Our birds...

We very much enjoy our little shrub tree filled with bird feeders just outside our breakfast room. Thomas feeds the birds with the birdseed---a big bucket purchased every January from the Wild Bird Habitat store. And then they come: finches, woodpeckers, cardinals, robins in the spring and summer, sparrows, bluejays. We have bird books by the backdoor and a pair of binoculars so that the kids can keep track of the birds they see. Large honking geese fly low during the fall and winter seasons, and soon green and brown ducks will inhabit the pond out front, usually trailed by four, five, or six baby ducklings. And the swooping owls and hawks (and sometimes even eagles!), talons spread, make for grand bird-watching too. In the summer, if we're not careful, the swallows will take over our front and back patios with their nests and multiple rounds of baby chicks: so messy and territorial. Last summer, with all of our own baby drama, we never got around to cleaning up the swallows' nests. We had baby birds everywhere, which was quite apropos for our lives at that time. And late- to mid-summer, we will again hear the distinct sound of the meadowlark as she sits atop our backyard tree or on our roof singing her sweet song. We love our birds!