Hillary Rodham Cluckin

We are now the proud owners of 52 chickens but I still have to buy eggs from my neighbor.  I am thinking about starting a chicken non-profit that will be named something like, Patriot Chicken or Chicky Tea Party.  I could dress the chickens up in little outfits and serve them tea; something I am already known for doing.  People could come too and give a tax deductible donation.  I am really doubting I will get any flack from the IRS at this point.  I bet I could just send out a quick email to them letting them know of my intentions and they will waive all paperwork to avoid looking like they were targeting conservative chickens.

Two shipments of baby chicks have arrived. It is really crazy that these little creatures are sent through the US Postal Service a day after they are hatched but that is how they came.  They sent two extra with each shipment.  I am assuming this is because there are usually a couple that don't survive the two to three day journey.  We did lose a couple but not without a fight.  The husband had one wrapped up in his sweatshirt feeding it water from an eye dropper while he was watching TV, but the poor little thing didn't make it through the night.  I stayed up to check on her until she finally died around midnight.  It is kind of crazy that we spent that much time and attention on a bird we planned on eating in a couple of months, but is was still sad to see her fade away.

We have told the boys which birds are for eggs and which are for meat and made them promise not to play with or name the meat birds because that will make for a very sad roast chicken dinner.  Here is the breakdown:

Faverolles are a favorite meat bird in France and I saw many a headless one in the butcher shops of Paris hanging by its scrawny legs.  The roosters are spectacularly beautiful and we will be giving a few of them a Presidential pardon in order to keep producing more birds so we don't have to do the shipping thing again.  Poor Kyle the Rooster is going to feel even more inadequate when he gets a load of his Favoerolle counterpart.

Speckled Sussex are also a meaty bird.  I feel a little guilty about these ones since one of our original layers is a Speckled Sussex and she may get a little nervous that her number is about to be up.

Cuckoo Marans lay these crazy brown eggs that look like chocolate Easter eggs.

Golden Comets and Black Australorps are docile girls who are reliable layers of your standard brown egg.

I was hoping to also get some Aruacanas. They lay beautiful blue eggs, but we couldn't find any.  My awesomeness cache would definitely go up a couple of notches if I could send my city visitors home with a dozen rainbow colored eggs.

The husband really has done a spectacular job with the chicken house for the layers and the new chicken tractor for the meat birds.  Unlike the Trump Tower he built last summer, the new one is more spacious, easier to move so the chickens can have new pasture every day and a big door so you can actually get into the coop; all at a fraction of the cost of the previous tractor.

The chicks are really cute, but luckily we have the kittens to fill our need for ridiculous cuteness so hopefully there will not be a boycott of our clean pasture raised chickens in favor of factory birds.

Even though we will not be naming the meat birds, I feel an overwhelming urge to name all the layers.  I have a thing for giving all of our animals a name which we never use because they also have a nickname.  I am going for a powerful women theme.  So far I have:

Hillary Rodham Cluckin
Joan of Eggs
Susan B Layer
Emma Goldegg
Eleanor Roosecluck
Martha Stewmeat (I know that is a meat reference but...)
Mother Therbeaker
Dorothy Pecker
Edith Waddleton

You get the gist.  Unfortunately there are only so many bad puns you can come up with using, egg, beak and cluck.  I need some help. There are twelve more girls to name  Please send me your ideas.