‍After co-owning two high-end consignment boutiques, I swore I would never, never, never own my own business again. Ever. But, because of my writing, I’m considered self-employed by the government, and that got my wheels turning a bit. If! If I were to try to grow the writing income that I already bring into the home like a business, what would that look like? How would I do that without losing home or taking up a lot more of my time? How could I take things I already do, tweak them a bit, and make them a better financial help to my family? I’m also looking forward into the years rolling down from middle age. After my husband’s health crisis, I began to think about ways I could bolster our financial situation now and provide for myself if need be, without returning to retail. I asked myself what my dream situation would be, and this was the answer: chickens.

My hens are my little cottage industry. I’m not here to sell their eggs, but to sell them, their stories. I’m eating their eggs. Their eggs are mine. (Actual egg goal is to have enough to share with others. I’m not there yet.) Baba Yaga’s Backyard and Curios is now my place to tell their tales, with a little weirdness on the side. This is where I will combine two great passions in my life—nature and writing. Some days I want to go back in time to the little twelve-year-old girl who hid to read books, loved to study animal behavior, daydreamed stories, and wanted to capture the clouds, the flowers, the birds in art so as to share their beauty with others and tell her that she could do that; she could do all those things, bring all those things that filled her with such joy it was closer to sorrow together. I want to tell her she will learn to write and then write about what she loves.[1]

First off, chickens aren’t my favorite animal. Horses are, followed by crows, rabbits, owls, foxes, and deer. I like woodland animals the best, and I was most certainly a card-carrying horse-girl growing up. Chickens aren’t even on that list, right? See, there are only a small handful of animals that I don’t love and want to pet. (I’m not a fan of most monkeys.) I love animals and want to connect with and understand all of them. Chickens happen to be the animal I currently have. Since I love animals, I’m deeply in love with and fascinated by my chickens. They’ve added so much to our home, and adding to my home is my heart—I’m a HearthKeeper[2].

I’m also the daughter of a woman who went through a strong homesteading phase while I was a kid, which left its mark on my soul. We lived out in the middle of nowhere in the Ozarks for about four years during that stage of my mom’s life. There I found a deep love of nature, country life, and animals – wild, domestic, and livestock. I’m not a homesteader. I live in suburbia in Texas, but I am blessed with a bigger yard than the average homeowner, so I pretend. I pretend that drones don’t fill my sky, that my wildflowers are a field instead of a bed, and that the woods are just around the corner. The last thing you should know about me is that I am a Christian. I’m not here to evangelize, but it will come out in my writing. Creation—from the most magnificent sequoias to the tiniest mushroom—spurs me to praise the Creator. Nature fills my heart with songs of rejoicing at the sheer profundity of life and the cornucopia of color. I don’t worship nature; I worship God as fully revealed in the Light of Scripture. The Light of Nature inspires me to praise.

Baba Yaga became my personal theme and brand because, in my enthusiasm at getting chickens in 2024, I was trying not to become the weird chicken lady who has chicken stuff everywhere. Instead, I went weirder to avoid being weird. Welcome to who I really am. I fell in love with Baba Yaga’s cottage long before the crazy old crone herself. I love the weaving together of creepy and cozy, the not-quite-sure-if-she’s-safe vibe. She’s not the Hansel and Gretel witch that is for sure eating children, we think…but she’s a bit unpredictable. And she lives in a small cottage standing on chicken legs. Crone goals right there.

So here you will find things about my chickens – articles, stories, little vignettes about their antics, and hard lessons about their care. Over on the Curios page, you will find odd, creepy, and cozy things that I’ve stumbled across here and there that you can add to your own cabinet of curiosities, bits and bobs, odds and ends, all thrifted.

Now to meet the girls:

I raise all my chickens by hand from as close to day one as possible. It is important to me that we bond, but I also do it because of the joy it brings me and because it helps me know when things aren’t right. I use Norse names for my chickens. I had planned to use plant names, but I loved the fierce femininity of the Norse names and thought it suited my tiny dinosaurs. Besides, it’s funny to think about my neighbors hearing me yell these names when someone is out where they don’t belong. ‍

The First Four

Sif (top), Astrid (sitting), Sigyn (standing)

Astrid (Production Red) (2024-2026)

She was supposed to be a Red Sex Link, but as per Tractor Supply’s normal policy, she wasn’t. She was twice the size of my Red Sex Links, opinionated about everything, everything, and truly believed the sky was falling when autumn rolled around. She hated windy days and sat in my lap almost every time I read in the backyard. She survived a dog attack, which made her incredibly and adorably clingy, but she began to struggle in early 2026. Despite my best efforts, I had to put her down in June of 2026.

Sif (Red Sex Link) (2024-)

Sif is my least friendly hen. She doesn’t like pets or hugs or any such signs of affection. She seems to think she’s the “rooster” of the flock regardless of the eggs she periodically lays. She’s been top dog since Astrid got sick. Towards the end, Astrid and Sif became inseparable. Sif did have one day where she was needy: the first day she laid. She went from me to the nest box over and over and wouldn’t settle until I walked her over to it. For over a year, she was my most consistent layer. She’s also bossy about bedtime. She screams and screams at the top of her lungs until everyone is in bed. She will greet me on the swing in the morning after treats for a few minutes. Her egg-laying song is so loud. And, yes, bedtime is very important to Sif.

Sigyn (Red Sex Link) (2024-2025)

Freya, who was always notoriously hard to get a picture of.

Don’t tell the others, but Sigyn was my favorite. She was intense, sweet-natured, curious, and smart. I called her Sigyn the Brave, but sometimes she was braver than she was smart. She survived a snake attack, took on a squirrel when she was still a teenager, conned me into letting her out in the yard, and ate a spider bigger than her head once. She was my shoulder chicken; that was her place. She also grabbed my lap if Astrid ever gave it up. Sadly, she broke a soft-shelled egg internally while trying to lay it and got sick. I miss her with all my heart.

Freya (Red Sex Link) (2024-2025)

Freya was my sweet girl. She never vied for the top of the pecking order and had the sweetest little clucks, which did sometimes sound like she was muttering under her breath about everything. She wasn’t a shoulder or lap hen, but she could always be found sitting somewhere close by when I was out. She was the first one of my hens that I lost. Our neighbor’s dog got in the yard and killed her. It was traumatic, and yes, I ugly-cried in the laundry room before burying her in the backyard.

The Autumn Ones

Frigg in the back. Skaði up front. Still teenager-chickens in this picture.

Frigg (unknown) (2024-2025)

Frigg was my broody girl. She wanted babies so badly, and I wanted to give them to her, but the timing just wasn’t right. Her coloring was beautiful, and she had these ridiculous, high-pitched clucks whenever I brought out a treat she hadn’t had before. “What is it!? What is it!? She’s trying to murder us!” So much drama. Unfortunately, she was also attacked by my neighbor’s dog. Her death wasn’t easy on her or me. It was traumatic and long. I learned so much and regret so much about how that all went down.

Skaði (unknown) (2024-)

I call Skaði my Halloween hen. I got her and Frigg right around Halloween. Skaði is orange and black with a full fluffy beard. She was the lowest in the pecking order throughout all of 2025, and I worried about her a lot after Frigg died. After I got my Salt and Pepper Gang and Astrid died, she got a promotion. She’s not handling her new position of power well. I spend half my time yelling at her to stop chasing the babies, who are fully grown. There are plenty of treats and food. As the lowest of the pecking order, she was always zoomy. She could zoom in and out between the others so fast to grab a treat that I swear she got more than everyone else. She seems to think she still has to do this even though she’s almost top dog. She has these lovely green-gray-bog-colored feet and the most beautiful feathers…although Verðandi is going to give her a bit of competition on that front. She’s a pretty consistent 4 eggs a week layer. She doesn’t like to be touched, but she does like to be close by if I’m out…mostly in case I start handing out treats.

The Salt and Pepper Gang

Verðandi (top), Tove (arm), Ingrid (seat). Yes, they love my chairs.

Ingrid (Barred Rock) (2026-)

Don’t tell the others, but Ingrid is my new favorite even if she is a troublemaker. Ingrid is super friendly. She’s my new shoulder chicken, loves to be petted, held, and talked to. She has the sweetest short clucks, which often sound like please, thank you, yes, no. It’s so funny. She is also the one I can’t keep in the chicken yard, and yes, I clipped her wing. I probably have to put her back inside 3-4 times a day. She seems to think this is just the game we play because she hardly ever tries to avoid getting caught. She waits for me to pick her up and clucks to me the whole time we’re making our way back to the yard. She was the first of the Gang to start laying. I highly recommend Barred Rocks. She is one of the calmest and friendliest hens I’ve ever had. She loves to nestle up under my arm and tuck her head in while standing on my hand. It’s a whole thing, and it is adorable.

Tove (White Leghorn) (2026-)

Tove is a spaz. She’s sweet, but a spaz. As a baby, she fell asleep in my hand several times, but she was also the first to escape the brooder and give me a heart attack. I call her my Kentucky Fried Chicken chicken because that’s what she looks like. Thankfully, because she’s my only white hen, she looks very exotic in my yard. She is also an escapee and was the first of my hens, despite her clipped wing, to fly up on the roof of the backyard shed. Yes, the neighbors probably hear me yell her name pretty regularly. She likes being petted and sitting in my lap. Everything startles her, and she’s fast. I probably won’t do a white leghorn again because calm is not her thing.

Verðandi (Rustic Rock) (2026-)

With her creamy-white, gray, and black feathering and red comb, Verðandi is one of my most beautiful hens. She’s an experiment because she’s a dual-purpose hen, not a high-production one. After the struggles I’ve had with Astrid, Sif, and Sigyn with trouble laying and quick burnout, I wanted to see if a breed meant for more than eggs was more consistent in the long run. Maybe not more eggs this week, but longer laying and better health over the years. Verðandi was the first of this round to jump up on my shoulder, but after some tussles when she got out, we’re struggling with a bit of trust. She’s at the top of the pecking order in the Salt and Pepper Gang, generally sweet and calm, plus she’s too heavy to really get out that often.

Norn (Rustic Rock) (2026-2026) (not pictured)

I only had Norn for a few days. My sister’s dog killed her. I have the worst luck with dogs! Thankfully, I saw the dog before she killed any more. I would have liked to have gotten to know this chicken.

Edda…oops…Cogburn, Rooster Cogburn (Barred Rock) (2026-2026)

I desperately want a rooster. Not only because I’ve had issues with the neighbors’ dogs, obviously, but also hawks, snakes, raccoons, and possums. A rooster would help with those. I also want the challenge of raising one to see if we could be friends, and my goodness, they’re just simply beautiful. I love their willingness to go to bat for their hens. As a woman who loves warriors,[3] roosters appeal to me. I got my wish with Cogburn. He was striking, very Tim Burton-looking, and overall, good-natured. He would get cocky, but then he would sit in my lap. Unfortunately, he started crowing at the sun about 430 in the morning, and I started to worry that a neighbor might report him, especially when someone reported our next-door neighbor for their dog barking. I found him a good home, but boy was it hard to leave him there. You could tell he just wanted to come to me, not stay there. Maybe someday I can have a rooster or two. But for now, I’m thankful I found a lady I trust who will take any roosters I accidentally get. Tractor Supply Special for the win.

These are my chickens so far. My plan right now is to continue to add 2-4 each spring, depending on how many I lose each year. Chickens are such a dichotomy. On the one hand, they’re tough, smart, and a no-brainer livestock. Why wouldn’t you have a few of these natural composters on hand? Why doesn’t everyone have a handful of chickens? On the other hand, they’re so easily killed, get sick, are dumb on a dangerous level, and are such frustrating livestock. Why would anyone have a chicken!?

You might also be interested to know that I have a crow murder that protects my yard. Their names are Oxford, Orion, Bodleian, Saxon, and Norse. Norse is the second generation to be taught to come to my yard for food and water. I also have three goldfish in an outside pond: Jove, Venus, and Mars.

I may not be a homesteader on acres of land, but I live as close to nature as possible. Thanks for taking a peek into my weird little world and tagging along with my little flock.

[1] All my writing contains these things, but especially my novel.

[2] I founded, write for, and co-manage HearthKeepers. We have a blog, GroupMe, and podcast.

[3] This should let you know that my books, written with my co-writer Alana, aren’t just for women. We have strong male characters who fight for their homes and generally lots of guns. ‍ ‍

Welcome to Baba Yaga’s Backyard and Curios

The First Four

The Autumn Ones

The Salt and Pepper Gang