Yesterday, I spent several hours with Arwen, just me, some plants, and Arwen, and it was great.
We used to buy hanging baskets of flowers to hang all around our property in the summers, but hanging baskets can be a little expensive. With that in mind, I started saving the pots and hangers and just buying individual plants and planting myself. The other perk of this is that I love doing it, so it’s a win-win. I bought enough flowers for six hanging baskets yesterday for $65. If I had bought the ready-made hanging baskets, the total would have been $240.
It took me an extra while working on these baskets yesterday because our hangers have rusted and died. I had the idea to use twine and just make my own hangers. I like the look a lot better, but it took me some hours to make that plus get the flowers planted.
I was just starting to feel lonely when Arwen made her appearance.
Arwen has had her wings trimmed, but she is still smart enough to get out of the chicken area and hang out in the driveway. Arwen has always been one of the smartest girls I have ever seen, even when she was a baby. I kind of marvel at her, so I was glad to see her.
She just sat with me for awhile, checking everything out, but then she decided she wanted to peck at my flowers. I told her “no.” Our chickens know “no,” but it will only work for a little bit with the stubborn ones. Arwen would stay away for a few minutes but then couldn’t resist the flowers and would be right back in the middle of them.
Finally, I got up and got her some treats. “You eat your treats and leave my flowers alone.”
She accepted this deal, and all was well–until she ran out of treats. Chickens will train you after just one time of getting treats, so she knew what to do. She went right back to my flowers, and I went right back to give her more treats. We did this three times.
Finally, when she was back into my flowers the third time, I got up and told her a big no and ran her off. In a few minutes, I heard her behind me digging holes in the flower bed, so I got up and ran her off from there.
After this, she looked pretty pouty and went to the door the chicken coop to be let in. She was like, “Fine. I’m leaving.”
So I got up one more time and let her back into the coop. I was sad to lose the company but glad to not be getting up and down waiting on a chicken.
It was great to get that one-on-one with her though. Arwen is the last baby Rooster will likely ever have, and she is the last baby we are going to have on our little farm for a good while.
Arwen is our baby. I think she knows it.
Farmer-ish 