Childhood.

With the death of so many including a 6 year old girl in the Colorado movie theater shooting it hits so much closer to home when you happen to have a 6 year old little girl. What I am sure started out as a fun memory making experience for that mom and little girl is a night that mother will probably never be able to forgive herself for. We make judgment calls that we could never know the outcome of if something goes wrong and that cold hard fact is that we never could for see it all or change it if something does happen but we also can't hide our children away and keep them from having amazing memories of their childhood. I hope that mother knows that on her daughters last day of life on this earth, she knew she was loved and had a mother who wanted her to be happy and have a life full of good times and memories. We live in a world that tries to make us fear so much and a lot of it is for a good reason I suppose but the fact is we just can't control it all. We can try and protect them from what we think might take place and we can try to be a buffer and shield from all the evil in this world but its just not always possible and facing that fact is harder than most would think, as my children get older I am now going down a road of trying to balance freedom with fear of the unknown, responsibility with protection and all without being an overbearing mother. I suppose this is a burden all parents must bear but this world just doesn't feel like it did when I was little. I had a childhood where I could ride my bike, roller blade, roam and explore my neighborhood without this unshakable fear of something going wrong, now that is not to say bad things didn't happen in my neighborhood and in this world of course sin and evil has roamed this earth for far to long but it just seems to be getting worse and worse as time goes on and unfortunately my kids won't have that carefree running a muck in the neighborhood memories like I had and as much as it saddens me I realize that as their mother I have to make up for this in other areas as well as entrust them to God that he will guide me down this road and protect my children should I make a wrong turn.

ChiCks on the loose!!

We move these chicken trailers a few times a day so the chicks can get fresh bugs and grass. Oh did I said "we" what I really mean is ben and josh I just sit back and watch! Great team work guys! LOL! Well anyways when you move the chicken tractors you have to raise up the front and pull it to a fresh spot, The chickens are learning this move well and as soon as they see an opening they like to go crazy, escape and run all over the place and once they escape they do everything in their power to keep from being captured. It really is funny to watch someone chase this little tiny chicken all over the place. I was amazed at how fast they really are and how good they are at not being caught! Thank goodness my quick thinking mother-in-law grabbed the camera to get some pictures of this.

She got one!

Here chickie chickie!!

Get in there chickie!

I think I got him!

Yup sure did! One proud boy.

Its a team effort to catch these little boogers!

Here is my family in all our country bumpkin rednecking glory. LOL. We look a hot mess but hey what did you expect after running around chasing chickens all day

The Chicken Tractors!

Ok well it has taken me awhile to get around to writing this post and I am sorry about that  but here it finally is! I know a lot of you have been asking what in the world is a chicken tractor so here it is. We made it out of recycled metal roofing, 2X4s, hog wire, and chicken wire.

Now it may not be the most beautiful thing in the world but we will work on that when we have more time….. I am thinking hot pink maybe? :@) It would have to be a secret mission thought to get hot pink paint past my husband but I will work on it. LOL!

Here is the door that you have to go through to get into the chicken trailers.

Joshua feeding the chickens a cricket, Poor cricket but happy chickens.

In this insanely HOT weather the chickens run out of water quite a bit and we def do not want that so my husband made this very interesting 5 gallon chicken waterer out of a 5 gallon bucket and an oil pan (new oil pan of course). You fill up the 5 gallon bucket with water and then put the oil pan on top and flip it over as fast as possible and it creates a suction that lets just enough water out without overflowing. I know awesome right!!!

They are happy as can be.

 The chickens have been in their chicken tractors for almost 2 weeks now! They LOVE it! They especially love it at night when the light is on and bugs are flying everywhere, They go CRAZY! We have hit a few bumps in the road (well more like other larger animals that keep attacking the chicken trailers) so we are gradually making them better and better and hopefully won't lose to many more chickens. The first attack was on there first day in them and the dogs decided to break in and play with them. They grabbed them one by one and took them to the porch to play with them. We lost about 20 chickens that night. *stupid dogs* After we dealt with the dogs the next thing that attacked was what we think is a raccoon (well our good friend tonia clued us in to this) all of the sudden we had chickens with NO WINGS! Now when you know they had wings when you went to bed but not when you got up in the morning it is pretty confusing. I never knew that a raccoon will reach through the chicken wire and eat the chickens piece by piece

This here is exactly how the chickens get eaten piece by piece, They huddle together against the sides and wont move for hardly anything!! Its like there in a trance or something when there going to sleep.

On an Adventure!

Have you ever seen a little boys face light up when you tell them we are about to go on an ADVENTURE!? It the cutest thing ever and a boys dream come true. My son joshua loves to watch, listen to, and hear about adventures and is always talking about going on one. Just like the adventures of tin tin which is his and has always been one of my husbands favorite movies. 

SoOoOoOo we did. :@)

They ran along the creeks little bank to get see what they could discover. 

They found some fish and even a few crawdads! 

Real men take there babies on adventures.  :@) Just kidding!

 but they do carry there babies so their wife can take all the pictures. 

We found a CAVE!!!(ok ok ok so we knew it was there when we drove to it) 

but the kids were soooooo excited! They found a cave! 

The ran around and did more exploring.

There they go!

I def think there favorite part was seeing what they could find in the water.

The places our mini van goes! LOL!

Here comes peter cotton tail……. Well not anymore

My husband, his brother Josh and my 2 oldest children Sariya 6 and Joshua 4 decided to go hunting for rabbits and succeeded.They caught two adults rabbits and a baby one. I know sad right!? I awwwwwed to, its ok go ahead and let it out. They were all super excited about their uncle josh actually hitting and killing these rabbits and couldn't wait to cook them and eat them!! Now you have to understand we are city people through and through. I have never EVER eaten a rabbit….. Nor have I EVER wanted to but when you hang out with country folk and you start doing things like buying 100 chickens to raise and slaughter you eventually have to tell your brain that maybe these thing are ok to do……. maybe.

These would be the 3 wascally wabbits!

This would be the man who got um!

And also who skinned them.

And who may have enjoyed this just a little to much. LOL!

The most surprising to me was my little princess Sariya had no problem watching uncle josh skin these things and she was even more excited to eat some! Oh goodness what am I going to do with these children, I believe they are def going to be more on the country side. 

We then stuffed the rabbit with some apples, onions, rosemary, lemon, and cilantro and baked it in the oven for 45 mins or so….. It wasnt long enough so we had undercooked rabbit and never got the chance to taste it but will try again another time.

Here chickie chickie!!

 Our newest adventure in the clean food movement is trying to figure out where is the best place to get the best chicken for our family. As a family of 6 with multiple guest over for dinner quite a bit we have decided that the best place to get good, clean, wholesome chicken is the same place you can get all of your other food that way, by doing it yourself or from a local reliable source. So we bought 100 of these little cuties. 

(The chicken not the child. LoL!)

We took them out of there boxes and put them in there new clean little home they ran around like wild children on crack just chirping away! 

Everyone was so excited and the kids love how cute and fluffy they are.

The chicks huddled together to get warm and use to there new home.

Here they are with their feeder and water. We have chosen to feed them with food made from non GMO organic substances (i.e., organic corn, organic oats, organic milo, & organic alfalfa…). We would eventually like to make our own chicken feed so we know exactly where it its from and what the chickens are eat.  After all you are what you eat. These chickens are feed the non GMO organic feed exclusively for the first 2 weeks in the brooder to grow big and strong, We then are going to free range them in a chicken trailer which is moved everyday so the chickens can get fresh grass and bugs but that will be for another post. 

A new way of life.

Well our family has been overwhelmed (as I am sure you all have lately) by the health issues of today food choices. Things we always viewed as basic and safe are now being proved to be quite the opposite. When you go to a restaurant you always want the option of being able to peek into the kitchen…. very few of you actually do but I bet if there was signs at the door saying "No one is allowed to view the kitchen!" You would *gasp* and say "Oh I don't think so! How dare you not let me see where my food is prepared!" Well of course they're not going to put that out there but I am sure there are some things they don't want you to see and the fact is there are things you know of but don't WANT to see. We know alot of our food choices are down right HORRIBLE but yet we still choose to take our families to those place and cook those kinds of food. I am as guilty as guilty gets but convenience  and price plays a big part in our day to day life and excuses aside it is a process like any other to break out of bad unhealthy habits and form new healthy cleansing ones but I would love to hear some of your guys steps you have taken to get away from the salmonella infested, hormone injected, insecticide and chemical over ridden food that there trying to sell your family now days.  I will be sharing with you guys in the next few posts the things that we are doing in our family and if you would like to be involved or have any helpful advice be sure and let me know. :@)