Alice on the porch

Chickens, man.  Who knew?

Love, J

Paul's progress

Poor Paul is recovering from a spinal cord injury.  He's doing pretty well, considering he was completely paralyzed from the waist (does a rabbit have a waist?) down for a week or so.  

Now he can hop in a lopsided way and one of his hind legs looks like it's almost back to normal.  The other one's not as great, but we've been taking him to see a vet/acupuncturist and I think it's helping.

I get a lot of eyerolls when I mention the acupuncturist to people, but if doing everything you can to help your animals is wrong, then I don't want to be right.  

Plus it was sort of our fault he got hurt, so there's a bit of the guilt factor going on there.

But mainly we just love him.

Love, J

Dad's day sail

Step-dad has been sailing tons and tons this summer and I finally joined him last Sunday.  O usually goes with him and they are such a cute crew of two.  

Step-dad: "O we're luffing" (or something equally gibberish) 

O jumps up and cranks a handle or pulls a rope or something and step-dad seems satisfied. 

Obviously I have a very thin grasp on what's happening (okay, no grasp at all), but it's fun to watch them run things.  

And the sun feels nice.

Love, J

Alice's favorite game

I caught her napping on the bookshelf.

And then:

Her favorite is to climb to the back of the couch and launch herself into the kitchen when I'm doing dishes.  It seems like she's aiming for my shoulder but she'll land anywhere - my head, the sink, the counter.  She's not the most precise flyer.

Love, J

The real news

Alice the Chicken is not the only new addition to our household.  There is also SL the Child.

She's not all-the-way ours yet but we expect she will be within the year.  For reasons both legal and emotional, she won't feature heavily here or on any of my social media for now.  Or maybe ever.  I haven't decided.

I will let this picture tell you that she and the hubs make a mean rapping duo when they bust out the karaoke machine.

Love, J

Chick

Hello again.  

I'm going through a years-long phase where I would rather set myself on fire than sit down to a computer away from work.  

However, I've got a backlog of some sweet photos*, videos, and general life updates I want to record, so here I am.  

We have a chicken now.  She showed up under step-dad and O's** back deck about a month ago, and was passed along to our household because we don't live with any sneaky cats who eyeball her with that rotten look on their face that says they're just biding their time until the humans leave the room.

This is her a few days after coming to live with us, when she was much smaller:

I really appreciate her company while I play in the garden.  The rabbits all need constant supervision so I have to keep them in their pens if I want to get anything done.  But this girl just follows me around, cheeping, eating bugs, and taking dirt baths.

She also makes an excellent nap buddy.

And she appreciates the Daily Show.  This is not strictly necessary to win my affection, but it does get you pretty far.

She's living in the kitchen until her coop is finished.  Then we'll get her some chicken friends and she'll move outside with them.

For now she seems very content just hanging out with us and the rabbits.  She's especially bonded with Ginny, who also goes by "The White Rabbit."  And so our little hen is "Alice."

Love, J

*Please forgive the noticeable downgrade in photo quality.  I never replaced Photoshop after we lost our laptop in the burglary, so all these pictures are off my phone and mostly raw, with maybe a couple run through a filter.

**G now goes by O and uses male pronouns.  Same person; same cute little face; same eye roll when he hears me talk about his cute little face.

Cuddlebun

This girl, she is my love.

 She jumped up into my arms for kisses here.  And then wouldn't leave.  Do you know rabbits at all?  Do you know how they behave?  Not like that.  She's affectionate beyond words, and I adore it.

 Freya and the hubs have a special bond too.  It's funny how uninterested she is in making friends with the other bunnies, but how clingy she is with her humans.  Oh my sweet girl.

Love, J