The Value of a Dozen Eggs

The Value of a Dozen Eggs

Eggs are something we eat every single day.  Either I cook eggs for breakfast or I use eggs in something I am baking.  When we lived in a big town in Colorado we bought 2 packs of 18 eggs probably every two weeks.  This is how many eggs we processed through while living in our apartment with two small children.  This also became one of the more expensive items to purchase in our grocery budget as egg prices fluctuated when different diseases would effect grocery store suppliers.

The price of eggs increasingly became one of the biggest reasons we wanted to have backyard chickens.  Jason and I wanted the ability to produce our own eggs, and have them be as nutritious as possible, since they were such a large part of our every day diet.

Fast forward to today.  Today grocery stores continue to be emptied daily by people continuing to stock pile due to the rising concern of when life will return to a sense of normalcy.  Guess what is one of the hardest things to buy in the grocery store today –  EGGS.  Something most of us probably only fathomed while studying the Great Depression in High School.  Yet, here we are All across America.

I am not writing this article to brag to my readers for how we prepared. I am actually writing this post to share how not only do we have a reliable source of eggs for our family, but how we have been able to provide eggs to people in our community.

We have 22 chickens and currently we have 11 eggs being laid in our chicken coop on average, every day.

This amount of eggs can add up to a lot of eggs if you don’t process through them.  The eggs can last 2 to three weeks on your counter as long as you do not wash a protective bacterial layer on the outside of the egg.  If you do wash the fresh farm egg then the egg must be refrigerated and is good for up to 2 to three weeks in your fridge.

We had a neighbor who (the week before life changed drastically for all of us due to the virus) saw us working in our garden outside and asked if we needed anything tilled.  We said yes!  And to say thank you and for a trade of goods, we gave him a dozen fresh eggs.

Last week, before our Safer at Home order, I had about 2 dozen extra eggs and  I decided to call up a good friend of ours who does so many wonderful things for our school.  I  asked her if her family could use some eggs.  She said yes! The stores are empty and can’t get any.  She dropped by after work and I gave her 2 dozen eggs for her and her close family who live near her that quarantine with her.

This past week we finally met one of our neighbors, talking over 6 feet away and with a fence between us, who are also backyard chicken people.  Their chickens are 5 months old and haven’t started laying yet but mentioned that they got a duck in their batch of chicks from a hatchery order.  They did not want the duck, which just so happens to be a crested duck, and asked if we wanted it (look at my pictures to see what a crested duck is).  We said yes! I always wanted one of these ducks so it really worked out.  Fiona loves them too!  So they gave us the duck and we handed over a dozen eggs for a trade.

Eggs are a huge deal.  As we all know, a huge part of most of our diets.  But also, to be able to supply your own eggs, allows the ability to trade and barter for simple things in your community.  It also allows you to help others in your community at very little cost to you.  

We live in the country, we are definitely part of a rural community.  I am grateful to have made choices that allow us to give back to our rural community that is so selfless and willing to help us at a moment’s notice.

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