Do Birds Predict the Seasons in Iowa?

And even more!

Robins Under the Crab Apples

Today,  it is cold...  Cold-er than yesterday.... and that was pretty cold.   Today,  it was solidly in the teens...and that is a very cold day  for Iowa.    However...

More came after I stopped

There are Robins here.  Not just a few stray ones that seem to be confused or lost  ( Although I question what they are thinking at this moment) ....But a BUNCH!  As if they are the vanguard of some  massive Migration.

As close as I could get. 

The thing is,  the ground is so frozen,  it is similar to concrete... even where there is no snow.  Luckily,   there are several crab apple trees scattered through out the town so they have some fruit to nibble on during the deep freeze.  I think I blogged about this before...but it still shocks me to see it.

Michigan Spring Herald

And it is not like the Robins never left.....They did!   They pretty much were gone by October...I'm not sure where they go, but I'm assuming somewhere south  ( and warm!) .  So I'm not sure why they suddenly feel the need to come back up north when the weather in January is traditionally the worst!

In Michigan,  you could pretty much bank on the Robins coming during the spring.   It used to be a game for us as to who could see the first Robin of the year.   It was almost always after a solid warm day in March or April. Forget the groundhog.....we used the return of the Robins as our measuring stick.

They don't seem like friends here

I guess Iowa has its own set of birds that foretell the season.    For instance....Bald Eagles and Turkey Vultures. Vultures arrive in late spring and stay for the summer.   The Eagles seem to come back only after the last Vulture has vacated the area and remain for the duration of the winter.   Not sure if they hassle each other over territory or if things just work out that way.

Spare room 

Bedroom Closet

Other than that,  Cheryl and I must have been motivated today, because we completed the closets in the spare room and bed room.   I'm quite happy they are now finished.   As soon as the paint dries,  I'm sure we will have to reorganize a few things.  I guess we have a few other projects on the horizon,  but for now...it appears we may be in the closing moments of the "apartment painting" chapter.

Cheryl paints the edges

Hiro shows how cats help out.

Hope everyone else is staying warm.   As for me,  I am brewing up a pot of home made Chili!   I could not rely on HyVee to keep their Chili stocked,  So I'm taking a stab at making my own.   The recipe seems simple enough.  I don't like mine too spicy.   I guess with this first attempt,  I should have cooked the beans a little longer.

Chili on a cold day.

  Or used canned beans instead of the dried ones.   All information I can use for the next batch.   The flavor is still good enough to eat...just the texture is off a bit.

Soaking the dry beans 24 hours

  I'm going to try to soak the remaining beans overnight.  ( recommended by Betty Crocker)  to see how well that softens them up.  We shall see how things go.

Weekend Wrap up!

Finally finished carving up 8 seats tonight. The store that supplies our seats is out at the moment, so two seats had to be pushed back until Monday. Other than carving though, we had a pretty fun weekend. We went to the World Store and got some silverware that we desperately needed ( our old plastic forks and spoons were falling apart!) And it has been raining here for two days straight. Friday was wonderful, but Saturday and Sunday have been raining cats and dogs. Speaking of cats, Red, the shop cat, got caught outside in the squall! He came back totally soaked! Also today, Cheryl took a picture of the Piliated woodpecker nests around this area. It's rare that he comes down close, but once he came so close to me and the cat I could have reached out and touched him. The picture is not bad for our little camera. This picture captures all of my birdhouses in the back yard.

Owls, A cat dentist, and bird watching with red

I have noticed that Owls seem to be very "in" this year. Maybe they were even before, But I never seemed to notice much. I carved up an owl tonight, but that is rare that people want an owl toilet seat. Cheryl's store, however, seems to sell out of owls faster than any other item.

Yesterday we had to get up early and take Red to the vet. It was a long day. He does have a tooth problem and the vet seems rather confident that she can fix him up with a couple of "pulls." ( Meaning he's gonna lose some bad molars) We are going to take him and Hiro to the vet on the 23rd and pick them up on the 24th. Anyway, the timing is totally off now and Cheryl and I went to bed early ( 2am) and got up at the insane time of 12 noon today! I was able to catch a couple of birds with Red at our bedroom window. It is not as easy as I thought. The cat kept getting his head in the way and the birds were gone in a blink. I mostly caught a empty window sill. But I did manage to catch a couple worth posting. Red was sure to "help".

Prototype Tuesday

Only one wood duck seat tonight, So I decided to take a shot at carving up a couple of the plywood seats. I tried to keep the designs simple because I had to make the seats completely. Also, Cheryl suggests that I should try to target the Etsy crowd a little more with modern designs. I have always liked the Asian feel of the bird silhouette on a branch. Specifically a cherry blossom branch. with a little luck, I'll be able to post them on Etsy tomorrow.

Update! I just found a new site to sell my stuff on and want to see if I can set up a shop there. 1000 markets looks very promising! I'll have to blog about it in the future. I read about it on this ladies blog. Spike, peanut, and me she has a shop on it and it totally in love with it. From what I have seen. I like it so far. I'm off to inspect and research some more..