Be Kind Please Rewind -Part 2, Gross Details Included

Gathering the Eggs

The Chiecken, that came before the egg

Yeah, I know it was like a month ago but I am just gett'n around to the details. So while we were in Idaho, a sweet sister in my parent's ward needed help,

butchering the chickens.

***This will get a little descriptive, not for the chicken lovers or tender hearted***

I was SO excited to get to share this opportunity with my girls. I can't say that I grew up on a farm, we just had a cow or two and some chickens. But I remember when we butchered the chickens. It is something that I never thought that I would get to share with the girls, let alone my sister Hailey who never got to be part of this process at home. So we put on some grubby clothes and went to Gina's. A couple other ward members where there too. They had already started the fun without us but there was plenty to do. Steve and Colton were assigned to catch the chickens, Hailey said she would join them. It was so fun to hear her squeal while she was trying to catch them. You have to be careful when you catch them so that you don't bruise them or break their legs. I didn't realize that Steve had never butchered chicken either. So after you catch them, you have to do the awful, use the ax to chop off their heads. Then you have to let them bleed so that you can dress them. It is true that they will flap around with their heads chopped off. Gina wanted skinless chicken breasts so we didn't have to pluck them-that is even messier. My Pops had to prove that he is still a rancher at heart and got one dressed fast enough to produce a beating heart. When you would cut the breast off the bone, sometimes it would pulse a bit-kinda freaky. Hailey was getting good at catching and chopping heads and I even got to do the honors. Ki and El watched one chicken head fly and thought that was enough. They went inside to play after that. It was great to see Steve work like that, and to hang out with my Pops watching him do something that seemed so natural to him. He was telling us that when he was growing up his family would do about 200 chickens a year. That is what they would eat every Sunday. After all the meat was in the freezer Gina invited the girls to come the next day to gather the other chicken's eggs. They liked that part a little bit more. It was great to hear Hailey a few days later when she said, " I killed chickens, and it was AWESOME!" I am so proud of the city kids (Steve and my youngest siblings) for taking the opportunity to do something that we don't get to do everyday.