First Egg

We have received our very first egg today from one of our pullets!  The pullet who decided to lay this beautiful Grade A egg (graded by my 4-H'er daughter), did so while I was gone to the grocery store.  And no, I did not buy any supermarket eggs ;)  After I got back home and put away the groceries I did buy, I went out to the coop for after noon rounds to check food and water.  I opened the door to the coop and there it was.....on the floor!   Ok, so this was the first egg, hopefully the pullets will get the hang of where to lay their eggs.  I do have a golf ball in each nesting box.  Not to entice them to lay, but to show them where to lay.

So who laid the egg?  I really, really, really want to believe it was one of the New Hampshire Reds.  Although it could be one of the Easter Eggers.  Easter Eggers can lay white, brown, green, blue or pink (very light brown) eggs.  I'm hoping for green and blue from my EE's!! *fingers crossed!*

Hopefully by mid April we'll be in full production of white, brown and tinted eggs!  Just in time for Spring!

Here is a photo of our First Egg (on right) placed next to a large white supermarket egg for comparison.

Our Journey Begins

This blog will be a journal of sorts pertaining to our family's beginning journey of homesteading and hopefully sustainable living.  Seems simple enough - but it will take hard work and determination.  As it is, we are learning as we go.  And that is so much part of the adventure that awaits.  I'm sure we will see our share of failures and successes.  And just maybe learning from our failures will bring fruitful rewards!

Speaking of fruitful, today our first order of seeds from SeedsNow.com came!  These are organic, non-GMO seeds.  I can not begin to tell you how excited we are to get them in the ground.  So far we have 27 different types of seed from Arugula to Zucchini.

Not only are we planning on having a much bigger crop this year, we are also raising chickens for farm fresh eggs!  Our layers consist of New Hampshire Reds, White Leghorns, Production Blacks and Ameraucanas (Easter Eggers).  I absolutely can not wait to taste these eggs!  The hatchery did throw in Barred Rocks and Rhode Island Red Roosters (17 roos total!!).  But I think we are going to have to find new homes for them, there's just way to many!  We did loose 5 birds, which gives us a remaining count of 38 total chickens.

Looks like we're off to a good start!

  More to come.......

~Marcie