A taste of spring

I saw a post on facebook this morning that read "I swear 90% of the posts between August and April are complaints about the weather". Hyperbole aside, the trend is a real one, especially if the majority of your friends live in the colder parts of the country.

The majority of posts this weekend, though, were largely positive and hopeful. It's amazing what a little sunshine will do for one's sense of optimism, and the weekend was a beautiful one. We had a well attended and successful book sale at the library, my brother and his bride-to-be visited, there was a birthday to celebrate, we had a delicious brunch with friends, and I ran my first race of the year (in a sparkly shamrock skirt to boot).

I realized this afternoon, as I was thinking of all the delightfulness that was visited upon our weekend, that I don't often post weekend or weekly roundups anymore since I just rely on our weekly 365 post to catch things up. But this weekend, and this weather, was just screaming for acknowledgement, so there it is.

Today the warmth and sunshine continued, and the weather channel, if we are to believe it, promises more of the same for the foreseeable future. Calvin and I took advantage of it, cameras in hands, by taking our first walk along our neighborhood "bird path" (our naming) since some time last fall. It's a little early yet for real migrators, but some of our old favorites, like the bluebirds and robins, are just beginning to emerge from their winter clusters and spread throughout their spring territory, and we heard the calls of several birds we weren't sharp enough to spot, or fast enough to capture on camera. It's just about that time of year again.

by Calvin

House Finches, by Calvin

House Finch, by Calvin

European Starling, by Calvin

Eastern Bluebird, by Calvin

Black-capped Chickadee, by Cortney

Black-capped Chickadee, by Cortney

Black-capped Chickadee, by Cortney

House Finch, by Cortney

Tuppence a bag...

We don't do a lot of birding in the winter. Although it's a good time to spy birds in the bare trees or bribe them closer with seeds while other food sources are limited, I don't last long in the cold, and we've had some pretty cold winter days as of late. Mostly we're waiting for the spring migration before we get out with our bird lists, field guides, and cameras, but some of our homeschooling friends invited us to join them at Kensington Park when it was relatively warm yesterday. Kensington is a top birding spot in southeast Michigan, and in the winter it's a great place to get up close and personal with a variety of songbirds that have become inured to hand feeding over the years. They are still completely wild birds, mind you, but stand still long enough with a handful of enticing seeds and nuts, and you'll likely be rewarded with a visitor or two.

Plus, there's great sledding in another park of the park to top off a perfect winter day.

Fall weekends

Michigan football on Saturdays

Family biking on Sunday mornings, followed by doughnuts and cider at the mill.

And, on occasion, wildlife in the neighborhood (although that has nothing to do with it being a weekend...at least not with this kind of wildlife)

The spaces between

Life is punctuated by routine.

Invariably we start the day with breakfast and an adios to Jon on his way to work. Our morning is about table work—the school lessons that we actually sit down and do, like math, spelling, grammar, geography, etc. (and not all homeschoolers do this, by the way, but my kid happens to like the predictability of it). And we squeak in piano, and some time to read, or build, or play. Then there's lunch, and a chance to get outside if the weather is good, or play games, watch videos, read, sing, build, what have you, in the afternoon. Then Jon comes home and we soak up our time with him before going to bed and starting all over again the next day.

This is our routine. It is the punctuation that keeps us on track, and punctuation is good because it keeps you on track. It's also good because it helps you tell or read the story with enough predictability that you can enjoy the unpredictable—the story that happens in the spaces between, like a surprise afternoon in the middle of a work week when our whole family gets to drop what we're doing and head to the park to enjoy the weather together. We like together.

Life happens in the spaces between.

Birding for Mother's Day

In helping Calvin prepare for is Science Olympiad bird test, the two of us spent a number of days out hiking nearby woods and preserves. We've always enjoyed nature, and birding was a casual pastime for me—casual as in I put out feeders and make sure they're filled, and when out on hikes I keep my eyes peeled and snap as many pictures as I can. But this more recent involvement has pushed this casual pastime closer to full blown hobby.

And the timing of the Olympiad couldn't have been more perfect. Not only because it took place in spring, when the birds are busy mating and nesting in a leafless tree canopy, but also because it aligned almost perfectly with peak migration time. Hike after hike we found ourselves surrounded beautiful birds we rarely get to see, some of them just brief visitors in our area.

For Mother's Day this year I requested two things. The first was a breakfast of eggs benedict, which my two boys delivered with great success. The second was an early morning hike through prime birding territory, and they delivered that, too. Eggs benedict, birding in a beautiful spring sun, a relaxing afternoon in the yard, and a delicious dinner with extended family at my parents' house. It was a perfect Mother's Day.

Some of my favorite shots from our recent birding expeditions:

Sandhill Crane (turning an egg in her nest)

Sandhill Crane

Yellow-rumped warbler

American bullfrog (not a bird)

American Redstart

Yellow warbler

Black-throated blue warbler

Common garter snake (again, not a bird)

Nashville warbler

Red-bellied woodpecker

White-breasted nuthatch

Magnolia warbler

Rufous-sided towhee

Rufous-sided towhee

Baltimore oriole (female)

Warbling vireo

Veery

Palm warbler

Wilson's warbler

Two birds of a feather

Blue-gray gnat catcher

Tree swallow

Chipping sparrow

Canada geese and Red-winged blackbird (female)

Tree swallow