Old Post Ranch: Chicken Coop

I've mentioned it a few times before, but I am a total wanna be. A wanna be homesteader that is. And Matt (hubbers) can lay claim to this feeling as well. Oh you know. The grow your own food, lay your own eggs (chickens that is ;) ), sew your own clothes, hunt your own meat and build your own house kinda homesteader. But of course all in the safety and comfort of 70 degrees and sunny southern California. Don't count on us moving to anywhere the sun don't a'shine 360 days a year (we'll let there be five or so rainy days for nostalgia's sake). Even though I consider us to be pretty gregarious and out going, we are time and time again glued to our house working on this or that or the other thang and don't feel a pang of guilt to have never left our yard for the weekend. And you know what? I think that it's pretty dang funny to have turned out this way because all through out my childhood and my teenage years my parents would do the same thing and I couldn't help but say to my self, 'How boring! I'll never be like that. I'll be goin here and there and everywhere, blah de blah blah'. But no sir-ree. Doesn't help matters that errands/travel/movement of any kind with three littles is damn near dead exhausting, expensive and sanity stretching. So friends... if you are reading this... come on over cuz we aren't a'movin ;)
With that said we have put plenty on our plates at the moment to grow our 'homestead'. Right now we are hackles deep in building a chicken coop for our newly acquired 12 fine feathered friends. The coop (or chicken mansion as our friends call it) is complete, now we just need to build a fenced in run and nesting boxes inside. But those can be put on the back burner for a bit as the chicks are still pretty little and will spending their time cooped up (haha) for now.
So on to a little picture show of the chicken mansion. We originally planned on a simple 4x4 shed/cage thing but the hubs sent me a sketch of this monster late at work one night and I said have fun with that! I'll be sitting on the lawn chair over'dare sipping some lemonade. But he went for it anyways and built us a behemoth... a beautiful behemoth.

Here he is building the floor and mocking up the sides with his little helper. Nearly gave me a damn heart attack with every swing of the hammer because chubby little fingers were flying in and out playing the game 'ha ha high five ha ha too slow ha ha high five ha ha OOOWWWWWW!!!'

Gotta have lots of sweet tea breaks!

Inspecting the child labor. Why'da think we are having so many?! Free help!

Straight out the kitchen sink window. Partially because it makes a nice view but mostly I think he put it there because it's directly in my line of sight so with every morning cup of coffee I can say to my self, 'Dang it! Gotta go let the chickens out!'

We pay for labor with beer..... just kidding.

Of course we decide to erect the coop during the only annual rainstorm to hit San Diego so instead of a leisurely pace it was 'Shit! We gotta beat this rain or else it's gonna ruin it!'

Who painted this beauty? Why moi of course. And where was the newborn you ask? Wait what new born???

Oh this newborn. Peacefully asleep under the orange tree.

Every morning these two eagerly await a visit to our feathered neighbors. And mama? Couldn't be happier with our church/barn/chicken mansion.
Only complaint?
When it's night out and I peer out the kitchen window an eery red glow from the heat lamp leaks out from the windows. Totally looks like we have a haunted church/barn/chicken mansion now ;)

Thanks for stopping by!