Chicken Coop Remodel

There are so many things that need tending to every spring and poor Hubby's 'honey do' list is growing by leaps and bounds *grin*. This year getting new chicks is high on my priority list as I miss having our own eggs SO much so the coop was the first place we hit as soon as we had a break in the rain :)

I normally raise our baby chicks, geese and ducks in the garage as it's the easiest place to get the heat lamp plugged in but this year Hubby is in the middle of building another new bed for the kids so there just isn't room for my brooding pen.

So I needed to come up with a new spot that was easily accessible but our old coop is really really hard to get into unless you're about a foot tall and covered in feathers. The only solution was to cut out part of the wall :)

We assessed the situation, made mental notes of what we wanted to do and then when it was time to frame in the door we found out just how crooked everything was *grin*. None of the walls or the floor were level LOL. The original shed was built sometime in the early sixties and over time it has begun to sink making everything slightly wonky :)

Once the wall was opened up I could get a good look inside to see what sort of clean up job was needed before the chicks can go in. The floor was surprisingly clean actually but there was some leftover chicken manure that need shoveling and my little guy was more than happy to help out.

He didn't really get much of it out of the house but had a lot of fun trying. At one point though he had a huge chunk of it in his hands as we were all telling him to drop it. Nothing like packing around poo! At least it was good and dry, and sadly that wasn't the only time I had to tell him to drop it that day LOL.

I love watching the kids muck around in the dirt :)
If you don't have enough arm power to push the shovel down when digging then you RIDE it down *grin*.

Next to the new door is an old single pane window and it was just thick with cobwebs and dust so I got the windex and some cloths so that L could shine it up.

I was a little worried about letting her wipe away on the old panes as they are so fragile but the window made it through it in one piece and she was so pleased with herself :) I actually don't remember the last time that we could even see through the glass!

Who knew that opening up the wall could be so much fun :)

With the wall back up around the door frame all that was left was to cut down the door to make it fit and get some hinges so that we could hang it.

Now I just need get the floor cleaned out nicely, give the whole thing a good bleaching and then I think I'm going to white wash the walls with lime :) The lime helps inhibit the growth of any harmful bacteria and it will brighten the whole place up real nice.

We're back to pouring down rain again though so I'm going to have to wait for a nicer day again so that everything can dry out nicely after I get it good and wet *grin*.

Hugs,
Rosina