As part of my Fine Art Child photography, I write a personal blog to honor and represent my little client. This sweet girl came up from Pecsacola Florida to visit family but also took some time to see me in studio. Here is Layla’s story.
Layla’s Story
Layla lives a double life. As a princess, she loves her dresses, shoes, and tiaras. She loves the dances and the attention that comes with her prominence. She loves her pink glittery bedroom. She lives in a beautiful palace by the sea and attends private princess lessons that teaches her to walk and talk with grace in her everyday life.
But more than all the shiny sparkles and dazzling lights and sweet privileges, Layla loves her chickens.
When princess lessons are complete each day, she quickly darts up to her room, finds a simple play dress, and heads outside. Past the flower beds, past the shrub labyrinth, back where the chicken’s aroma won’t bother anybody important, is the chicken coop.
Layla’s Pet Chickens
Layla’s chickens are special. She incubated them herself from rainbow-colored eggs daddy ordered her, and she mothered henned them till her mother insisted it was time for them to live in their own coop and not the palace.
“But mom,” Layla insisted, “I can’t sleep out in the coop with them! We can make them a special place in my bedroom.” This was the one debate, Layla did not win.
As she arrived at the coop, she called out to her chickens in a gentle tone. They all knew her voice and quickly flocked to her side. Out of Layla’s pockets came left over popcorn and crust from Layla’s sandwich from lunch. She always remembered to save her feathered friends some of her own special meal.
“Here you go,” she said with a soft voice as she made sure each chicken received a fair share. “1, 2, 3…8, 9, 10….where’s 11?” Layla looked around the coop run quickly, then recounted her hens. Some hen was missing.
Her eyes scanned through the flock as she called them by name, “JJ, Dorothy, Fruity, Jackie, Pebbles, Connie, Tuney, Red, Ugenious, Elvis…where’s Nispy???”
Layla is Missing a Chicken!
Nipsy was Layla’s favorite chicken. She laid a pastel green eggs and it reminded her of her favorite bedtime story daddy would read to her “Green Eggs and Ham.” So, each morning for breakfast, Layla would request Nipsy’s green eggs and a slice of fried ham on the side.
“Nipsy, Nipsy,” she called, but there was no answer. Nipsy always came to her side, and allowed Layla to pick her up and snuggle her. She wandered in the coop and searched high and low. The nesting boxes were filled with 9 eggs, blue, brown, pink, white…but no green ones. She collected the eggs in the flounce of her dress, walked the perimeter of the chicken run, peeking in all the small spaces, but couldn’t find her chicken.
Layla could hear mommy calling her. She remembered that she had an important gymnastic performance in celebration of opening the children’s hospital. She would have to hurry up and change and head out to this important event.
Sadly, but not giving up hope, she took her egg harvest back to the palace kitchen. “I’ll look again this evening after dinner,” she said.
Layla’s Day in Interrupted
Though Layla performed her gymnastic routine flawless, her mind kept racing back to her missing chicken. “Where is my chicken?” she asked herself over and over again.
Following dinner, she ran out of the house without changing from her dinner clothes, and back to the chicken coop, still dressed in her white cowgirl boots bedazzled with diamonds.
The sun was low, casting shadows, and Layla knew this meant the chickens would be heading to the coop to roost for the evening. “Nipsy likes the top roost, so that’s where she will be.”
Once again, Layla started counting and naming all her chickens. At number 10, the counting stopped. So, she recounted, tapping their heads as if she was playing Duck, Duck, Goose. Still no Nipsy.
The Search Begins
Quickly, she ran back to the palace, calling for mommy, daddy, and Jaxon, to help her find her missing chicken. The sun sank lower and lower.
With flashlights and servants, everyone helped Layla search, but it quickly ended when a chicken caretaker (chicken tender?) found a breach in the fencing. He admitted to knowing it needed to be fixed, and there was a black feather stuck in the fence. Nipsy may have gotten out of the fence and be somewhere out in the woods beyond the coop.
“Oh Princess Layla,” the chicken tender cried on his knees, “Please forgive my neglect! I have meant to fix this hole for 2 days, but forgot as I performed my daily task. I will do it now, in the dark, and then I will go look for your Nipsy.”
Layla face was expressionless. Her fingers worked the ends of her long hair, as the company of people held their breath waiting for her to respond. They all were aware how much love she showed her chickens, but even more how much she loved Nipsy, the chicken who laid her green eggs for breakfast.
“You are forgiven,” she said with grace in her voice, and tears brimming from her eyes. Daddy then said it was the children’s bedtime, and the search would continue in the morning. He reminded Layla that Nipsy was a smart chicken, and she would find a safe, high branch to roost for the night and come home in the morning.
“I hope you’re right.” Layla said, as she took daddy and mommy’s hand and walked quietly back to the palace.
The Search Continues
Morning came, and Layla was up with the sun. She raced back to the coop in pink fuzzy bunny slippers and in her pjs ready to sweep up her chicken in her arms and hug the feathers off of her. Her chicken tender was already in the run, feeding the chickens, but his head hung low.
“Is she here?” Layla gasped. “Did she come back?”
“Not yet, Princess. But I am going out to look for her soon. Come back after your princess lessons.”
Princess lessons felt like they dragged extra-long that day. When the bell finally rang, Layla wasted no time and was back at the coop. The chicken tender was nowhere to be found. Daddy said he was still looking for Nipsy. Layla joined the search looking through the flower gardens and the labyrinth.
Hours turned into days, days into weeks. Nipsy had not come home.
A Happy Ending
Then one bright morning, when Layla felt like hope was lost, and though daddy promised her another chicken that laid green eggs, she heard the sound of baby chicks peeping outside the breakfast room door.
She jumped from her seat, startling all who were in the room, swung open the door, and there ahead of the chicken parade, was a proud mother Nipsy and 5 little black chicks behind her, followed by the chicken tender. Dropping to her knees and swooping up her favorite hen, Layla cried happy tears as she rubbed her cheeks in Nipsy’s feathers.
Mommy then ordered a special brooder to be placed in Layla’s bedroom for Nipsy and her babies, where she herself can be a chicken tender to her new baby chicks.
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