As I stated previously, there is some big news to communicate. March 2019 we will have an addition joining our flock. No, we do not plan to go bonkers during Chick Days. No, Troy is not letting me get some goats. No, we definitely still do not have room for a cow or a horse.
Instead we will have a new addition to our flock of humans. Quite the unexpected surprise, I discovered right around our one-year anniversary that I was pregnant. I could go into vast amounts of details as to why this was considered an impossible feat but, honestly, it doesn’t really matter. Because impossible as it may have seemed or not, it happened.
So, we made the official announcement much earlier than I’d originally expected. We told the kids and our family and friends much earlier than I had presumed. It’s terrifying in a way for the fear of miscarriage and anything else imaginable that could go wrong loomed heavily over me. However, it’s also quite freeing. I don’t have to try and hide this secret bubbling up inside of me for 4 months. People can be more understanding (hopefully) as to why I’m exhausted every moment of the day, pee constantly and eventually getting a little bit bigger.
This has not effected our quickly approaching honeymoon plans, though. In fact our vacation seems to come at just about the perfect time in the pregnancy. And naturally I’ll be doing my best to go slow and take it easy. That means working out and hiking has once more become a priority. Even more of a priority since I don’t want to slack off right before the trip and feel terrible.
Even if I’m grumpy and don’t want to go because, let’s face it, ALL I want to do lately is sleep constantly, Troy pushes me forward and I do feel proud of myself for getting out there and getting it done. He has taken his working out to a whole new level to prepare for the trip and get back in shape. The dogs are certainly enjoying all of these adventures and getting to go on almost daily walks/runs.
This weekend marks the second weekend without the kids and I will admit that it is quite difficult going this long without seeing them. Perhaps my mother instincts are just feeling even stronger now. Maybe it’s because summer is coming to an end. Heck, maybe I’m just a bit extra emotional. Either way I miss them like crazy and it feels like forever until they will finally be home again.
We have been trying to have some fun, though. I convinced Troy to go to the fair with me and he remains convinced that I conveniently forgot to tell him to go get food beforehand so we could eat at the fair. We each got to pick out some super yummy food and, most importantly, Troy learned the difference between an elephant ear and a funnel cake. And then learned that he’d been ordering an elephant ear when what he really wanted was a funnel cake the last 6 years. He DID get a deep fried Twinkie, though. I pride myself on never having eaten a Twinkie before but he did have me try a bite. It was incredibly odd. Next year I think I’ll stick with the deep cried oreos or candy bars.
The fair was fun and even better since we didn’t have to go to the midway and stress over which child wanted to go on which ride while they each tried to run off in a different direction. SIGH. They are less than thrilled that they did not get to go to the fair this year. But it certainly saved us quite a bit of money.
The past couple weeks we have been doing some necessary changes around our little homestead in order to prepare for this brand new human that will exist in approximately 7 months. Unfortunately that meant selling about half of our chicken flock. Troy let me keep all the chickens that I had named for and make sure I had one of each breed that I’ve worked so hard to collect. That leaves us with 20 birds (including Paprike the rooster) and 6 ducks. That may still sound like a lot but when we just got rid of at least half of them in about a week, I can drastically see the change and the coop looks so empty.
I’m happy with my girls and it will certainly be some much needed minimum care as well as large savings in chicken feed overall. In a couple more months the turkeys will be gone also so those feed costs will be gone.
The turkeys continue to amuse me. For turkeys, these don’t seem to be terribly dumb. But they certainly have some personality. When these three came to the door Oren told me they were “just like the three amigos. Except they speak turkey, not Spanish.” That boy’s one liners are as good as mine and, I swear, sometimes I wonder if somehow he got some of my DNA.
This is the beginning of a very new journey for us all. It will require quite a bit of changes to come in the future. But they will all be worth it.
chickensandtomatoes 