Friday, December 26, 2008

Christmas 2008

Christmas Eve was at our house. It was unusually warm and the roads were fine. In spite of all our weather worries, the conditions couldn't have been better. I love my family but my favorite part is watching my grandkids.

Christmas Day was another story. The power was out when I woke up, and as I have mentioned before, no power, no well pump, no flushee flushee. We missed our traditional Christmas Day dinner but son Josh graciously offered to eat my crab legs for me. We also missed three plus hours on the road in snowy conditions.
Ian dug out the garage and around the house. He also dug paths to the bird feeders. A lot of song birds winter over here. We feed them because we enjoy watching them. Color me selfish.
I took this from our bedroom window this morning. So many different kinds of birds, but my favorite of all are the quail. I love their call and silly little plumes. They run up and down the bank but because their little legs are buried in the snow, it looks as if they are skiing.
I was folding laundry on the bed this afternoon.- yes, on the day after Christmas. The tyranny of laundry knows no holidays. Suddenly I realized that there weren't any birds and went to the window to check it out. Nope,there weren't any birds and here's why. An American Kestral, also known as Sparrow Hawk, was sitting expectantly on top of a bird feeder. Sorry chump. My song birds are smarter than you are. Note the quail tracks on the bank. Run away, little quail. Run away.

4 comments:

Leigh said...

Wow Sharon, what a way to spend Christmas. We decided a long time ago that if we ever get to finally move back to the country. we'll try to get some sort of hand pump for emergencies. We learned that a 55 gal barrel of water can only lasts a couple of days when the power is out.

Pretty neat about Kestrel. From a birders perspective, not from a song birds perspective!

~~Sittin.n.Spinnin said...

Hey! He's gotta eat too! lol
Sounds like a wonderful Christmas!

Valerie said...

Lovely post....what a population of grandkids and birds!

We too have well and septic and when the power is out it is miserable. Well if you were doing laundry the day after, it wasn't out toooooo long.

Now my laundry calls.

vlb5757 said...

How funny that all the birdies fled when the hawk showed up. I love all the bird feeders. We have little dogs and the baby birds that spring brings stand not a chance in our yard. I can't bear the thought of feeding the local city birds only to have my dogs use them for sharpening their hunting skills. Doxies love the chase and sadly, the kill. So, no more feeders for us. If we ever get out of the city we will have feeders away from the killer doxies reach. I do love the birds. Though I am not a weaver I have come to appreciate those who do and what they create. I found your site via Leigh. I have been reading her blog and admiring her creations and the skill that goes into them for a while. Love your blog!