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Meet the newest members of our farmily! (Sorry. I had to say it.) You are not supposed to name food animals. But we couldn't help it, so at least we gave them both the same name: Nom, and Nom.

As in: nomnomnomnomNOM! That is what they do all day. They are amazing digging machines. I had no idea. Fortunately we are just starting a new journey in landscaping, so having portable self-powered tillers is great. They are digging up all the crappy dirt in our yard and aerating and enriching it so that next year it will be super-nutritious for all the plants.

They are very rambunctious little ladies and spend a fair amount of time galloping around the yard. The ducks are, frankly, not amused, but the chickens love all the new dirt being dug up.

They're also VERY curious about everything and run over to see us when we come out of the house, and try to nibble on our boots and the hose, and, well, everything.

How many babies can fit on top of The Mothership? I saw at least seven while I was taking these pictures.

It's time for baby chicks!  This year we had a broody chicken starting in mid-April.  A broody chicken is one who refuses to come outside and scratch and eat and drink and do all those things that chickens should do; instead she sits inside on a nest full of eggs and waits for them to hatch.

Never you mind that all her eggs were infertile (we don't have any roosters), or that Spruce Goose regularly kicked her off the nest to lay GIANT goose eggs in it.  She was determined.  So when it was time for us to get chicks, we decided that instead of raising them ourselves, we'd give them to the broody one.  We called her Broody McBrooderson.

She is the best mom ever.  When the chicks came, I went into the bird house and, while Aaron distracted Broody, I snuck out an egg and put two chicks in its place.  And then I did it again, until there were 21 (you read that right, TWENTY ONE) tiny babies underneath her.  They all fell asleep immediately.  We lifted up a wing to check that they weren't being smothered or anything, and they were all lined up like tiny fuzzy sardines. The next day we added 12 more (they came late), so she's got 33 little ones to take care of.

Notice the tiny foot sticking out under her wing. Now we call her The Mothership. She moves around like a tank and all the little babies follow her and sometimes they hop onto her head and when they get chilly they all disappear under her belly and she lies on top of them.

This chick is clearly giving me the stinkeye. She's a Buff Orpington (just like mom!). This year we also got 3 turkeys, some Barred Rocks, and some Araucanas, who have cheeks like chipmunks and apparently lay blue and green eggs.

It has been busy around here! So busy I have been neglecting the blog! But we have not been neglecting the snow. I'll give you a rundown:

First we hiked up middle Sugarloaf. From the top, you can see the front of Mount Washington. On the way down, I lost my (brand new!) gloves, which is sad. But I lost them because they were in my pocket because it was so warm outside that I didn't need to wear them. So that was happy.

The top of middle Sugarloaf is flat and broad, which is nice because it is also a granite cliff which might otherwise be a dangerous place to be in the snow. While we were up there the sun had warmed the snow so that it took perfect impressions of anything pressed into it. It did not take long before that led to sillyness. This is what it looks like when you do a forward-roll (AKA somersault) in the snow.

Later we hiked down near the Dartmouth Skiway, which is crazy cute. We didn't realize that our trail took us directly to the top of one of the ski hills until we reached the top and found hordes of little kids in tiny skis pouring off the lift just to the left of our trail.

This week we went up the Starr King trail. It was a pretty walk, and when we got to the top we could see the other side of Mt Washington! Technically this is a picture of some of the other Presidentials (Jefferson, the 5 Adams, Madison), but Washington is just behind that tree on the right. It kept coming in and out of cloud the whole time we were on the peak.

At the top of Mount Starr King, miles from any sort of road, we found the remains of a cabin. Someone had thoughtfully left a duraflame log in the hearth, which made us feel oh-so-welcome!

We've been back from Panama for two weeks, but do you know what happens when you take time off? Apparently the work just piles up waiting for you to return. What is up with that, work? I thought you'd finish yourself while I was gone.

The weather was about 95F warmer there than it is here, and we spent much of our time hanging out on the beach. Around sunset each night, there was a specific tree (el arbol de los monos, we called it) where a herd (group? family? pack?) of white-faced capuchin monkeys would gather and hop around and make little squeaky noises and generally be adorable. There were also howler monkeys in the forest (hoo hoo hoooooo hoo) but we only heard them and never saw even one. And there were hermit crabs, oh so many hermit crabs.

We went to this great animal rehab center in Boquete called Paradise Gardens. They take in orphaned, injured, or otherwise sad little animals and nurse them back to health, then set them free again. They also are part of a world-wide bird breeding program (for nifty rain forest birds like macaws and toucans) to help endandered species with low numbers.

One thing that was totally awesome was that many of these animals are very social and because the whole point was to help them get healthy and happy again, interaction was encouraged! So the monkeys run over when you come near them and they untie your shoes and reach in your pockets and are totally great and awesome. There were also super-tiny Geoffrey's Tamarins, which are about the size of an orange. They zip around and will only stop if you have fruit for them, or if you pet their bellies. Otherwise they have no need for you.

We even got to pet a Margay, which is a big cat like an Ocelot, but they have extra-special ankle joints that allow them to climb down trees face-first! She purred and rolled over and kneaded just like a giant housecat. A giant killer housecat. (The Margay had a sad story which was that a farmer caught the kitten and thought it was cute until it got to be a giant cat. Then instead of just setting it free, they locked it in a tiny cage in the dark back of a chicken coop! So when she was brought to the center she couldn't even walk. Now she runs around and catches fish and any unfortunate birds who wander into her cage, and loves to say hi to the visitors.)

The best animal was the baby sloth. Her name was Temba. She wanted to be held, all the time, and she is soft and wooly like a lamb. If you tried to put her down, she would made the saddest little keen, like "ehn ehn ehhhhn" and then she'd crawl up the side of her cage and out the door and back into your arms. Oh man. Baby sloths can be fast if they are moving towards snuggles. Once she got settled on her little blankie then she just sat there and smiled. You may notice a very strong resemblance to a Muppet.

Sloth trivia: they only go to the bathroom once a week. In the wild, they climb down from their trees, do their business (and bury it so predators don't find them), then climb up another tree to spend the next week in. Temba's bathroom day is Sunday.