Anne is 13!

 

Our first teenager! (A terribly belated birthday post!)

 

Back in early November, Anne turned 13. Anne has such a fun personality. She is very confident in who she is and has a firm belief that she is quite hilarious. She is a lover of puns and her box full of puns was one of the most loved gifts she received for Christmas. Anne is also very good at voices and impersonations. The girls favorite voice she does is Harlow Doyle from Adventures in Odyssey, and my personal favorite is Mr. Bean.

 

Anne has a very nice singing voice (certainly not inherited from her parents), and has a flair for the dramatics. She has high hopes for being in some school plays in future years.

 

Anne has taken on incredible responsibility with the amount of chickens we have. She raised and helped butcher ducks in the spring. We now have a total of 25 hens and 1 rooster. Anne does the bulk of the work for them. She has researched when some of our chicks were ill and not only figured out what was wrong with them, but found the medicine to make them well, administered the proper dosage and they all recovered. When we had a disappointing loss of some of our chicks due to a hawk, Anne did the research to figure out ways to deter them. When our scarecrows and other efforts still failed we added a rooster to the flock at Anne's suggestion. He's been the perfect addition and we have only lost one chick since then and it was her first day out in the pasture. 

 

Anne doctoring an injured chicken

Anne has been saving up money from the eggs she has been selling to purchase an incubator. She wants to add some rare breeds to our flock and sell chicks in the spring. With a boost from her Christmas money she had enough and was thrilled when the incubator came in the mail. Some of the breeds Anne is hoping to hatch are Lavender Orpingtons, Buff Brahmas, Welsummers, and Cream Legbars. She has spent a lot of time on hatchery websites finding where to purchase fertilized eggs. She plans to also hatch some of our own eggs that our rooster fertilizes.

Trent and Anne have planned to start raising Coturnix Quail for meat. They will hatch them out in Anne's incubator and then raise them continuously throughout the year. She has really enjoyed our hobby “farm” life, especially this year during shutdowns.

Anne is a great big sister to all the girls, but especially to Heidi. Heidi will cry if Anne walks past her without acknowledging or picking her up. One of the few words Heidi says consistently is “NaNa”, for Anne.

While we haven't decided what we will do for school in the fall, Anne is hopeful to go to a brick and mortar school for the first time. There is a lot to consider, especially with the changes that schools are facing currently and what the education system will look like in the coming year. Anne is a very talented and smart girl.

Anne has been happy to be part of our church youth group this year. It's always nice to get a chance to be away from little sisters for awhile and make some friends. We're so excited to watch Anne grow into a young woman. She continues to have her goal set at becoming a nurse when she grows up. It's been really neat for her to hear her cousin, Zoey, speak of her experience as a nurse in the labor and delivery department. My personal hope is that she'll continue to seek the Lord for all her days and that she'll follow in whatever direction He leads her. Anne is a bright spot in all our lives, and we hope she'll shine the light of the Lord into the ever-darkening world.