Abby the dog

This is Abby, our new dog.



She was rescued from the shelter by our friend Bianca, who passed her on to us. She's been a Jacobs dog since August and we love her a lot. She is a red heeler mix. Mixed with what is a great mystery! She is really cute, she has one blue eye and one brown eye, and she's just short enough that she can't counter surf.
She lets the girls dress her up:


Even though she doesn't exactly enjoy it:


She loves her squeeky chewy toys:


And puts up with lots of love and such from Anna:


Yes, I swore we wouldn't get another dog while we lived in the city limits, and Abby would love to eat the chickens, so we have to find creative ways to keep them separated, but Abby just won our hearts and we're really glad she's here. :)

New Baby Chicks

We ordered four new chicks for this year. They are "easter eggers" which means they will lay very pretty blue-green eggs. As an added bonus, they have very cute puffy cheek feathers. They came in the mail four weeks ago, so this is a bit late, but here they are:

This is what they looked like when they came out of the box


This was last Wednesday, when they were 3.5 weeks old, and we took them outside for the first time


they aren't little puff balls anymore, but they're still really cute


they let the girls handle them


the girls named this one Turtle, she's the sweetest


this one is Sunshine, we think she will be white


and this is Bean


and Ivy


Anna with Turtle on her lap


The big chickens are spending most of their time in the pen we built them these days because they like to tear up the garden beds and we have seedlings in them now. :)


We are busy working on plans for a new improved coop so they will be more comfortable when they are all outside full-time.

Thursday Update, Maggie Update

Today it was unseasonably warm, and the girls played outside a bit. I took some pictures of them on the swings and captured Maggie the dog-bear doing pretty much the only thing she does these days that isn't sleeping or eating, which is barking at the girls while they swing.

This is the primary reason why we aren't able to put her to sleep, even though she stumbles all of the time, she can't hear, she increasingly can't see, and she seems to be in a fair amount of pain from her arthritis. She is a border collie which means that when she was younger she would chase pretty much anything that moved, including the broom and vacuum cleaner, any shovels, the water spray from the hose, cars, balls, frisbees, and of course the kids. Now that she doesn't get around so much (she's 15 years old now) she can't really do any of those things, but she still gets up and goes to the door anytime she's awake enough to notice the kids going out and goes out to bark at them (I think because she can't chase them).

I believe that as long as she feels up to the job of barking at the kids we'll keep trying to make her comfortable and postpone the inevitable. We really do enjoy having her around, even with all of her issues.







I should also add that since Maggie is an honorary chicken, the chickens are going to miss her greatly when she's gone!

Introducing...

Sparkey the guinea pig:


I was absolutely not going to get any more pets, even though our collection of elderly animals is dwindling, but some friends of ours were giving him away and he was so little and cute, so now we have two piggies again. They can't live together, of course, because Penny is an old lady and Sparkey is a little boy, but it turns out Sparkey hasn't spent more than a few hours in his little cage in the four days he's been here.
Here he is exploring the house:

and watching TV with Sophia:

Life is good for the Jacobs piggies. :)

Yet Another Farewell to a Pet Post

This morning our guinea pig Patch ("Patchy-Poo") Jacobs passed away after an extended illness. She is survived by her sister, Penny, and her owners, the Jacobs family, who will all miss her greatly. Patch was born June 1st, 2003, and died September 16, 2008.

The girls will undoubtedly be spending more time loving on Penny now that she is all alone, so hopefully she won't be too lonely. Here is an old post with pictures of the two piggies.

We buried Patch in the backyard and the girls decorated her grave with lots of flowers, then they spent some time hanging out with our newest pets, the chickens.






I'm not sure what it is with Anna and this scrunchy-nose smile, but it's awfully cute. As you can see, she still has both of her front teeth, although the right one still hangs a bit lower than the other. Contrary to my expectations, it has reattached, so for now she gets to keep it!

Farewell to another pet

Sadly, right after I finished the last post, we discovered that our oldest and most beloved fish, Princess Leia, had passed. He (yes, he) was a lovely large red betta fish, and he has now gone to rest with Alexander and Priscilla in the fish graveyard that Sophia established in the backyard.

Here he is in his glory days:


Here is another photo of him from earlier in the summer, and here is his first appearance on the blog.

The Dog-Bear

Ellie and I went for a walk to the playground yesterday and brought Maggie along. A dad with his little girl came along to play and the little girl (about 5) said "Daddy look, that lady has a pet bear!"

Our Girls

The chicks (starting to look more like chickens):



Anna, hanging out:

Margaret, looking smug:

Eleanor and her flora collection:

Sophia found some honeysuckle:


Everyone is fine, Anna had roseola but she is fully recovered, we're busy and it's hot. Pretty much sums it up. :)

Mediocre Chick Video

Here is a youtube video we took earlier today. Daisy and Hyacinth both like to sit on the back of Margaret's hand. The quality is not so good, but you can at least hear their cute little cheeping.

More Chicken News and a Tooth Update

The chicks are doing great, they are now over 1 week old. They spent a bit of time out in the grass today, scratching and pecking. They pretty much have names now, the two most outgoing are Hyacinth (she's the singer) and Daisy. Sophie and Ellie have named the other two Rosalind and Celia. Celia is the little one that was very wobbly the first few days, but seems to be coming along fine. They all have some wing feathers now and a few tail feathers. We can still tell them apart by their markings, but their personalities are easier to tell apart all the time.

Here they are outside earlier today:




Anna's tooth is still hanging in there, hanging being the operative word :(. It does not appear to be reattaching at all, and I expect it will fall out the next time she bumps it. It really was almost completely knocked out when she fell, so we're not surprised. I'm trying not to worry about it and just be thankful she wasn't really hurt. I am sad at the thought of her little smile changing. Oh well.

Chicken Update

The baby chicks are doing well. We have them in the house right now, in a makeshift brooder which is a metal washtub with two lamps on top to keep them warm. They aren't very much work right now, but they can be pretty loud with the chirping sometimes. One of them in particular seems to like to sing really loud. The singer is the most active and jittery, while another is the most friendly.

Edited to add: We are a bit nervous that the singer might turn out to be a rooster. It's very hard to tell at this point, but she/he is definitely the most aggressive and vocal of the lot. :)

One of them is also obviously smaller and less active than the others, but she still seems to be doing ok.







The girls really like the shakespeare names the best, so we're leaning towards them (since there was no clear winner in the poll.)

A Difficult Day

I'm feeling all out-of-sorts today. Anna kept us up most of the night fussing, so Tony and I were pretty tired today. She had a sad accident yesterday in which she fell down and hit her mouth and knocked one of her front two teeth loose. We took her to the dentist, but there isn't anything he can do. We'll have to wait and watch to see if it will re-attach or come out completely. I'm really sad at the thought of her losing her tooth.

Here is her beautiful smile before:


and after:




Tomorrow is Ellie's birthday and I have grocery shopping and baking to do which I haven't had time to do because the baby chicks came unexpectedly one day early!



They are so amazingly cute I'll have to post a video of their cheeping when I get a chance. So far we have nicknames for them based on their markings, and we plan to watch them and discern their personalities a bit before naming them.

Baby chicks

After the loss of Blaise, we decided that we needed to find some other sort of pet to keep and take a break from dog ownership for a while.

We do still have Maggie, but having Maggie isn't really that much like having a dog anymore. She has arthritis so she doesn't really run around, she can't jump up anymore, she doesn't chase her beloved frisby anymore, she doesn't come when we call her (we think she's mostly deaf), and she can't go for walks unless they are very short. What she does do is sleep, eat, drink, and hang out looking confused. Don't get me wrong, her funny old lady ways are very endearing. The reason we call her the bear dog is that she doesn't really shed anymore and because of all her hair she looks like she's part bear. Unfortunately, since she's nearly 15 we are assuming that she won't be with us too many more years.

So, while researching alternative pets, Margaret came up with the idea of keeping pet chickens. After a bit of consideration (and looking at our city ordinances) we decided this could be quite fun and also a bit productive since we can get eggs. We ordered 4 baby chicks (silver-laced wyandottes) from a hatchery and they are being shipped today. We expect to receive them Wed. or Thurs. and then the adventure will begin. We are complete poultry novices so we've been reading a lot about keeping chickens and we'll be learning a lot as we go, I'm sure.

Provided the hatchery has followed our instructions, the babies will be all girls because we can't keep a rooster in the city limits. Please vote in our name poll, and we'll post pictures and names as soon as we have them.

It's a Lovely Morning

The kids are playing,




the growing things are growing,


the trusty bear dog is at my side,


Tony finished the last leg of the fence, enclosing the breezeway,


and it looks so nice from the front,


and the pre-teen is still in bed, reading.

Photography by Sophie

Here are some photos by Sophia of the fish,

Princess Leia:


Aaron:


Aiden:


They are all male betta fish, so they live in separate tanks. I don't claim any responsibility for their silly names, which I may or may not have spelled correctly. :)