Tag: birds

Sunday morning at the bird feeder

January 10th, 2021

I love Sunday mornings. They’re the one morning of the week I sleep in, with no chores or errands awaiting me. Today I slept until 8 am; I got a ten-hour night of sleep. After I made coffee, I sat at the kitchen table and watched the bird feeder that hangs in the oak tree. I watched wings flutter, branches dip and sway under bird weight, and the feeder spin as birds lit on it, then dashed for the cover of bare branches after nipping a seed or two.

I refilled the feeder with black oil sunflower seed Saturday afternoon but saw no birds. Bird visits are inconsistent during the afternoon; you can’t really count on them after lunch. But morning when the sun is shining, like today, is like brunch at a fancy cafe on Mother’s Day. The feeder is all atwitter. Right now a blush-headed house finch perches on the disc tray beneath the column of seed. Up on the hill, a blue jay flutters from the wooden platform feeder. After he leaves, a mourning dove hops up and bobs around in the seed. A red cardinal sits on the wood fence and watches.

In the time I ate my oatmeal, the hanging feeder swung with tufted titmice, black-capped chickadees, little brown birds that I never know what they are — maybe sparrows? -, a female cardinal, a small yellow-brown bird that may have been a pine sisken, or it may have been a goldfinch. Now a blue jay hangs sideways from the cylinder of seed. It gleams brilliant blue in the morning light, its wings an iridescent teal, its back shiny cadet. The jay is chased off by a red-bellied woodpecker with its red crown and stark zebra striped back.

I want my gardening journal and new inks to arrive so I can sketch. I ordered a bright green Leuchtturm hardcover notebook along with several new ink samples. I’ll need to load pens with brown, grey, and cardinal red. I’ll need to keep one loaded with teal for the jays.

I spent most of the day today in wonder of the birds, soaking up sunlight on a walk, feeling giddy anticipation of the arrival of my seed catalog, and researching a new camera for when the world comes alive again. Appreciating beauty fills me up. It makes me feel bright inside.

My inks should arrive tomorrow. I’m taking Friday off, so I’ll be able to play. Is it Friday yet? I can’t wait to spend another day with the birds, garden dreams, fountain pens, and new color.
So many birds!

October 22nd, 2020

I slept in on Sunday after I woke at 5:15am to feed the dumb cats. When I got out of bed around 7:45, this time by my choice, the light out back was glorious — a dazzling golden light on a crisp October morning. It shone on the bronze blades of ornamental grasses, on the yellow flowers of the rudbeckia, on the oak with its coppery leaves, the magenta coneflowers, burgundy mums, and scarlet pineapple sage.

I refilled the bird feeders Saturday, so in that peaceful morning light, it was like Wild Kingdom in our yard. I opened the sliding glass door to move the screen door over so I could see out the clear glass panel instead of the clouded one. At the sound of the heavy door sliding open, the squirrel on the hanging feeder scurried up into the oak, causing the heavy feeder to swing madly while all the ground doves scattered in a flutter of grey-brown wings.

I ate oatmeal and drank coffee at the kitchen table and watched birds: goldfinches, house finches, blue jays, cardinals. They flew from oak to fence to ground to maple to other oak. They darted to the platform feeder, they shook branches as they fluttered, took off, landed. Doves ran across the mulch, a goldfinch perched on the trellis for the passion vine. A bright red cardinal scavenged seed from the ground near the platform feeder, under the rue and the Mexican feather grass. Blue jays swept across the flower bed with wings spread to land on the feeder, the fence, a tree branch.

I love my garden. Sometimes I have to laugh, though, that I spend my free time watching squirrels and birds. All I need now is a rocking chair.

Tag: birds

Sunday morning at the bird feeder

So many birds!