What's wrong with him?

What's wrong with this poor Robin? I just finished stalking him around the yard for the last half hour trying to get a decent photo of him... these are the best that I could come up with. He didn't feel like posing. At first I thought he had weird coloring but it became evident that a bunch of his feathers are missing. Poor baby.
Even the feathers on the back of his head and neck are gone. I wonder if something tried to get him and he barely escaped with his life. He was hopping around happy and eating so I think he's OK.

I didn't want to do it

The last thing I wanted to do was activate comment word verification. I've had my blog for nearly two years and never once have I had a problem with spam comments and things trying to download on my computer from them until the last month or so. I keep deleting them and saying "OK, one more chance" and then another will come and then another. I even got another one today. I'm sorry to have had to activate that feature but I hope you will understand. I always wondered why people used that option when I'd never had a problem.... now I know. I hope that doesn't deter you from leaving comments.... I love hearing from you.

This is it... I promise

We just got home from closing night. The kids are at another cast party tonight. I held out pretty good until Caleb came out and hugged me after the show. That's pretty good for me. I'm sorry if I've bored you to death this week with all my Guys and Dolls postings. It just consumed us. I'll be back to my regular blogging now......
The whole cast and crew (click photo to enlarge).
The whole cast and crew including the orchestra pit.

Cast Pizza Party

It's tradition that after the Saturday night show the whole cast goes out to Pizza Hut for a party. The pictures speak for themselves.

After the Show

Opening night was great. Tonight is when all the extended family comes, including Craig's parents who came all the way from Florida just to see the musical. I am so proud of all those kids. Caleb (Sky Masterson) and Jordan (Hot Box Dancer & Mission Girl)Caleb and Lindsey (Sarah Brown)Caleb and Trent (Nathan Detroit) Caleb and Bethany (Adalaide)
Caleb and Mrs. Yo (voice and music instructor)Jordan and Lindsey... best friends

Jordan and Shane... Jordan's biggest fan.

I slept until 8:00 this morning!! That is late for me and it felt so good. I am still trying to get over this nasty cold (two weeks now!). Work was crazy busy last week on top of everything else! The house is a mess and I have piles and piles of laundry to do. There is no food in the house. My list goes on and on. Today is catch up day. But..... I still had time to post pictures of the kids..... you know, priorities!!

Sneak Peak 3

Caleb singing "Luck Be A Lady". It's my favorite song he sings.
Hot Box Dancers.... "Take Back Your Mink".

It's opening night tonight!! Wish you could all be there.

Sneak Peak 2

Guys N Dolls.... Sneak Peak

It is finally here.... the week of the musical. We wait all year for this. I may not be doing a lot of blogging for the rest of the week. As soon as I get off work I am usually up at the school for dress rehearsals, with my camera of course. The kids get home about 10:30, go to sleep and then start all over the next day. The first photo is Caleb and his buddy Trent. Caleb is Sky Masterson and Trent is Nathan Detroit. This is so much fun!! Jordan is a mission girl and a hotbox dancer (in yellow). She loves to be on the stage but prefers to have non singing parts.
Here is Caleb and Lindsey (Jordan's best friend) who is playing Sarah Brown whom Caleb falls in love with and marries at the end of the musical.

From the time Caleb was in grade school age we knew he was gifted in theatre and voice. We have so many wonderful memories of all the plays and musicals that he has participated in over the years. I have a feeling that this will be an emotional weekend for me since this is Caleb's last high school musical.

For our family and friends that live close we hope to see you this weekend. Friday and Saturday performances are at 7:00 PM and Sunday is at 3:00 PM.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter Dear Friends and Family.
These photos are 2 years old. You may have seen them before but I thought it was appropriate to post them again today. Zoe is every one's friend no matter what type of an animal you are. This was Sundae, Jordan's beloved pet rabbit. Sundae no longer lives with us. She went to live on a farm when Jordan outgrew her rabbit days. Jordan loved Sundae. We allowed Jordan to have a litter of bunnies with Sundae each spring. Somehow we always managed to find homes for all the babies, even when she had 9 one year!!

Weird Object Friday

I'm not sure if you can call my object this week "weird" maybe more unique. And in honor of Easter this Sunday I decided this would be a good week to use this object. My Grandma gave this to me a few years ago. It a seashell with scenes of Jesus carved into it. I don't believe that it is hand carved. It looks to me like it might have been drilled. The top center is the manager scene and the bottom scene is the last supper. I'm not sure what the top two sides are. Some day I plan to take it to church and ask Pastor Ron if he can tell me.
It's very detailed and beautiful.

If you would like to see some bird photos that I took today head on over to my "Viewfinder" blog.... click here.

Hamster the Acrobat

This is the bruised battered and beaten hamster that I posted about a few weeks ago. I really did not think that she was going to survive. We barely saw her move at all for days. Slowly she has come out of her shell. I think it took her awhile to figure out that she was safe all by herself. In fact she has become even more active than the other one now.
Her favorite thing to do is climb the bars of her cage. I can't tell if she enjoys doing this or if she's trying to find an escape route. (Click to enlarge this photo and check out her nose and paws)
I think it's amazing that those little bitty paws and claws can grab like that.
Only problem is she doesn't know how to get back down so she crashes to the bottom all the time. It must not hurt her because she does it over and over.

More feathered friends

It's such a dreary rainy day. And I am sick. I have the worst head and chest cold and I can barely squeak a few sounds when I try to talk. Just a few days ago I was saying that I made it all the way through winter without getting sick... guess I spoke too soon. Getting through this cold I can handle. What I am worried about is Caleb catching this and the musical is next week. That would be a disaster. Jordan and Craig have both already had it. I suggested to Caleb last night that he should go and spend the rest of the week at Grams so he doesn't catch this but I don't think he took me serious. I'm just staying as far away from him as I can. I left work early to come home and take a nap but I couldn't help but spend a few minutes with my birds. They are coming in droves now! When I walk outside I get serenaded by the sweetest sounds. They are all over the trees just chirping away.
This finch feeder usually has a line of birds waiting for their turn.
This is a terrible blurry photo but I wanted to post it anyway. Can you see 4 different types of birds? A chickadee, a goldfinch, a downy woodpecker, and a white breasted nuthatch!

I love these little red breasted nuthatches but they are fast little birdies and I never get a good shot of them.

This is what I was most excited to see when I got home. Craig and I just hung this up last night... my suet woodpecker feeder and already Mr. Redbellied is enjoying it. I hope you are not tired of all my bird postings. I am just really excited to finally have some feathered friends.

Did you wear green today?

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I can't say that I am really that into this particular day. I came downstairs this morning and Jordan says "You're not wearing green Mom". No, why should I when as soon as I get to work I have to change into blue OR scrubs. I'm not trying to be a stick in the mud, it's just one of those days that I never give much thought to. Maybe if I was Irish I would think differently.

One thing I have found interesting is the dyeing of the Chicago river green on St. Patrick's Day. I think someday I might like to witness it as I only live 100 miles from Chicago but I probably never will. I can imagine the crowds are really bad in downtown Chicago today. I wondered how they did it and why they did it and I found this explanation on a Google search.........

"Chicago is famous for a somewhat peculiar annual event: dyeing the Chicago River green. The tradition started in 1962, when city pollution-control workers used dyes to trace illegal sewage discharges and realized that the green dye might provide a unique way to celebrate the holiday. That year, they released 100 pounds of green vegetable dye into the river—enough to keep it green for a week! Today, in order to minimize environmental damage, only forty pounds of dye are used, making the river green for only several hours."

Did you wear green today?

For the birds

This morning I saw 4 new varieties of birds in the yard and around my feeders; cardinals, mourning doves, blue jays and starlings. Things are coming along nicely with the birds. There have been about 4 of these little downy woodpeckers flying around this afternoon. And we have been busy all weekend finishing our bird houses/nest boxes. Craig did the sawing and assembling. I was in charge of sanding.

Here are the finished products. All except the holes in the front. Craig didn't have the right hole saw sizes so tomorrow the holes will be drilled. The far left is a robin nest box. Middle is a wren house and far right is the blue bird house. We made 2 of each.
Craig also threw this together for me. It's a suet woodpecker feeder. I saw one in the store and tried to explain it to Craig. I think he did a wonderful job on it.
And lastly I wanted to show you these. My parents were displaying in a home and garden show today with Mom's orchids and other house plants. After church I went to see them at the show and look around. There was a lady there that was selling gourd items. She grows these gourds herself and makes beautiful items with them. I bought these two. The long one is a bird house and the other has about 3 holes and is full of organic wool material. The birds pick out the wool and use it to construct their nests.

More to follow when we get the houses and feeders hung.....