Two Different Birds

Both of the woodpeckers came to the feeders today but I show them to you nearly every day and I wonder if you're getting sick of seeing them. So today I have two different birds that showed up yesterday that we haven't seen in a while. First was a male Goldfinch in his winter drabness. The yellow on his head is so pale I don't know if you can even see it in the photo. He hopped from feeder to crook and back, not staying on any one for long before flying off.

A Chickadee landed on the suet cakes and just as I got the camera up and was ready to push the shutter button it flew away. But it only went to the birdbath for a drink so I was able to take its picture. They're fast little devils so I was pretty happy to have the chance to snap it.

And third and fourth birds. The male Cardinal flew to the platform feeder and chased away all of the House Finches that were on it but this Mourning Dove was perched on the roof and the Cardinal either didn't see it or figured it wasn't a threat and left it alone.

This squirrel was fun to watch. It tried to climb up two of the crooks that are side by side but the Slinkys were in the way. I don't know how it managed it but the squirrel pulled one of the Slinkys down almost to the ground so it could climb up the pole unhindered. When it got up there it didn't really know what to do so it hung there for a minute, didn't make it to the suet nuggets, and dropped to the ground. I went out later and reattached the Slinky to the top of the crook. Take that, squirrel!

Today's drawing went much better than yesterday's. It's called Room with a View and is out of Half Hour of Pencil Power. I should have used the ruler to make the initial square which is kind of wonky. He said to use a ruler to make the prospective lines which I did. I like the way it turned out. 

And the watercolor today is Goldenrod. It's okay. My lines are thicker and longer than the ones in the book so my flower isn't as delicate looking as the one in the book but I'm okay with that. I like the way the leaves turned out.

 

I made time after supper to draw a gratitude journal page. The big thing I was grateful for was finding the bullfrog that sits on my dashboard. I took my car in for an oil change last week and the next day I noticed that the frog was gone. I looked all over (I thought) and didn't find it so I called the shop and he laughed and said they didn't have my frog. So I pulled the car out onto the driveway so I could really search around and there it was nestled under the basket I keep grocery bags in. I don't know how it got down under there but I'm glad I found it. Grateful even.

I spent some time working on polishing up the December monthly writing progress email letter. I got a new program called ProWritingAid which tells you when you're writing in passive voice or you  need or don't need a comma, when your phrasing is awkward, and when things are misspelled. I could tell how old one of the scenes in the piece I submitted for critique is because the program made me go through and take out one space after each period because now there's only supposed to be one space after a period instead of two. It's no fair when they change the rules like that.

--Barbara