They’ve Flown the Coop!

| June 29, 2017

I mentioned in a past post that Sam has been watching the nest full of bird eggs in my neighbor’s potted plant. It has been quite a saga, I’ll tell you that much. Well, first, the eggs obviously hatched. We caught a glimpse of the baby birds.

How cute are those little feathered friends? We watched them almost every day to see how they were doing. Mama and Papa bird weren’t thrilled, but they let us peek.

Well, the saga begins here. We had the cats outside and while I was out front with Penny, I noticed something fuzzy looking on the edge of his porch right by the step. I eventually brought Penny in and went over to look and saw that it was a baby bird! The bird had a lot more feathers (they were growing quickly) and he or she was just sitting there. It didn’t look hurt, but it wasn’t flying away either. I think it tried to fly and couldn’t quite do it, and wasn’t strong enough to fly back to the nest. I got Mark and he put it back into the nest. We did let Sam see how big they had gotten. There were only two birds left in the nest (including the escapee) so I think the other did get big enough to fly away.

The saga continues in that my neighbor was getting a new roof. The potted plant was hanging off of my neighbor’s porch, so….it had to move. We kept hoping the birds would fly away before the roofers came, but they didn’t. We wanted to move the plant, but were afraid that the mom wouldn’t know where it was. My crazy neighbor and I (yes, we are both insane), slowly moved the pot farther and farther away from the house by hanging it on a shepherd’s hook we migrated little by little. Mama and Papa bird always found them.

Every morning and evening Sam and I would check on the babies. Finally, just the other day, they flew away! The nest was empty. So, all’s well that ends well. I did figure out from looking in a bird book that they are house finches and these particular birds tend to like to nest in hanging flower baskets. Go figure. It was super fun watching them while they were there, and I think it is a good lesson for Sam in seeing things in nature, watching the mom bird feed them and hover over them, and seeing how they grew up and flew away. Every year my neighbor hangs those pots, and every year they wither and die because he stops watering them for fear of drowning the birds, so I’m sure we’ll see more babies next year. I hope so!

Kitty Swing

| June 27, 2017

We have had this little kitty swing hanging in our tree for, well, just about forever. I think I bought it when Sam was only a few years old. She just loves it. Every year it has to hang right next to her swing so they can swing together. I recently discovered a piece chipped off the back and I am a little afraid it may start to fall apart. I promised Sam I would try to fix it, but she wanted to make sure we had photos of it just in case it doesn’t work out. So…here’s kitty!

Chippy!

| June 25, 2017

Sam is pretty obsessed with the multitude of chipmunks we have in our yard. I mean, they are adorable. Today she had a few sugar donuts and one didn’t get eaten. I thought it might be sort of stale after sitting out, so I told her to put it outside and some squirrel or some other animal would likely eat it. She decided to put it at the base of one of our downspouts where the chipmunks always seem to be hanging out. They like to nap in there, and who knows what else. About a minute after Sam put the donut there, Chippy (as she likes to call them) came right out and started licking and eating it! It was so cute. She just about exploded with glee. She does love our little animal friends.

The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far

| June 24, 2017

And my little apple unfortunately falls from a very snarky tree. It really is hard to remember sometimes that little ears do hear everything. I think we are always careful of the obvious things like cursing, adult topics, etc., but sometimes it is hard to remember to watch language that isn’t exactly inappropriate, but is well…not something you want mimicked.

Our neighbors that we share the driveway with were getting a new roof, and the huge dumpster had been delivered and sat for about a week before they started working. Every day I’d come home from work and there it would sit, empty. We were getting frustrated to say the least. The entire time it was there we couldn’t use our driveway. Well, I guess I snarked about it too much because one day recently we came home from my mom’s and as we were walking up the driveway, Sam commented in a very Me-like way that oh, look, the roof people didn’t come and then she asked me if the water delivery people were supposed to deliver that day. I told her yes, and she then told me, in again, a very Me-like way, that they didn’t come and then she yelled, “Isn’t anybody doing their job today?” It actually was pretty funny, but I tried not to laugh. The other day she commented on trash day, “Oh, look, the empty trash cans are actually standing up, that’s a shock.” Well, ok. I do complain — a lot — about how our trash men just throw the empty cans back on the curb where they then roll off into the driveway or street.

I guess I need to start watching what I say around the house. And the car. Have I mentioned my road rage and annoying drivers? Yikes.

Broccoli

| June 24, 2017

Sam’s broccoli from our garden was finally ready! She loved it. She doesn’t eat many vegetables, but at least she eats good ones!