Final Days of Spring

The beginning of June always feels like the beginning of summer. But we still technically have a week of spring left! This thought prompted me to make a long overdue post on some of the things that have been happening in the last couple months, and the above video from our childhood favorite movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers perfectly captures what this season has been to our family. Greer and Austin got married and are embarking on their new life together (see the below post), Hannah is now eight months pregnant and we celebrated with a baby shower, and of course, last but not least, our baby birds hatched and flew the coop!

Greer and Austin's wedding could not have been more beautiful, and it was truly a great and emotional weekend for all involved. And then about two weeks later, we got to get all emotional again for Hannah's baby shower! Her friends Casey and Kelly threw an awesome party at Casey's house, and it was a gorgeous day with fun company, and Hannah seemed to get all the things she will need for her little one. Here are a few snapshots of the day:

 

Now, as for them baby birds!

 

The day before Derek and I were to head up north for Greer and Austin's wedding, I came home from work to see that one of the baby birds had descended from the birdhouse, onto to the platform I (thankfully) erected below its house--otherwise, he would have had a 3 story fall! I was both excited and nervous for him as I photographed him perched on the edge of this strung up fabric box.

After staring at him for about 15 minutes, I decided I needed to shoo him onto the porch before he fell off (apparently I'm not much for letting mother nature do her thing). So I managed to guide him onto the railing where he promptly fell to the balcony floor (3 foot fall seemed preferable to that 3 story one). He then proceeded to hip and hop around the balcony (which thankfully has full wood sides rather than open bars), until he reached the opposite end of the balcony, where he decided it would be a grand adventure to slip under the wood partition that divides us from our neighbor's balcony.

Of course this freaked me out as I couldn't see him anymore. Just then I heard the neighbor's slider door open and I decided to peek my head around the partition (I've never introduced myself to this person, by the way), and say "Hi, not to be creepy, but there might be a baby bird on your porch." I think this guy jumped about 2 feet at the mention of a small feral creature roaming his turf. But then he politely said, "thanks for the heads up," and quickly darted back inside.

After a minute or so, little hoppy found his way back to our side of the balcony. Right about then Derek came home and I updated him on our big bird news. I had barely spit the story out when baby #2 decided it was time to pop out of the birdhouse, and also landed kaput onto the platform. Perhaps led by his sibling's actions, he almost immediately jumped down onto the balcony floor all on his own. The two babies quickly huddled in the corner chirp chirping away. At this point I realized the parents must have decided it was the perfect day to make them jump from the nest, as they kept going in and out of the birdhouse making a racket and subsequently baby #3 made his little pop down. He followed #2's example and jumped down to the floor, where the 3 sibs bundled up in the corner and chirped some more. The parents kept going in and out of the birdhouse so we weren't sure if there were going to be any more babies, but this was apparently it.

 By this point the sun had totally gone down and it was getting cold. After showing interest in their offspring for awhile, parents took off for the night and babies quieted down. At Peter's suggestion I loosely wrapped a towel around where they were huddled to protect them from the cold, and we called it a night.

In the morning I woke to find two of the babies sitting on the towel tweeting away. The third baby was nowhere to be found, so hopefully he was the most developed and already flew away. The other two spent the rest of the day bouncing around the balcony, being fed by their parents, and trying to hop onto flower pots and stretch out their wings. Finally they found a nice little hiding place in an empty tipped over flower pot.

 

When we returned from the wedding, there was no sign left of the babies save all their little white droppings. I miss the little cuties! Every now and then one of the parents comes back and lands on the perch of the birdhouse; I'm not sure if it is doing this out of habit or if it is considering building another nest there again already, but it is always good to see our bird friends...it was such a neat process to experience! 

--Jessica