin’. Chickens do something for the soul, you should totally get some in the spring, but order from a hatchery or get from a mom and pop feed store, that will order for you. Can’t wait to hear the adventures!
Elizabeth - Oh if only you lived next door to me. Then your lil Annie could have all the fresh eggs her lil heart desired 🙂
I highly recommend getting chickens if you can. We currently have 30+. We are now getting 25+ eggs A.DAY.
We are a family of four for crying out loud…lol. But like someone else mentioned above, Tractor Supply sells pullets in the spring. My hubby may have went nuts 🙂
Now onto costumes: New ones. Every year. Some our handmade and some our bought. I tend to like the handmade best and that’s usually what my costume is. Yes, the hubs and I dress up every year from my mom’s annual Adult Halloween Party. This year we are Mr. & Mrs. Howell from Gilligan’s Island. My favorite to date is when I was JB Fletcher from Murder She Wrote and he was Columbo 🙂
Prairie Jenn - Yay for chickens! You can get pullets at Tractor Supply Company in the spring (March and April) if you have one around there. That way you are sure to get chicks that are female…plus you can get just a few to start. The red sex link hens (which are actually orange-ish) are good layers that give those pretty brown eggs. Chickens are so easy, and my girls think they are the best pets;)
Costumes here are usually homemade, but last year we found a tiny local costume shop where this older lady creates costumes from things she finds at yard sales and thrift stores:) She comes up with some amazing creations and themes! Last year, we left with a pirate costume for me, a gypsy costume for my oldest, and a fifties costume for my youngest. Too fun!
Jennifer F. - I mix it up with costumes. Before I really used my sewing machine, I bought the costumes. Once I got the sewing bug, though, I have made all of them. Snow White and a Dwarf, Butterfly, etc. This year, my son wants to be Iron Man and we will buy it. My daughter will be a peacock and I am making it. She said, “Mom, I want YOU to make it, because you make the BEST clothes!”. I have about 5 seconds of that attitude left and I am going to soak it all up. ( : I love making the costumes, but am not going to stress over it. It isn’t worth it for one hour, half of which is dark.
I have bought costumes after Halloween and given them to my kids as Christmas presents for dress-up. They loved it and play with them all of the time.
Kelly - My sil and I were just talking about the costume thing. I really thought I would be a make the costumes get all creative kind of mom. I loved to help make my Halloween costumes growing up and my mom kindly obliged. I wanted to be all sorts of unique things like an African princess, etc. We would just use things we had on hand, borrow things from my grandma, sometimes buy a thing or two and just make the costumes up.
My son’s first Halloween I bought cheap jeans and an “ugly” plaid shirt at a kids’ consignment sale and then used yarn and raffia and made him a scarecrow. I had a lot of fun with it. Last year we were walking through Marshall’s and there was an adorable monkey costume for (gasp) $20 and he really liked monkeys at the time and I tried it on him and it was all over, we were getting it.
This year he really doesn’t even know what dressing up is still and I think I’ll just have him wear the monkey costume again.
I think I may get more into it when my kids can request to be certain things but right now it feels like a lot of effort for one night for what? Praise for my cute costume making skills? I need to not be addicted to that kind of praise and I know my tendency to care to much so I feel like the pendulum has kind of swung the other way.
It’s good for now and works for us for now. We’ll see what the future brings. Kelly
vonda - We have had chickens for the past 5 years and we LOVE them. McMurray Hatchery is the best. You can go to their website, pick out your baby chicks, and pick a date that you want them sent to you and go to the post office and pick them up. (We buy mostly all girls because roosters can get mean). One breed we love are the Ameraucana’s. They lay big blue eggs!!!!!
Ani G W - This year will be my first year making a costume. I am making my 4 year a raccoon costume because I couldn’t find a kid’s grey raccoon costume! 🙂 So this year my 4 year old will be wearing a homemade costume, my 9 year old will be wearing one he already had (his choice) and my 2 year old will be wearing a new bought costume (which I bought online).
juli - we live in Memphis TN… right in the heart of the city and we have 3 chickens… all of them are the Buff Orpington’s… the “easy” to catch ones ;)…we got them in June as matureish chicks… and they laid their first eggs in August..the VERY LAST day of AUgust. It was the longest 2 months that we had to wait to get eggs…however we used that time to really get to know our pets… Henrietta, Cackle & Yolkie…. They are very tame and come to us to eat out of our hands… they are even comfortable around our 3 dogs. I think that you will be most pleased with chickens as pets… and in return they will give you the BEST eggs you have ever had. ;} Also… we built our coop using left over wood from the home depot & lowes stores SPRING GARDEN shipments… used pallets and stuff like that… got OOPS paint and created our pallet from there. We love our chickens… and if you are ever in town… please stop by. 🙂
Heather - It varies from year to year here. Some years I make them. Some years I buy at full price. Some years I find them second hand. And I’m okay with that.
One Halloween I was totally stressed about the pumpkin carving. I was in the habit of getting five or six and intricately stencil carving all of them. I was tired that year and bitchy, to be honest, and regretting getting so many.
My husband and kids asked if they could do them. I went into full panic. They’ll look like heck, they won’t be at all photoshoot ready, what would Martha think? Then I thought, if I don’t want to do them, why make myself. And I let go. And they did them. And they were beautifully imperfect pumpkins. And they had FUN (pumpkin carving with me is NOT fun, I’m far too intense about it). I got to cross something off my list.
So, the way I’d look at this is that you might have spent more than normal BUT it’s done weeks ahead of time. The kids are happy. It’s crossed off your list.
It’s all good.
Andrea - I made a lot of the girls costumes when they were small – using a Wal-mart cheapy sweat pants/shirt as a base (don’t think I sewed princess dresses or anything because I can’t even hem straight). As they got older they built their own – the middle one was “Flo” from the Progressive commercials last year and that was all white clothes (Goodwill) and her hair done the same as Flo, bright red lipstick. I LOVE those kinds of costumes.
My little boy wants storebought, TV/comic character costumes. By this third kid I’m tired, I set a price limit, I buy online.
Valerie @ Chateau A La Mode - I actually made costumes for my oldest two for a couple of years and since then we always bought costumes. Of course my youngest reminds me that I never made her a costume…ouch! No more costumes now though cuz they are older.
Good luck on the big chicken adventure. Can’t wait to follow that. I toy with the idea of having chickens too. I think I would like that, fresh eggs and all, but chickens are a little creepy. I’m not sure I really want to commit to raising chickens. I have a feeling I’d be a little like Lucy when she raises chickens on I Love Lucy 🙂
Tiffany - I’m excited for your chicken adventure! I bet you’ll love it. I always loved harvesting the eggs from my parents’ chickens as a kid. Now it’s fun getting my kids involved when we visit Grandma and Papa’s place. For Halloween this year my kids are going as the princess and the frog. My 4 year old daughter’s idea… She has plenty of princess stuff, so no purchases needed there. I’m just mixing green clothing for my boy, and will be making him a green hat with eyes on top. That’s this weekend’s project!
Aby - My niece used to have a chicken named Percy. I have always LOVED that name for a chicken!! lol
tiffany gardner - So funny. Sure… I let my kids pick who they want to be… THE YEAR BEFORE ON MAJOR CLEARANCE! Seriously.. go there two weeks after halloween and say … whatever you would like. They have never seemed to mind!
Routhie - I buy my girls costumes every year because they play with them until they don’t fit and the older girl’s costume is happily accepted (for now) as a hand-me-down to our younger girl. We don’t always buy the pre-packaged costumes, though. We have a great church thrift store nearby to sift through for inspiration and, sometimes, we are even able to pull something together from what we’ve already got. It’s our yearly indulgence, along with Christmas dresses. 🙂
Pat - THRIFT STORE EVERYBODY!!!!
jen - i just discovered that our neighbour has chickens! i couldn’t figure out what the noise was and he other day i went peeking through the hedge and saw them!! i was hearing the clucking. i would love to get chickens but i am terribly nervous around birds so i don’t know if it would work.
for costumes we have lucked out on great deals {my mom picked up every disney princess dress for $5 each one year – those have been in rotation for 4 years} last year my daughter wanted to be the Bride of Frankenstein and after everything i went through it would have been cheaper to buy something :s. this year i bought some at costco. i have too many other things i want to make – like decorations – that they were happy with them – ariel & iron man. suits me fine!! check!
Kim - Whatever works is right, my daughter is 4 this year and I asked her what she wanted to be, this was our conversation:
“What do you want to be for Halloween?”
“A Pig.”
“Like last year, you want to be Olivia again?”
“Yes, I like Pigs.”
“Ok!”
My thoughts, YES!!!!! I dont have to do anything for this years costume because the other ones still fits her!!!
She dresses up ALOT, we have a whole corner of her room full of dress up clothing, but the one thing she has not dressed up as all year is a pig. I guess everything else is just to “everyday” for her. 🙂
stephanie - Oh! We moved to this subdivision and they said we couldn’t keep chickens. I am thinking about doing it anyway. 😛 My kids and I want them so bad! They like Buff Orpingtons and I like Copper Marans. Beautiful eggs!
shelly - check out http://www.mypetchicken.com a couple of my friends have chickens and they live in town..total golf course subdivision in the front, chicken coop in the back lol. One of them has a hen that lays the prettiest pale blue-green eggs (they’re my fav ;)) I know that one of them got their chicks from 4H kids too.
Lisa - I use to buy new costumes but once we added child 3 and 4 it got too expensive. Now I buy clearance after Halloween or they have to figure out a costume from what we have. We go to goodwill sometimes too. And if they need an accessory for 5$ or less I might help with that. My 11yr old spent her own money to buy what she wanted for this year! Every years been a little different. 🙂
Lisa - The colors of that chicken against Talby’s coat…my favorite combo! Great photos. My kids are wearing costumes I picked up at garage sales over the summer. Thankfully they were both thrilled with the things I brought home. I doubt it will work that way too much longer!
Rachel Spin - Miz Booshay has a picture on her blog today that you would really love. I thought of you immediately when I saw it. It’s the very first one. http://booshay.blogspot.com/2012/10/nest.html
Cute chickens! Cuter girls.
Lisa - Meg
What kind of personalities do chickens have (silly question?). Are they cuddly? Do they like Annie’s massage or being petted? I have no idea, but so many people seem to be getting chickens lately. Just curious.
Michelle Whitlow - I have made costumes & bought them. Last year I made my 2 older kids’ costumes. The 3 went as Alice in Wonderland, The Mad Hatter & the baby was the White Rabbit. I made the Alice costume, for my son I made the pants, found a jacket at a thrift shop, the hat & wig at a Halloween store & decorated with a scarf I made & made the big bow tie. For the baby I bought the rabbit ears but then bought a pink tutu & pink & white striped shirt at Target, easy peasy. I have pics on my old blog: http://meandmyscraps.blogspot.com/2011/11/halloween-in-new-town.html
This year I bought costumes…one of which was bought last on clearance. Love doing that! Usually I just do that for dress up clothes but it ended up working out well for the little one’s costume. My oldest is going to be an 80s girl (fun!) and my son is a werewolf. We’re going easy this year! The little one is going to be Dorothy from Wizard of Oz so I’m going to be the scarecrow (from some thrift store clothes) and I bought some fur to make a lion’s mane for my lab. And maybe I’ll make my hubby be the tin man 🙂
lauren - always homemade costumes….actually two days ago on msn.com they featured over 30 photos of costume ideas and a photo from my blog of our son as a penny was #4! freaky.
i hope you get chickens because we can’t. township ordinance or some-reason-or-other. but if i COULD get a variance to have the ordinance changed i would get a miniature horse 🙂
take care my yellow-boot-wearing blog friend!
Jennifer - A friend of mine has chickens and she named them all after the Desperate Housewives! So funny. Bree, Lynette, etc. :o)
Jenny B. - Love the cooler fall weather! I read a blog post recently that made me want to never have chickens. It had to do with a hen coop and a murderous raccoon. Yuck. Anyway… I always buy Halloween costumes at Walmart. It’s just too easy. And I kinda feel about Halloween the way you feel about Valentine’s Day. So, yeah. Easy is good. 🙂
mama lola - yum, fresh farm eggs! we are an egg free family now as my eldest is allergic, but i do love a good chicken n’ egg picture!
as for costumes… never buy new. always borrow from friends or buy second hand or on the clearance rack!
Lisa M. - This is my son’s eighth trick or treat and I have purchased every one of his costumes. Every year (aside from the first two or three) he has know exactly what he wants to be months ahead of time (lion, fireman, Navy Seal, Yoda…). And although a more creative, sewing-kinda mom would make the costumes herself, I choose to purchase. Otherwise, my child would go trick or treating in what he had on for school that day 🙂
Great pictures!
jackie grandy - Your photos of the chickens are awesome! I love how kids just blurt things out. They speak with their hearts and not always their minds, but I love it. We should remember as adults to do that more often, you never know what it could bring. My brother in-law is raising chickens and he lives in MN. He is so into it and he installed this tree branch for them to hang out on, I guess chickens love hanging on branches, go figure. Anyway the eggs that they produced, were the best eggs I have ever eaten. I would love to raise some chickens, but we don’t have a big enough yard.
We’re still undecided about Halloween costumes over here. We always buy part of the costume and then throw together the rest ourselves. My daughter is going to be the 10th doctor from Dr. Who, for any of you Dr. Who fans out there, you will know who that is. My son wants to be a ninja. He makes these organimi ninja stars out of paper all the time so that is where he got the idea. We haven’t gotten his costume yet, of course.
I don’t make costumes from scratch because I’m not the craftiest person (per my daughter). I wish I was better at sewing etc. Maybe I will just have to sign up for one of your craft weekends and learn a few things!
xoxo,
Jackie
Amber - If you decide to get them my offer to build you a coop is still on the table. I’m serious. My route to visit my brother and sister-in-law goes right past Marion.
My daughter is only 4 months old so Halloween costumes haven’t been an issue yet, but based on a blog post my friend Lindsey wrote (http://www.mom2momkc.com/?a=profile&u=19245&t=blog&blog_id=4886) I think buying them is a great option.
Lauren - I can’t even imagine the fun you’d have with chickens!!! So exciting!
Kate - Yes – You have to what works! That’s the rules.
Pamela Fitzgerald - Hi Meg,
I have 3 kids and I always am on the hunt for discounted costumes or something at the local thrift store. When I was growing up we made our costumes from things we had around the house…it was soo much fun. It is really expensive to buy costumes….I feel your pain!!…Pamela
Alice H - I am lucky that my mom has made a lot of my kids costumes. My favorites that she has made so far are: Jessie from Toy Story, Scarecrow and Dorothy, and Tin Man.
My daugther Emilee (13) was Jessie and Dorothy. She has also been a bee that was homemade as well.
My son Zack (12) has been a bat, Scarecrow, Bob the Builder, a magician, and Michael Jackson and they were all homemade too.
My youngest son (3) was a race car driver and Tin Man. Both homemade. This year he wants to be a baseball player this year and I am ordering his jersey off Etsy.
Leah - I’m with you on the costumes. I usually create something from scratch. Or I will buy costumes at resale and Goodwill stores. That’s how we found Cinderella last year. This year I told my daughter she can only wear one of the many dress-up outfits she has at home. And believe me, there is no shortage!
Dani - I hate to buy costumes! It seems like such a waste of money. I give my kids $5 and take them to the Dollar Tree. They buy what they need and can come up with some pretty awesome ideas. One year Tyler bought a bunch of gauze and went as a wreck. He used face paint to paint bruises on his face and a little blood coming from his mouth. I love to let my kids get creative!
Kelly Henderson - I made costumes with the first three kids… always. And then number four came along. Thrift stores became my go to Halloween costume place. Two years ago, I caved and bought the expensive costumes from the catalog costume for youngest child… I have been defeated now 🙂 This year the youngest (girl) wants to go as a Smore… planning to make a costume again with a large brown cardboard box and pillows. Hah! This should be interesting… don’t stress or feel like you’ve caved…it’s no biggie.
amanda - This is the first year I’ve ever bought a costume. I only bought for my youngest (2) because he wanted to be a power ranger and I didn’t have the energy to try and make that, so I got it at K-Mart. It was painfully expensive. My older two (6 and 11) are piecing together costumes from stuff we already own.
Wendy @ Ramblings from the Sunshine State - We usually get new babies in spring. Rhode Island Reds are great hens, and I love Araucanas with their blue eggs.
Terrie - First…LOVE those chickens!!
I just talked with my friends about all the costumes I used
to make for the kids.
I still have all of them…
maybe my grandone will wear them one day.
Have you seen the pic of Pinterest of the little boy
who is a shark on the beach?
I’d love to make that for the grandone!
And I say…you gotta do what works for you!
I do have an egg costume…would be pretty cute
while carrying one of those chickens!! 🙂
Michelle - I made Tate’s costume this year, she’s going to be a peacock and even I was slightly impressed with myself. It turned out much better than this non-sewing, only slightly crafty Mama thought. Finn wants to be Hulk and has ZERO interest in me making something for him, so we’ll buy that one.
So what are the girls going as?
Amy K. - I can’t believe I forgot Jacket Man, which I jokingly suggested the year my son couldn’t think what he wanted to be, and he went for it!
Dana - I would love to have chickens, but live in a suburb and they don’t allow it.
I’ve always bought Halloween costumes for my now 11 year old, but in the last few years Halloween has become less of a big deal. Since I have an 11 year old and 1 year old this year only bought the baby a costume. I’m also 4 months pregnant and this baby will probably wear hand me downs. I hope it’s a girl or we may have to die the hot pink zebra costume.
Amy K. - We spend a ton of time discussing, planning & making costumes here, with the occasional store-bought one thrown in as time requires! I’ve had a firefighter, a pig, Bob the builder and Thomas the train, an awesome robot that my husband stayed up nearly all night making, Perry & Doofenschmirtz, a dog-cyborg (I don’t get it either, and I made th costume!), and a lego guy.
got2havefaith - This year Halloween is even more of a pain. My daughter whined that she really, really wanted to be a zombie bride, then we go to the thift sore to “make” the costume before October 1st (way too early), now she whines some more that maybe she doesn’t want to be that anymore! Ugh. I will not buy another costume! {repeat} I put a $20 limit on costumes. Thankfully my 6 year old was super easy this year. But the 10 year old is killing with the whining to go to a big name Halloween store with over priced costumes.
Tanya - I would get chickens stat!… if I lived in the country 🙂
We change things up every year and I try not to go down the guilt road.
Sometimes my mom makes elaborate costumes for them, sometimes I buy them, sometimes we use older cousins’ ones. This year I bought one at the grocery story (a unicorn that’s super warm cause it’ll be COLD here) and my little guy wants to wear his racecar driver one from last year again.
The end 🙂
Anne - I vary from year to year. Last year I created and this year I purchased. I just have to do what my schedule allows and this year I just didn’t have time to get anything created.
April R - yes do get chickens 🙂 so we can vicariously have chickens too!
We don’t think about halloween much beforehand bc we don’t do witches, gore, scary stuff, etc and don’t feel comfortable endorsing that aspect of it all. It’s kinda hard to avoid but we don’t cruise the costume/Halloween section of a store much.
It’s just tough bc we do love kids and candy and dressin’ up and goofing around (and run-on sentences…). So usually what happens is we decide at the last minute – “oh yes, we would like to dress up and give/get candy with friends!” We make a mad dash around the house to find something to wear or go get something family friendly and under $20 at the store. Then I tell myself that next year I’ll just order online ahead of time and that’ll be so much better and then I put it off and we do it all over again. yeah CANDY! 🙂
Melinda - When our girls will little, we made costumes, usually out of sweats, felt, and yarn. Now they are 16, 13, and 10. Five years ago we got invited to a huge Halloween bash, given by some clients who are now friends (and they’ve spent a LOT of money with us). We feel a little obligated to do up the costumes in a big way, since they’ve done so much for us. It’s always a family theme. Two years we were a wild west saloon scene. This year we are all going to be pirates. But the best year was when we ALL went as witches (hubby included). He was an extremely disturbing female witch, and everyone loved it! Not usually a fan of Halloween, but this makes it fun for us.
Jen - I think I’d have a hard time saying no to Annie, too. We buy our girls’ costumes. I’d like to make them, but all the ones I suggest they don’t like. Princess Leia came from Target this year (I knew that’s what my 8-year-old wanted to be so I bought it on my own one wonderful day while I was at Target by myself), and I bought my 5-year-old daughter’s pirate costume online from Kohl’s. I love both of them. My daughters and the costumes. Their costumes are so stinkin’ cute this year.
Heather S. - I would totally have chickens if we could. We live in a neighborhood where everyone has a little land (like 3+ acres), but the rules state NO LIVESTOCK! Pooey!
Jennifer Davis Wood - My Kids begin to harass me for Halloween costumes about 1 month after Halloween LOL. I love it, I hate it… No full covering masks this year though, last year my son insisted on a morph suit. He fell into a ditch, don’t worry he was okay just a scratch and rip in the knee. I’ve promised a trip to party city this weekend. Why do I do these things and make these promises. Ugh. 🙂
elma - Oh do get chickens!!! We only got six and one rooster and we just love them. They are so fun to watch and the kids ge so excited each day to get the eggs!! Soooo much fun!!!