The Girls are back in production mode!

For several months now, my chickens have been less than forthcoming, when it comes to 

"gOOgle production". 

(That's egg production, for you non chicken-obsessed folks.)

Between  them molting, and then the cold, cold weather, no one has seen the need to actually earn their keep around here.

We went months with no one laying, and quite frankly, I was getting sick and tired of cooking them a lovely warm breakfast...

 day after day ...   

and then getting nothing in return.

I was actually at the point to where I was printing out, and compiling tasty chicken recipes, and I even considered contacting Colonel Sanders for his secret recipe.

I was  just planning on just getting some new, more prolific, girls in the spring.

Oh, in the last few weeks, we have gotten an odd egg here or there, but never enough for breakfast for the two of us, and never with any regularity. 

So,  tonight.... as I was doing the washing up after dinner, I happened to look down at the chicken yard, because I heard them making a horrible cackling ruckus.... and I noticed that the door to the coop had blown closed.

Great.

They're probably all stuck outside their coop in this cold sleet and snow with no shelter, and they're probably half  frozen to death.

 I'm hearing their death throes - I'm sure of it.

I'm hearing them singing their final "swan song", so to speak.

.

 I sigh mightily... and tell myself that I had better go down and check on what kind of damage has been done.

So I bundle up in my heaviest jacket, my sturdy chook-poop-proof shoes, a scarf wound 'round and 'round  my nose and neck, and my thickest, warmest, and loveliest woolly red gloves.

Because I  really, really, don't want to feel their cold, stiff, lifeless little bodies with my un-gloved hands,  and they do deserve to be carried to their final resting place, with lovely woolly red gloves.

BUT... what a surprise!

They've redeemed themselves!

In spades!

We're down to 10 girls now,

(we had 11, until my sweet little Brehenda Lee went to that great "chicken coop in the sky" week before last)

 and out of the 10 girls we have left, we actually got 7 eggs today!

SEVEN!

You've heard of "lucky ducks"?

My girls have no idea, how close they actually were, to becoming  Colonel Sanders style chickens.

Now I'm thinking that we might have a lovely Spinach and Swiss cheese Quiche for dinner tomorrow night.

I'll cancel the call to Colonel Sanders...