It's taken a couple of weeks to get back into routine after my couple of weeks off. As we've been short staffed at work, and the weather has been getting quite hot, I seem to be short on energy and inspiration.
Went (naturally!) to the recent SA Festival of Quilts exhibition. It was a great exhibition with many interesting and varied quilts. It was a pleasant surprise to get a 2nd prize for my quilt 'Off to see the wizard'. Made after a suggestion from my daughter many years ago, I had been working on it for about 18 months. You can see it among the prize winners on the QGSA website www.saquilters.org.au
Over the last 4 weeks have enjoyed watching the progress from nesting (not enthralled on the location - in my hanging basket about 8 foot up, right beside the back door) to hatching of blackbirds. I initially saw one lovely blue egg, but discovered on squawking that there were 4 baby birds.
They flew/jumped/fell out of the nest on Saturday, and with still some tufty feathers and virtually no tail feathers, they have been fluttering about the yard for the last few days. Our old cat who always shares his bicuits with the parents hasn't been at all interested - one of the little ones actually fell onto him and he hardly turned his head!
It is amazing how hard the parent birds have worked, building the nest and then endlessly foraging to feed the four little ones.
I have enjoyed watching all this, though I'm not sure I want to see 4 more blackbirds scratching our garden mulch everywhere!
