This was the second year we hosted our Halloween climbing competition and let me just say…as stressful as it always turns out to be, I’m so glad we do it! Last year we had about 30 people show up. This year it was 60! I’m not sure what the heck we’re going to do next year if the number doubles again! I’m thrilled at the success of this event and how stoked people get over it, but I’m not sure our house can handle it.  There were people everywhere and at midnight when everyone left, the place was trashed! Not from garbage or anything, but just dirt and grime everywhere. It took us the entire next day to clean everything up. Again…we’re not complaining. Just trying to figure out how we’re going to keep this going. Hmmmm…we just bought the acre next door to us… Maybe build a party house with parking, yeah?? Woo hoo!

Here’s a fun little video compilation of the event:

On our way down to Flagstaff to visit Keto and Dana, we stopped and visited Monument Valley. We wanted to take our Christmas picture here, but couldn’t make it back out in time. Maybe next year!

After going back and forth for a while, we finally decided to pull the trigger and get some chickens for egg laying! I had been talking to my girlfriend about them and she convinced us it was a great idea. So we went to Ace and bought four baby chicks. They were absolutely adorable! The gentleman who helped us buy them has become a good friend actually, and we asked that he give us chicks who would be good tempered, good egg layers and do well in the hot weather. He picked out four different breeds and we took them home.

For the next 2 months we watched them grow like weeds and they each developed little personalities. It was fun to take them out of their box and let them run around the garage. The only problem was that they pooped SO much and poor Tommy was getting sick of all the chicken bombs. Haha.

I knew we needed a good coop and I wanted Tommy to build one, but we were pressed for time and he had so much on his plate, I decided to just buy one instead. We found one online that was shipped down from Oregon, but when we opened up the package we were absolutely shocked at the poor quality. We decided to try and make it work and set it up out against the block wall with a few modifications.

However, we found out pretty quickly that it had not been completely waterproofed and after a couple days of rain, the chicks looked like drowned rats running around in the mud. Plus, it was SO small. I couldn’t believe they had promoted this thing being able to house SIX chickens! Baloney! They were growing at such a rapid rate and living in such close quarters I knew they were getting stressed.  This can cause major problems with a flock. So, I basically forced Tommy to make a coop that I found on Craigslist instead of spending a ton more money and getting another piece of crap. It was an awesome design and he agreed it would be much better.

Three of the girls are laying right now. The golden girl up front has not started yet. So far we’ve been getting about  15-20 eggs a week and they are delicious!  They will not become adults until about a year old, so they still have some growing to do. I’m happy we made this decision. These girls have been a lot of fun and it’s been really cool to have our boys experience something like this.

*** As of November 9th, 2016, we’ve had quite the revelation happen. Izzy has now become Ozzy. We found out this morning he was a rooster! Crowing and squawking to his hearts content. Tommy wasn’t very thrilled but I’ve insisted that we keep him around unless he starts to get unmanageable. We are not going to make him chicken dinner, but rather if the time comes, we’ll sell him off to a good home looking for a good rooster. Hopefully that never happens, but I’m afraid that nature is much more powerful than nurture in situations like these,  so we’ll just have to see what happens.  Fingers crossed! =)

Our good friends, Mario and Maria, have a daughter, Brianna, who got married in early September. I haven’t been to a lot of weddings, but this was one of the best ones by far that I’ve attended. I wish we would have taken more pictures, but it ended up being so rainy that we left all of our belongings in the car so they wouldn’t get soaked! Ha! Anyway, the venue was beautiful and it was really cool to be a part of this young ladies special day. I guess it was so memorable because I imagined myself in Maria’s shoes when she and Mario gave Brianna away. They were of course very emotional and I tried to imagine myself going to Will or Henry’s weddings in the future and how I would feel. I’ll probably be a total wreck and they’ll  have to escort me away because of my sobbing and snorting. NOT looking forward to that. However, that is a while away and for now I can be happy with them at home where they aren’t exposed to girls who will take them away from me. Haha! Yes, I need help. 😉

Hahaha! Not really. I don’t think we’ll ever get ANY pets again. If you weren’t aware, we got rid of our two cats. Our really good friend, Steve, took them and now they are living like kings down at his house. I’m super happy about that but not eager to repeat the whole pet situation again. Not sure if that will change. I know the kids would love a dog…but again, it’s such a responsibility. I’m not saying never. Just not right now. We’ll see what the future holds. In the meantime, I am more than happy to have this little fellow up at the top of our patio cover coming and going as he pleases. He is SO cute!!!