Thursday, June 26, 2008

The Love of a Parent

This past week my family has been under seige........

by this......


......................................................a bird!!!


Sure she looks innocent, but looks can be deceiving. In her mind, we are the enemy.

  

It started about a week ago.  We noticed her hanging around a bush on the corner of our house. The following day, she'd make all kinds of noises if you walked in her direction.  I told the kids that she must be the Mommie bird and that she's probably protecting her nest of eggs.


They were all fascinated and thrilled at the prospect of possibly seeing the nest, eggs......and one day soon, the baby birds. I told them, they'd have to wait until the eggs hatched, because we didn't want to disturb the nest.


Shortly thereafter, the full on assaults began.


If one of us would enter our front yard at all, the bird would go nuts.  Making all kinds of noises and flapping her wings.


That evening Charlie was messing with the bird and trying to get it riled up, by walking in our front yard....that's it, really, just walking into the yard....and she flew at him about 90 miles per hour and nipped him in the butt!


We noticed that the next day another bird joined her....the father, I presume.


Sometimes our dog likes to go out front and lay in the yard.  That day, I noticed that when Dakota went out the birds were in a fit, making all kinds of noise and doing lots of fly bys. Apparently, Dakota is Enemy #1, as far as the birds are concerned. I decided to try not to let her out front anymore just to give the birds some peace.


The following morning when I was outside taking pictures with my new camera, I let Dakota out in the backyard to go potty.  The birds took about 3.5 seconds to figure out that Dakota was in the backyard and this time there was lots of noise, and fly bys, and then it happened, she was attacked....3 TIMES!  Poor doggy!  The birds just nipped her from behind, but she was so startled.  She had a look on her face as if to say, 

What in the heck??  I'm just trying to pee here.


The rest of the day, the birds would be up in arms, mounting tons of fly bys if any of us entered the front OR back yard!


Now it has reached a new level.  Veruka and Mike were sitting INSIDE of our house, in the Study. (That's right, I said inside!) Veruka was on my laptop sitting on the floor, by the window, when the birds started up again. They were fired up that she was invading their territory!!!


Thankfully, the eggs have hatched.  We can hear the baby birds, but have yet to even see the nest.  Veruka was the brave one who took the bird picture....thank goodness for my new zoom lens!  (Just a little aside, when she took the pix and zoomed in she noticed the bird had a spider in it's mouth.  She was disgusted and said, "Who in the world would want to eat a spider?"  I answered....."Uh....a baby bird."  :)


The kids said the birds are crazy, but I told them that they are just parents who would do anything to protect their "children."  I can totally relate.  I can take all kinds of injustices against myself.   People can hurt my feelings or wrong me, and I'll just turn the other cheek. However, when it comes to my children, it's a different story.  I will defend them to the end. 'Don't mess with my child, if you don't want to mess with me.' Do you know what I mean?


I guess that is love.


That is what these kids do to us.  They make us want to fight any battle for them.  They make us want to protect them.  They make us want to provide for them.  They make us want to make it a better, safer world for them.


That is the love that a parent has for their child.  Wholehearted, unconditional, complete love.

  

I remember when each of my kids were born, I was just amazed at the depths of my love for these brand new little babies.  In fact, I was smitten before they were even born.  Just like the Mommie & Daddy bird....protecting their babies before they'd even hatched out of their eggs.


I remember one night as I sat rocking Veruka, thinking that I couldn't imagine my own parents having that same depth of love for me.  But guess what?  They did and they still do.  It is mind boggling.


As I lay in bed last night, I was thinking about all of this, something occurred to me.

  

This same kind of parent-child love is the love that God has for EACH of us.  Not just for a few special people.  Not just for those who go to church.  Not just for those who walk a certain path, but for EVERYONE.   We are all His children.  He loves all of us wholeheartedly, unconditionally, and completely. How is that for mind boggling??


I miss being able to enter our front & back yard without fear of attack.  Hopefully, by the time we get back from vacation, the whole family will have moved on, and we can have a cool nest to remember them by.

PS.  Yes, I know that you don't spell Mommy with an 'ie'....I just like it that way.  :)

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Playing instead of Packing

Yesterday, instead of packing for our upcoming vacation, I spent a couple of hours playing with my new toy.

I got a new camera on Monday and I LOVE IT!! Sorry Tammy, we no longer have twin cameras. :(

I was very indecisive about which kind of camera to buy.....in fact, I originally went to Best Buy on Friday, but left without buying anything. Isn't that sad??

The tassel pictures were some of my first......here are some others......what do you think?

All of these pictures are the original shots straight from my camera.....I didn't do any tweaking, enhancing, or cropping on the computer.

Front porch flowerpot.

Morning.





Fun with the zoom feature. This shot is from our front porch with no zoom at all.

This shot is our neighbors back yard....camera is half way zoomed in....full optical zoom. (I'm still standing on my porch.)

This is a picture of flowers that are 2 backyards away! (I'm still standing on my porch!) The camera is fully zoomed in with digital zoom...pretty cool, eh?

Macro setting.

Night time setting.


Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Looky What I Got.......









That's right......it's one of The Nester's tassels!    

Here's a funny story...the other night we had some friends over to eat dinner and my girlfriend noticed my tassel hanging from my baker's rack and she said, "Is that one of The Nester's tassels????"

This friend doesn't even HAVE a blog......she's seen her blog and heard about The Nester through others! 

Wish you could have one??  She has all kinds of cool ones for sale on her etsy shop at her blog.

Click HERE to check it out.

PS.  Can you believe I've had over 10,000 hits on my blog???? Woo Hoo!!

Monday, June 23, 2008

Where are those family pictures???? Here they are!













Wednesday, June 18, 2008

A Quick Trip

This week while B was away for work, I piled the dog and kids into the trusty minivan and we took an impromptu trip to my Mom & Dad's cabin.




There were no video games, no cell phones, and no computers.....can you imagine??? It always amazes me how easily the kiddos can entertain themselves without all of the electronics when they don't have a choice.





Mmmmmmm S'mores!





Sparklers!


A friend that was caught in the creek. (Mean Mom that I am, I wouldn't let them keep him.)


Peace.

Monday, June 16, 2008

Happy Father's Day!

First, let me say I have been blessed with a wonderful father, a loving father in law, and a husband who is one of the best Dad's I know. Happy Father's Day to 3 great men.



I am grateful.


We had the chance this weekend to celebrate with both sides of our family and it was so nice to see everyone. Lately, it seems as if we've been living our lives in a whirlwind of activity....I guess because we have been....and we haven't seen much of either side of our families. This weekend, we had the opportunity to celebrate the all of the Fathers and to visit with our brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews.


I am grateful.

(I took lots of pictures of the families...I promise I'll post them soon.)


I wanted to talk about Brian.

Brian is the kind of Dad who inspires you to want to be a better person. He is so good with the kids. The funny thing is, long before we were married.....back when we were dating, I knew he was going to be a great Dad. He's just that kind of guy. He has fun with the kids. He can make any situation fun. He just has this easy going way about him. (He's a good balance for me! :)


I am grateful.



He's coached all of them. He plays with them. He wrestles them....(thank goodness, because I can't stand that!) He teaches them. He guides them. He holds them accountable. In the way he lives his life, day by day, he's teaching our boys how to treat their future wives and teaching our daughter to have high standards for her future husband.


I am grateful.


He loves God.


I am grateful.


He is one of the most authentic people I've ever known. What you see is what you get. He is who he is.


I am grateful.



Integrity matters to him. He does the right thing, even when nobody knows. He is passing this on to our kids.


I am grateful.



He is humble. You'd never know of his accomplishments....because he won't tell you.


I am grateful.


He invests his time in me and the kids.


I am grateful.


He is a great Dad.


I am grateful.



Happy Father's Day, Honey.....I love you!

We Are the Champions!

We had another "stacked" weekend around here. Both boys had big games on Saturday. Little Buddy was playing in his division's All Star game and The Champ was playing in his division's Championship game. Of course, as fate would have it, they were both playing at THE SAME TIME and on DIFFERENT fields.

I hustled back & forth between the two games along with the Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, & cousins, who had braved the 100 degree day to come cheer on the boys.

It was a GREAT day. Both boys teams won!!!