Most of our chickens don't have names, but the ones that do were named by our sons. We haven't named them because we don't plan on keeping all of them. The minimum order was 15 chicks, but that is more than we can keep. As it stands now a few chicks will be heading to my Mom's house so she can start her own backyard flock.
After a glorious day exploring the coop and run the chicks seemed a little lost as the sun went down. A few of them huddled together in the run. A couple tried to roost on the feeder. A couple of brave little chicks hung out at the bottom of the stairs that lead up to the hen house, but not a one of them went inside. We waited for a little bit to see if any of the chickens would figure it out on their own but that never happened. I wanted to secure them for the night and make sure that all of the girls were safe and warm, I thought if I crawled inside the run I could shoo them up into the house. I convinced the girls to run silly into the space under the house, but I couldn't get them to go up the ladder.
The chickens now live outside in their spacious coop! The chicks are six weeks old, the weather is warm and beautiful, they have moved outside. It was a fun little adventure carrying each one up out of the basement and off to their new home. Each chick had a slightly different reaction.
Our big project for this past weekend was not coop cleaning, it was actually supposed to be fence assembling. We planned on dividing our "L" shaped yard with a simple chain link fence. Unfortunately we didn't anticipate how much it would cost to purchase a few posts and a roll of link, while not terribly expensive, it wasn't in our budget. So we divided our yard in a more frugal (albeit temporary) manner; a log "fence".
31 Days 2014, Backyard Chickens | in Family Life, Homestead 
This weekend was lovely. Absolutely beautiful weather that just demanded that we spend as much time as possible outside. It was the perfect opportunity to open up the coop and give it a complete cleaning in preparation for some new occupants. Some vinegar, some water, and plenty of sunshine later and the girls are ready for their big move to the big outdoors.