Waiting to be discovered. Sitting in a big jar. Spritz cookies. Tradition for our family.
Spritz Cookies
Oh Christmas Trees!
Christmas trees atop an apple pie. Made with McIntosh apples, my favorite apple for baking pies and making applesauce. Using my Mom’s recipe. All set to be served.
Rain Drops
Spider web, treasured rain drops, Colorado Blue Spruce (Picea pungens).
Poison Ivy Berries
Poison Ivy (Toxicodendron radicans). I know, not something you really want to think about. I’m right there with you. I’m highly allergic to it. BUT birds, including many woodpeckers, LOVE the berries. So I enjoy the Poison Ivy too, because of the birds, though I certainly try not to touch it.
Snowflakes 2017
In the morning hours of December 9, 2017 moist air and snowflakes wafted past a spider web. The moisture in the air and the feathery ice crystals clung to the web and captured my fascination.
Goldfinch
Goldfinch (Spinus tristis) in dull winter garb. All set for the cold. If it ever comes.
Gregarious Cedar Waxwings
Gregarious birds. Cedar Waxwings (Bombycilla cedrorum). In a group they’re called an “ear-ful” or a “museum” of Waxwings. They move together, often with American Robins (Turdus migratorius), from one area to another hunting down their favorite berries and fruits. Nomads roaming their range, showing up here and there wherever they can find a meal for their numbers. Here, Smooth Sumac berries have attracted them.
Christmas Card in the Works
An annual tradition for many many years. Today I’ve chosen a photograph to use but its look will change as I add borders, surrounding the picture with images of fabric, or wrapping paper, or other visual textures that have tickled my fancy through the years. Choosing the photo is just the first of many steps along the way. This image was captured in Hobbs, New Mexico, at the beginning of November, 2004.
Rose Hips in the Rain
These are rose hips of Multiflora Rose (Rosa multiflora). An exotic invasive. Unwelcome but certainly looking lovely in the rain. The rain has stopped now, leaving much too little. Our last rain was eighteen days ago and much too little then as well. One of these days it will rain, lots of rain, and then it will all average out.
Irruption of Red-breasted Nuthatches
The term irruption when applied to birds is the sudden change in population density of a species of birds. Usually precipitated by lower than normal food supply.
It’s this phenomenon that brings a precious tiny bird to my yard every few years. The Red-breasted Nuthatch (Sitta canadensis).
I like to think of its call as a chuckle, which absolutely enchants me. During those wonderful winters, when I get to see these little creatures (a bit smaller than the White-breasted Nuthatch [Sitta carolinensis]), I am taken by their lack of concern of my presence as I bring seeds out to feed them. Peering at me and coming closer as if to say, “Hello! Is that for me?” How could I not fall in love!