Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Bird Migration! Spring IS on the way!

This American Robin seemed to be a tag-a-long with the flock of over 200 Cedar Waxwing birds that stopped in our backyard this last weekend. There was a smaller flock of Robin along with the Cedar Waxwings.
There were so many Cedar Waxwings that it truly was difficult to catch a close-up of just one bird. They enjoyed flying to and fro between the trees with the little berries and the big Cedar trees in our yard. I think they were enjoying an all-you-can-eat buffet!
The markings of the Cedar Waxwing are striking! I love the mask around their eyes, it's not just black, but outlined with white. Their tails have yellow feathers at the end. The marking for which they are named is the red "wax drip" on their secondary wing feathers. Their bellies are a buff yellowish color. I had seen them dashing back and forth in the yard while I was sitting on the couch in the house looking out to the backyard. I had heard the Robins outside earlier, so I just thought that it was Robins. But when I looked closely, through the raindrops, I saw the Cedar Waxwings on the Cedar tree. I dashed outside to first hear the birds and then see the massive amount of them!

They would take breaks from berry eating by perching in the naked Sycamore tree in our front yard. It was really impossible to count them all!


If anyone can tell me what type of tree this is, I'd love to know! I don't have a tree book and I'm not sure where to find it on the web.
Aren't they beautiful!? God is so amazing. When I did the Bible Lesson for the Level 3 kids at BSF I was able to use these birds as an illustration of how we can see God in His creation. Hope you have a wonderful day. Take these birds as notice that Spring is on it's way my East Coast friends!!

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Out from under winter

I made this wreath for Valentine's Day. Using old book pages is quite trendy these days. You know already how I feel about that! The base of the wreath is a wire form that I wrapped book pages around and taped them on. Then, I made giant rosettes of book pages, just like I did for the pennant banner that I showed you how to make in an earlier post. I hot glued the rosettes onto the wire frame. I made a center plaque with a piece of chipboard that I covered with a book page. I embellished that with L O V E and some ribbon. I glued a wrinkly piece of pink scrap paper on the back of the chipboard and then stuck that with hot glue onto the wreath.
I gave this wreath to Carla for her front door as a hostess gift for having friends in to make Valentine cards. There were ten of us who got together to make 6 Valentine cards! Here are five of them. The sixth one was camera shy. So, I'll post a picture of it in a day or two. Three of the cards were little mini ATCs. ATC stands for Artist Trading Card. They measure 2.5 x 3.5 inches and are lots of fun to make.

Have a great day!