Tuesday night the Matthews family was in town and spent the afternoon at our house helping to ceremoniously move the chickens to their outdoor coup and to start building the new shed in our backyard. Uncle Mark came over to help too. I felt like we were Amish. The men were building raising the walls of the barn and the women and children were tending the chickens... barefoot none-the-less :) Ellie and Kate are adorable and since they are chicken experts (they have 7 hens at their house in Utah!) they were very helpful in moving the chicks.

The boys raising the barn

How many professionals does it take to build a barn? ...at least 1 engineer, 1 doctor, 1 lawyer and 1 five-year-old.

Aunt Maureen kept the Dooodle busy while we moved chicks (she is due with baby number three on Francie's birthday!)

Uncle Mark in the chicken coup!

We tried to let Francie entertain herself on her blanket with her favorite climbing block from Oma but she had other plans...

She wanted to go in the coup with her cousins... they all LOVE silly Uncle Mark

The girls with the chicks

Chickens at 5 weeks old... doesn't take long for a cute little baby chick to get big and ugly huh! (Oh and they do have names: Red Neck and Trailer Trash (the red ones), Daisy and Duke (the blonde ones) and Queenie (the black one). Oprah, the other black one died.

"Dasiy" flying away from Kate

Ellie was a huge help. She told me, "Aunt Mary... the trick will be, we need to make sure that when we transport the chicks, we don't let them get loose or Ollie will get them. And that will be the end of the chickens." Ellie got IN the coup to catch the little buggers, put them in their tempoary home in a cooler, then moved them one-by-one into their new home. (One of my old polo mallets for a roosting place and serving a better use than collecting dust in the garage)