Animal House

At what point do you have too many animals?  And what do you do when your husband and kids are just crazy over them....even when they're chickens???

OK so I have to admit, the chickens have been a lot of fun.  Oh, the hours you could find all four of us sitting out in the chicken coop watching our little brood.  These were are first batch.  Three or four weeks later Spence brought home another batch; and then a few weeks later another batch.  We have Leghorns and Wyandottes and Barred Rocks and Orpingtons and Rhode Island Reds and Araucanas and Black Stars; just to name a few! :) 

Hayes has a lot of them thinking that HE is their mother.  They follow him around and try to hide in the legs of his shorts.

Hayes likes to hold the chicks while he watches TV.  This little one climbed up his shirt and nestled under his chin.

He's even taught them a few tricks:

Chase loves the chickens also, we just can't let him hold them in his little vice grip.  He visits the coop daily and helped me get them water today.  He wanted to do it himself so he carried their water all the way out to the coop without dropping it which was quite a feat for him. 

So as our list of animals grows, so does the list of chores.  I have mixed feelings about this.  On one hand, it's been great for our kids and Hayes has become quite the responsible pet owner. It's been great for Chase too, who loves and animals and is getting better and better with them.  BUT....the chores become very time consuming.  BUT....I do it because I think the benefits outweigh the costs....at least for now! :) I'm such a pushover.

Besides, maybe I'm more of an animal lover than I think.  I spent 15 minutes watching and taking pictures of this dumb little lizard while I was outside building up our fire pit.  I thought he looked so cool standing up with his crazy long toes and biceps that look like a man's.  These boys must be rubbing off on me.