1. Obtain 18 fertilized heritage turkey eggs from a friend who raises turkeys
2. Put all the eggs in the incubator without looking up the differences between incubating chicken eggs and turkey eggs
3. Kill all but one of the turkey eggs
4. Cry to your husband
5. Drive 2 hours away to the nearest hatchery
6. Spend $6 a piece on 5 heritage turkey poults
7. Spend the next seven months chasing off hawks, owls, possums, and raccoons
8. Eat two of the toms for Thanksgiving and Christmas
9. Make the remaining two toms and two hens comfortable for the next four months
10. Try not to stare as they get busy
11. Start gathering fertilized turkey eggs once you realize they aren't big speckled chicken eggs
12. Lovingly put your turkey's eggs in the incubator with more turkey-appropriate humidity and heat levels than last year
13. Cry when you still kill off about half of them
14. Rejoice when you start hatching out more than you kill
15. Keep all thirty-some-odd babies you hatch because you don't trust them not to die
16. Lose five of them to the cold
17. Lose three of them to hawks
18. Lose one of them to an owl
19. Spend the next eight months sleeping with one ear open and a powerful flashlight next to your head so you can jump up and run outside the second you hear your turkeys are in distress
20. Spend the same eight months buying $30 of poultry food a week because now you have twenty-six turkeys
21. Tell everyone that comes to your house and remarks with alarm that a giant flock of turkeys is running up to meet them that your turkeys are harmless and will taste delicious
22. Eat your biggest and best toms from this year for Thanksgiving and Christmas
23. Try to forget they were your babies and had names
24. Realize there's no need to keep the rest of them alive and that you can't keep spending $30 a week on food
25. Recruit your sister-in-law to dismantle turkeys with you
26. Recruit your husband and father-in-law to chop heads for you
27. Wrangle the doomed turkeys you raised from eggs into the dog kennel to await their fate
28. Stand on the other side of the barn while they are beheaded
29. Remove their skin and feathers
30. Slice off their quality pasture-raised, hormone-free, heritage turkey breast and thigh meat
31. Get out your grandma's meat grinder
32. Grind one pound of meat by hand
33. Decide that's too much work
34. Borrow your mother-in-law's electric meat grinder
35. Assemble it backwards
36. Cry to your husband when your dreams of home-made turkey sausage are vaporizing before your eyes
37. Watch as he fixes it
38. Have him chop up all thirty pounds of meat into grinder-managable pieces
39. Shove it into the now-working grinder
40. Take a moment to savor the fact that your dreams are becoming reality
41. Mix in sausage seasoning
42. Spoon the home-made sausage into freezer bags one pound at a time
43. Stick thirty pounds of home-made sausage into your freezer
44. Brag about it on facebook
45. Feed most of it to the dog when your freezer dies two months later
46. Pray for better luck next year!
2. Put all the eggs in the incubator without looking up the differences between incubating chicken eggs and turkey eggs
3. Kill all but one of the turkey eggs
4. Cry to your husband
5. Drive 2 hours away to the nearest hatchery
6. Spend $6 a piece on 5 heritage turkey poults
7. Spend the next seven months chasing off hawks, owls, possums, and raccoons
8. Eat two of the toms for Thanksgiving and Christmas
9. Make the remaining two toms and two hens comfortable for the next four months
10. Try not to stare as they get busy
11. Start gathering fertilized turkey eggs once you realize they aren't big speckled chicken eggs
12. Lovingly put your turkey's eggs in the incubator with more turkey-appropriate humidity and heat levels than last year
13. Cry when you still kill off about half of them
14. Rejoice when you start hatching out more than you kill
15. Keep all thirty-some-odd babies you hatch because you don't trust them not to die
16. Lose five of them to the cold
17. Lose three of them to hawks
18. Lose one of them to an owl
19. Spend the next eight months sleeping with one ear open and a powerful flashlight next to your head so you can jump up and run outside the second you hear your turkeys are in distress
20. Spend the same eight months buying $30 of poultry food a week because now you have twenty-six turkeys
21. Tell everyone that comes to your house and remarks with alarm that a giant flock of turkeys is running up to meet them that your turkeys are harmless and will taste delicious
22. Eat your biggest and best toms from this year for Thanksgiving and Christmas
23. Try to forget they were your babies and had names
24. Realize there's no need to keep the rest of them alive and that you can't keep spending $30 a week on food
25. Recruit your sister-in-law to dismantle turkeys with you
26. Recruit your husband and father-in-law to chop heads for you
27. Wrangle the doomed turkeys you raised from eggs into the dog kennel to await their fate
28. Stand on the other side of the barn while they are beheaded
29. Remove their skin and feathers
30. Slice off their quality pasture-raised, hormone-free, heritage turkey breast and thigh meat
31. Get out your grandma's meat grinder
32. Grind one pound of meat by hand
33. Decide that's too much work
34. Borrow your mother-in-law's electric meat grinder
35. Assemble it backwards
36. Cry to your husband when your dreams of home-made turkey sausage are vaporizing before your eyes
37. Watch as he fixes it
38. Have him chop up all thirty pounds of meat into grinder-managable pieces
39. Shove it into the now-working grinder
40. Take a moment to savor the fact that your dreams are becoming reality
41. Mix in sausage seasoning
42. Spoon the home-made sausage into freezer bags one pound at a time
43. Stick thirty pounds of home-made sausage into your freezer
44. Brag about it on facebook
45. Feed most of it to the dog when your freezer dies two months later
46. Pray for better luck next year!
