Miscellaneous Monday

It was crazy socks/hat day the other day at the elementary school in honor of Dr. Seuss's birthday...

To be honest, I usually dread these school "spirit" days because it always ends in a fight or last minute scramble to come up with an appropriate ensemble.  My new rule is that if it's important to you to participate in the spirit day theme, then everything has to be done the night before...

We hit the mother load this year thanks to our neighbor, Jeannie, who lent us her Dr. Seuss and leprechan hat.  

I was surprised that Reilly agreed to go as a "semi-twin" with Ellie with the socks...

Notice how she switched the pattern up so as not to be completely identical with her, though?

A few years ago, for this crazy hat/socks spirit day, Reilly wanted to wear a crazy hat but was too self conscience to wear anything remotely crazy. After I  produced several options, she ended up deciding on a rather understated stocking cap, but then was in tears at the end of the day because no one thought it looked crazy.  What the?!  I can't win!

Jake's in house basketball team played their last game last Saturday...

This wasn't their best season, sadly, but he still had fun.

Brian was the head coach which was nice...I love watching him coach...he's exactly what a coach should be-

He's encouraging, knows the game like the back of his hand, and has a good relationship with the boys...

My friend, Megan, called me the other day in a panic, as apparently, there was a fox attack on several of her chickens.  Out of the 10 that she had, only 5 were recovered--two of which had major gouges and chunks taken out of their backs.

I offered to help her since I have had a bit of experience with wounded birds...

She brought one of the hens over and I got her cleaned up as much as I could with hydrogen peroxide and neosporin.  

She wouldn't keep the dressing on though, and kept trying to put straw on her wounds which was making a gooey mess.

I had her stay in a cage in my potting room that first night.  (Notice, the chicks are in the pack and play with the heat lamp).

The wound still didn't look great the next morning, so I decided to give her a "spa" treatment by soaking her in epsom salts and warm water.  (I probably should have done it the day before, but didn't want to send her into more shock than she had already experienced).  She didn't seem to mind and was very calm through the process.  I kept pouring the water over her back for about 20 minutes or so with a cup since that's where the bite marks were.

I wrapped her in a towel and then blew dried her until she was fluffy and dry, 

 put more neosporin on her and then some clean dressing and then. . .

I put a chicken saddle on her!  (Thanks to my friend Olivia who made these for her hens that were getting pecked at by her rooster).  I called her to ask her if she would be able to make a chicken saddle for this chicken and within an hour, she was at my doorstep with two!  

The saddle, which fits over their wings with elastic, was the perfect thing to keep her (and the other hens) from pecking at her exposed back as well as keeping the wound clean.

Since it was warm yesterday, I put her in our spare chicken coop and had her stay there for the night. I was pleasantly surprised to see that her wounds have made a drastic improvement and she appears to be on the mend.  Epsom salts are one of my go to remedies for many different chicken related ailments!