home again, home again jiggety jig

  Third day home from California and the bucket list of things to do is still there. Seeds to plant and other plants to tend and 5 peach trees to plant. Games to play must be included for sure! We have played five rounds of Clue so far. In between rounds we have tried to do little tasks.

Today was a really weird day. First we left for babysitting after letting all the animals out of their pens and feeding them. That was pretty uneventful. As a trade off my daughter kept my two for an hour or so while I ran to get paperwork and new plastic plates for summer use.

When I arrived back to pick up just one kiddo and try to find a trampoline center open both kiddos were sent out the door. It seems no one could get along with each other today. No worries, I had forgotten my wallet at the house and could not do any more in town without it.

So home we went. On arrival I remembered to try and order medication that was due and encountered the new MHS Genesis system that has been put in place instead of Tricare. That was the first nightmare of the day. Try as I might I could not find the sign up page. I will try again tomorrow.

The rest of the afternoon was spent cooking and cleaning. Lunch was chicken noodle soup. I called the oldest to get her bowl, simple right? Never in my house. She got her soup and promptly spilled the steaming hot bowl onto her foot. That made for a good size, deep burn. 

After food was had by all, the two girls started playing somewhat independently, that is until the younger one decided to provoke the older one. I was outside when it started and had filled the yard wagon with used bedding from the duck and turkey pen. (you know, pooped on straw) I then proceeded to disperse this treasure on my garden beds. As I dumped the last of the straw on the flower beds, I heard the youngest screaming a blood curdling scream. Now a good parent would run. I am not a good parent.

The youngest is on the east porch screaming and holding her hand as if it has been cut with a knife or something. The aggressor comes out the front door. No one has an explanation, just accusations and a teeny tiny scratch that is clearly a fingernail inflicted abrasion. I scold both and send them inside... the youngest catches her barefoot on the bottom of the door as it shuts. More screaming, a much larger scrape than the finger problem so I go in the house and try to bandage up the wounds. Dogs are reacting to all the screaming so I shoved them out the west door into their pen.

As I finish with the screaming kid I hear what sounds like a helicopter. I looked out the east door towards the chicken barn and it is a chaotic mess of ducks and turkeys flapping wings and little chickens running for their lives and FOUR dogs chasing them! Now I am the one screaming frantically to get the kids attention. Once I caught the two little dogs the two big dogs ran off. This left me with two kids screaming again that their dogs were going to get killed.

We threw the little dogs in the house and proceeded to try and round up the chickens, turkeys and ducks. The girls yelled there were two brown chickens on the west side of the house. Silly me I said chase them this way. Okay, just so you know chickens can float. This small detour into the pool caused the oldest to melt into a crying fit that they were going to drown.  

I ran to the pool, dropped to my knees and plucked the two birds out of the pool. they were floating like a duck would. Not sure how long they would last that way but I got them out and tossed them both into the chicken yard. It took about 40 minutes to get the majority of the birds into the barn. A count by color showed we were still missing a few. The oldest kiddo was crying because she couldn't find Sunflower aka Congress, the lame duck. There weren't enough feathers anywhere to indicate a murder.

I started counting turkeys and ducks and sure enough Congress had managed to get herself to the safety of the turkey side of the barn and hide beside a bale of straw! To think that everyday I go out and pick her up and put her in the grass in the sunshine with food and water and repeat the process to put her to bed at night. No more, she will sleep with the rest of the turkeys and ducks from this night forward.

The older kid went into the house and the youngest kiddo stayed outside with me to wait for the big dogs to return and to watch for any stray chickens to appear. Appear they did four more came out of their hiding places and were safely placed into the barn. As we picked up stuff to put into the dumpster, who should appear? (hint: it wasn't eight reindeer nor a jolly 'ole elf)

I turned around and saw both dogs come from the northeast corner of the yard, tired and thirsty, they both came when called. The oldest had just walked out the front door and the sight of both dogs being back home, you guessed it, caused another round of inconsolable tears. 

The birds are all safely in their pens and the doors closed. The dogs are in the house and outside pen, the children are tucked into bed with band aids and ice packs. And DH is back from his men's group. Yes, he missed out on all the fun... poor guy, he leads a very boring life!

Sorry there are no pictures of the chaos, but believe me it was there!!!