like most families with little kids, we have an overabundance of plastic toys slowly taking over our little slice of suburbia. so for my son Landon’s 5th birthday present, i decided to surprise him with the chick hatching program from rent a coop. it was such an amazing experience for our family, i just had to blog about it!
being a busy working mama of two little boys, i was definitely not looking for a high maintenance activity. we received the tiny, fully automated incubator with seven fertilized eggs just in time for Landon’s birthday party, along with two one-week-old chicks in a fully equipped brooder. i thought we’d have to at least turn the eggs ourselves a couple times a day, but the high tech incubator does it ALL and even turns the eggs for you! every day for the next two weeks we’d take out an egg and bring it into a dark room with a special light rent a coop gave us to see the development of the chick INSIDE of the egg. it is fascinating! this was the kids’ absolute favorite time of the day during those two weeks.
the digital display on the top of the incubator tells you how many days are left until the chicks hatch, so our anticipation grew as the due date approached. the day of the hatching was a HUGE event in our house. the kids were glued to the clear top incubator watching as the exhausted little hatchlings pecked their way out. i admit that it was as intriguing for the adults as it was for the boys! after the chicks hatched, we played with them, watched them grow and took care of them for a week until rent a coop took them back. the boys learned so much from this little project and the best part is that there was no permanent commitment to raising chickens. i think we might do it again next year to satisfy the little farmer inclinations of my family. 🙂
