I am probably way more excited than I need to be about this, but...I have chickens.  Chicks to be precise.  our plan was to start with ten of them.  We now have fifteen.  We haven't lost any either...not yet.  They are sooooo small and fluffy!  Our dog Zoey can barely keep herself contained; chicks are the perfect little squeaky fluff toy to her, so we've got to keep a close eye when they're in the same room. ...

 So we are starting with just about nothing on our half acre dream; directly behind the house are some larger, mature juniper trees and another tree I'm not sure of yet, and then just to the south east of our house is the giant 'bean tree', that is the kids play area.  Against the east side of our house are some Rose of Sharon bushes, and near the driveway are a few shrubs.  We have one small tree, I'm not sure of the species, in...