The Royal Watchers

When my husband and I started thinking about building a new chicken coop, we visited our friends who were in the middle of having a new coop and run built. When we saw it, my husband said, "That's the Taj Mahal of chicken coops!" And he was pretty accurate... what they were having built was nothing like I had ever seen - a huge and beautifully artistic structure just for their chickens.

So then we had to come up with a name and "Pluckingham Palace" came almost instantly as we thought about famous grand homes and our dear little Plucky. Since then, our tongue-in-cheek royals theme has been embraced by our neighbors and friends. Just as Buckingham Palace and its residents have inspired "Royal Watchers" around the world, our chicken princesses have inspired their own fans.

At our chicken coop "house warming" two of our neighbors presented us with an egg collecting bag custom designed with four chickens wearing tiaras! We've also been gifted with cookies shaped like chickens, a book about the building of Pluckingham and just last week a new sign, "Pluckingham Lane."  Our neighbor, Joanne, is the main instigator of this fun which keeps us giggling. Joanne is one of my favorite people on Earth - she is a role model in every way, is just amazingly capable with an ax (for firewood, not chickens!) and a gardener extraordinaire - her veggie garden in full production should be in Sunset magazine.

I know she conspires with her brother, John, who lives clear across the country. The two siblings feed off each other in terms of silly Pluckingham ideas and I love it! I think there might even be a song in the making... 

"High on the mountain and tell me what do you see
Hen tracks, hen tracks looking back at me."

I'm blessed to have wonderful neighbors, like Joanne who sees the good in people and the fun in Pluckingham, and shares the joy she finds in daily life.