Are You Ready to Hatch an Unusual Chicken?
Page 15
X Yes, I accept responsibility, and agree to the above conditions.
No, please remove this new breed from my care.
Please return one signed copy to the Unusual Poultry Committee for our records, keeping one copy for your own records.
Signed:
Date: Thursday, October 2
To: Hortensia James
From: Sophie Brown
Subject: Thank you
Dear Hort,
I know you had to do what you thought was right. But I appreciate you speaking your truths to the inspector too, and sticking up for me and my chick. I guess you did your own observations instead of making assumptions about a kid who didn’t have a certificate or anything.
Thank you for believing in me.
Your friend,
Soph
PS Maybe you already heard that I’m going to be a real apprentice now. I might have questions for you too, so can I keep emailing you?
PPS Here’s a picture of my chicks in their new coop at Redwood Farm. Sorry it’s a little blurry. They move fast.
Date: Thursday, October 2
To: Sophie Brown
From: Hortensia James
Subject: RE: Thank you
Dear Sophie,
You can always email me. I’d like to stay in touch, even when you don’t have questions.
Your friend,
Hort
Saturday, October 4
Mariposa García González
Heaven
Querida Abuelita,
Today we had the best apple-picking party ever. I wish you could have been there too. You would have loved it.
Xochi and her family came, and Jake and Ms. O’Malley, and Chris and his mom, and Sam and her parents, and Gregory and his friend George, and Al, and Jane and Violet, and Joy, and you know what? I invited Ms. Griegson, and she came too. After all, there were a LOT of apples to pick.
After we picked every single apple from every single tree, we had a picnic. We had seven kinds of crisp!! Apple crisp that Chris and his mom made, blackberry crisp that Sam and her dad made, plum crisp that Dad made all by himself, apple-blackberry crisp that Lupe and Mom made (they wanted to try making some too), and plum-apple crisp, blackberry-plum crisp, and apple-blackberry-plum crisp that Dad and I made. (Apple-blackberry-plum was my favorite!) We also had a tomato salad from Joy’s garden, zucchini spread from Jane and Violet’s garden, breadsticks from Jake’s dad, Ms. O’Malley’s special applesauce, long skinny cookies called Pocky that Al brought, pickled carrots that Ms. Griegson brought, Gregory’s favorite potato salad, and esquites from Xochi’s family. (As soon as Gregory took one bite of that corn, he said he had to have the recipe, so Dad translated for him and Xochi’s abuela.)
We had to make two trips, even with our car and Lupe’s, because you can’t tip a crisp on its side or stack it on top of another crisp, and we had all of Lupe’s stuff too, because she moved to Redwood Farm today. I’m going to miss her a lot, but I’ll still see her every day, and I’m glad she’ll be there for the chicks. I know she can handle it. I don’t know if Mom and Dad will ever really believe that she didn’t do anything wrong, but after she signed up with my school for all her volunteer hours, and got written up in the paper for becoming our club leader, and got an A on her college paper about our building-stuff club, and after Tía Gabriela called Mom and Tía Catalina and threatened to tell me and Lupe and Javier about all the mistakes they made when they were teenagers, Mom and Dad and Tía Catalina and Tío Fernando decided Lupe could try living at Redwood Farm. I taught her how to give the chicks food and water without letting them out of the coop, just in case, but I’ll still check on them every day.
We had all kinds of things to celebrate—more good things than I ever could imagine!
Ella won a red ribbon in the llama show (and didn’t spit on anyone this time).
Chris gets to go spend the weekend with his dad and see a soccer game in the city.
Chris’s mom gets a quiet weekend in her garden.
We’re crossing our fingers for Jake, who is trying to buy a piece of land from another farmer, so he can maybe start his own poultry farm.
Gregory got a promotion—he’s the head of our post office now! But he says he’ll still bring our mail.
Ms. O’Malley got a grant for twenty new books at the library. She says at least one will definitely be about chickens.
Joy got an award for one of her photographs. They’re going to print it in the big-city paper so everyone can see teenagers reading at the library.
Al learned how to do the Funky Chicken and the Macarena, and she tried to teach us how to moonwalk. I need more practice.
The feedstore is doing well, and so is Jane and Violet’s farm—maybe even so well that Violet can look for a job closer to home soon.
Ms. Griegson is getting a special new kind of chick (but not an unusual kind): Swedish Flower hens. She seems excited.
Lupe got her A, and gets to try living on her own.
Dad sold our grapes and made some money.
Mom got the lead article in a major magazine, and you know what? It’s about the chicken coop we built for Sam’s granddad!
And Xochi’s parents decided she can have chickens! You know what else was neat? Chris and Sam were almost as excited for her as I was. We’re going to help her build her coop next.
As for me, I’m going to be an unusual poultry apprentice, and learn how to take care of enough unusual chickens to fill every coop at Redwood Farm.
Maybe everything does work out sometimes, when you try your best.
Te quiero,
Soficita
Date: Monday, October 6
To: Sophie Brown
From: Betty Johnson
Subject: Egg update
Dear Sophie,
My chickens have finished hatching the zoo’s ibises and are beginning to lay again. I’ll collect eggs to send to you later this month.
Here’s what you’ll need:
1 ostrich- or emu-size egg incubator
1 extra-large heat lamp
1 extra-large chick brooder
Poultry feeder
Poultry waterer
Large quantity of chick food
Large quantity of chicken grit
A chicken coop separate from your other chickens
I’ll let you know when they’re in the mail.
Sincerely,
Betty
I can’t imagine writing this book without:
My family, with feathers and without, whose support, encouragement, excited squawking, and occasional reality checks have taken me farther than any of us could have imagined.
The writers and readers and friends who keep me going, especially Caroline Stevermer, Brenna Shanks, Mike Denton, Marin Younker, Edith Hope Bishop, Jen Adam, Kim Baker, Melissa Koosman, Liz Wong, Aarene Storms, Alene Moroni, Alison Weatherby, Lish McBride, Dana Sullivan, Courtney Gould, and the wild and wonderful writers and illustrators of SCBWI Western Washington.
The awesome team at Penguin Random House who made it all happen, especially Jenny Brown, Marisa DiNovis, Trish Parcell, Isabel Warren-Lynch, Josh Redlich, Artie Bennett, Lisa Leventer, Deanna Meyerhoff, Adrienne Waintraub, Lisa Nadel, and Kristin Schulz.
Taryn Fagerness, who introduced Sophie to the rest of the world.
Claudia Guadalupe Martínez, Kim Baker, Miriam Rosario, and Jen Adam, who took time from their own amazing books and work to patiently help me get things right.
Molly Baker, who helped Sophie sign her certificates.
Katie Kath,
who drew Sophie’s world, and who let us see the funniest parts of her life, and the hardest, too.
Mandy Hubbard, who answered every single question I’ve had on this strange and wonderful journey, and who believed in Sophie before anyone else knew her story.
Nancy Siscoe, who always listened to Sophie, who kept the heart of this book safe every time I lost my way, and whose answer to every question was “More chickens!”
And all the students, teachers, librarians, booksellers, chicken people, and readers who loved Sophie’s first adventure, who understand that sometimes funny things and sad things and magic and science are all mixed up together, and who asked what happened next. You’re the reason I wrote this book.
PS I hope you like it.
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