My kids put this in my kitchen. I nearly died three deaths. You won’t believe it.

I suppose the love affair started a couple of months ago when my boys lost a favorite hen to a predator and adopted her only remaining coop-mate instead. On any given day, you’ll find a boy with this black and white hen. Over the weeks, the boys and hen got closer to the house — Frederick on two of our decks and Alastair in the video below at the foot of our kitchen porch.

My favorite part of all of this is that Frederick appears in nearly every picture and video in his pajamas. Alastair wears both his pants and pull-over backwards in the video below. Apparently their mother needs to be more attentive in dressing them…

One day I heard strange scratching noises coming from a family room. I should have known this would happen and yet I had not considered it…

A week later the boys were concerned about Picker Pecker’s exposure to the rain and sought a solution. Apparently they spent quite a bit of time on different solutions to the problem. This is the one I walked in on.

After the “chicken dress” incident, I should have really seen it coming but I didn’t. I heard a familiar noise, “Cluck, cluck, squawwwwk” and followed it. Realizing something extremely unusual was happening, I pulled out my iPhone for a video. I followed the noise to my kitchen.

(I should keep the kitchen cleaner for these potential video moments and yet I don’t.)

Yes, that’s my kitchen in the video below.

I did allow Frederick the final episode below after a promise of no “chicken in the kitchen” re-runs.