an old cartoon of Rachel's

Rachel drew this cartoon at the tender age of 8, and I thought it would be fun to post in light of her recent post about Cam. Did you know they met in Hawaii?! I found this tonight in the 6th issue of the "Special Delivery Paper," a weekly collection of stories and pictures we made for our parents for a couple of years during childhood.

It's a little hard to see. A woman is drowning and is saved by a man. She first says, "Help me" then "Oh, thank you" then "Oh, my hero." The intense final dialogue has the woman saying "Hawaii is great" and the man responding with, "I know."

eggs and our pubescent chickens

About 10 days ago, the hens began a 2-day squawking and cackling festival. They were LOUD. We knew something was up, and it turns out, someone was fixing to lay an egg. When she did, rather than use the laying boxes Jason had built, she decided a cozier spot was here, wedged between a pile of fencing, a prickly broom, and a paper sack.


Now then. That first paragraph might sound all cool and relaxed, but the truth is we were out of our minds with joy when we found this egg. Watching the chickens and Zoralee and more recently our plants grow this spring, we keep having these surges of surprise over the natural life process. "Things are doing what they're supposed to do!" we keep saying. "That's insane!" We don't know what we ever did to deserve chickens who actually lay eggs, but it's witnessing a small miracle every morning.

Here we are exploring and tenderly loving our first egg.

We had learned that as the chickens got sexually mature, their combs and waddles would grow and become bright red instead of pale pink, and sure enough, we'd been observing it for a couple of weeks in our chickens before the first egg came. Again, we were incredulous that what we'd been reading about actually happened. See here the comparison between two hens at different stages (photos taken on the same day):

On day 2, we got another single egg on pellets Jason had laid in the box. But the weirdest thing is that the inside of an egg (no shell) had fallen from a chicken while she roosted at night. It was in the poop box below. This whole thing has the feel of chickens going through puberty. Hormones are all weird, they're laying eggs evidently on accident at night. Just like a period. We are so proud of them. They are growing up.

So, Jason filled the laying boxes with hay and shaped nests to make them more inviting. We set the mature hens in the boxes, to show them how lovely they were. The next day, there was another single egg, and this time it was nestled into the hay in a box! The next day there were two eggs in one box, the next day three.

What you see below is one of our eggs on the right and an average-sized grocery store egg on the left. Ours are starting out small, as is typical. They will grow in size and keep that rich coloring, an indication of their good diet.

Yesterday, we got four eggs (Gosh, it's cool!!) and found one of these water balloon, shell-less eggs. Here's a photograph, though by today the moisture has started to seep out of the membrane. Evidently this happens occasionally while the hens' bodies are still adjusting to egg-making. We are NOT eating this thing; it's right out of Alien World.

As you can see, we're pleased as punch about our eggs. They're little packets of protein, dude, in a protective shell that our chickens push out as little love gifts to us! It's just nuts.

company

Our family reunion (for my maternal grandpa and grandma's families) starts Sunday afternoon, so people are starting to arrive from out of town. Yee-haw! One of the best parts of hanging out with relatives now is everyone meeting, fawning over, and commenting on the ever-expanding wardrobe (ever-expanding, in part, due to their bringing her things!) of the first baby we've had in our immediate and pretty immediate family in over a decade. That'd be Zoralee. Besides the joy of simply having a baby around, we're also reaping the health benefit of building our immunities by exposure to each other's germs via her ears. What did we ever do for fun and health before her?!

Zoralee doesn't hand out smiles willy-nilly. She is a very cautious girl and looks a person over real good before deciding on her excitement level. She has a long week of decisions ahead of her.

"Story Time With Zoralee"

(practicing for her syndicated talk show)

We also just got to spend two days with Cousin Autumn, from my dad's Alaska side of the fam. Gosh, it was good to see her! This is a girl with whom many of our travels and adventures and dreamings are intertwined. She is a kindred spirit in so many ways. Crud, we've plunged ourselves into glacially-fed rivers for the shock of it (stupid), spent days and nights and days and nights hiking through the Alaskan wilderness (rad), dug ditches for water lines in the sweltering Guatemalan heat (jewel in crown), dreamed of communal living, sustainability, building cob houses, and running hostels (coffee-induced highs). Can you imagine how thrilled we were to see her? Can you imagine what a drag it was to let her go this morning? Booooooo for that!

Luke and Rachel both think Zoralee looks quite a bit like her.

family look-alikes

And while I'm on the subject of family look-alikes, I'll post a pic of Jason's niece, Ashley, who I've personally seen the most of in Zoralee since she was born. This is Ashley's high school graduation three years ago.

Zoralee and Great-grandpa Gene seem to be a favorite family-wide comparison, especially the backs of their heads. (Note the hair ribbons in this shot.)

love you, Pops

happy day of fathers to my main man

I love you, Baby.

You kick pants at being a Papa.
Happy first Father's Day.