City Slicker Chickens

I grew up in the suburbs. My parents grew up in the suburbs. THEIR parents grew up in the suburbs. But, somehow, I have a love for all things farm. If you knew me as a youngster, you would know that I was afraid of all animals - even kittens and baby chicks. Once, when I was really young, I held a baby bunny and it peed on me. From then on, I didn't want to hold or touch any animal. When I was a bit older, and knew better, I held a baby chick and promptly dropped her on the ground at first twitch. Oops.

But, that younger me wouldn't recognize this older me. Now I love farm animals (although, admittedly, I am still skittish around other people's farm animals). I raise chickens in my backyard in the city. They have a nice view of the city pool from where they roost. We have 5 hens who free-range in our backyard and 4 new chicks living in a wooden box on the porch.

These 4 new chicks are an adventure. A certain little girl of mine recently requested a jump rope and baby chicks for her birthday, thus an idea was born... A friend of mine hatched the eggs out for me in an incubator. I have no idea if they are hens or roosters or what kind of chickens they are, what color they will be, what color their eggs will be, how big they will get...

But, what I do know is that they are loved... and named. They've been handled quite a bit by a pair of sticky 3-year-old hands. Dear daughter has named all of the chicks. They are: Honey, Chicky-Chick, Dixie Chick, and Bobby. She had a little help coming up with Bobby. Bobby is the chick that has the most possible rooster characteristics, so we pointed her in the direction of a gender-neutral name. (last time, we ended up with a rooster named Sandy...)

Dear son, who is nearing 10 months of age, loves the backyard chickens. His second psuedo-word (after buh-bye) was "bak bak." Whenever we go near the door he says "bak bak" and looks for the chickens. He has now started associating the baby chicks with "bak bak" although dear daughter informs him that baby chicks do not say "bak bak," that they in fact say "peep peep."

I mentioned to my family the other day that I had had a dream about moving to a new house. I described the house in its glorious hobby farm location. Dear daughter informed me "I don't like farms. I want to buy a castle." For now, we will remain in our city home, but if we do ever move, we'll be searching for the best castle on a farm that money can buy!