Sewing, Quilting, Clean-up, Company & Birds!

Bill and I were thrilled to have son John here over Christmas - but even more thrilled to meet his girlfriend, Vanessa. She is definitely a keeper!

We drove to Tampa to spend a day with them after they returned from their New Year's weekend in Fort Myers and Key West. Vanessa had never seen a Manatee so we took her to the Manatee Viewing Area in Tampa. You can see the huge power plant in the background that generates the warm water that the Manatees are attracted to.

We saw lots of Manatees including this guy doing the backstroke. The water was clear and the viewing was much better than at Manatee Park in Fort Myers.

Bill challenged me to get a shot of this Pelican in flight. Not too shabby if I do say so myself!

There were tons of fish swimming around - but look how they kept out of the way of this stingray!

I had never seen a stingray swimming around before - so I took lots of pictures! The stingrays are actually quite cute.

Afterwards, we went to lunch in Ybor City (an historic neighborhood in downtown Tampa) before saying good-bye and heading back to Ocala.

Back at the compound, I've been busy sewing. This is a jacket that I made at a class over at a friend's house. It began life as a all black man's shirt.

We covered the collar, cut off the sleeves and added cuffs, tucked the back, cut off the hem and faced the inside. Later, I changed the buttons and added the handkerchief. It was fun to see how differently each of our projects turned out.

I've also been working on another quilt - this one will be as bright as the last one! I have all of the squares assembled and put together - I just need to add the border and assemble the back before it goes out to be machine quilted. My beginner quilting class starts this weekend so I can learn all the things I'm doing wrong.

We had a "minor" problem earlier this week. We were heading out and while I was getting ready, Bill decided to start the dishwasher. I had complained that the dishwasher wasn't doing a very good job - so he was checking it out. A few minutes later, I heard him yell that we had bubbles everywhere! Bill had added Jet Dri (or so he thought) to make it rinse better. Long story short: he actually added Dawn dish-washing liquid into the Jet Dri compartment. His reason? "It was blue."

This is Bubba - an adorable Havanese puppy that belongs to our very good friends Larry and Wendy. They were here visiting for the weekend. After returning home, Bubba fell into their pool and nearly drowned. Poor Bubba - I sure hope he's going to be okay.

I haven't forgotten about my birds. This is a Red-bellied Woodpecker and if you look closely, you can see the faint red on his chest that gives him his name.

Our back-yard feeders are busy all day long. I love sitting out in the Florida room watching them.

We have lots and lots of Bluebirds - and they get bluer and bluer the closer we get to Spring.

We enjoy the backyard feeders so much that I added a feeder in the front yard. Squirrels are not a problem, so I hung it in the Oak tree. Mrs. Cardinal found the new feeder almost immediately.

And so did this adorable Titmouse who paused from his lunch just long enough to pose for a quick picture. The bird on the left is a Chipping Sparrow and they arrive at the feeders in flocks.

I think I took this picture of a Common Moorhen on one of our walks. Funny, but my sister Beth seems to see the same birds at the same time when she walks the beach in North Carolina.


This picture is for my sister. This must be the year of the Armadillos! We've seen at least one on each of our walks - but none as cute as this one - standing up and posing for a picture. They do not have very good eyesight, so if you are very quiet, they just go on with their business. I thought they would be slow - they just LOOK slow - but once they hear you, they scurry off in a hurry.

Playing Catch-up

As I write, Laura, Tim and the kids should be half way back to Colorado after their Florida vacation - but I'm still working on all the pictures I took on our various adventures while they were visiting both here in Ocala and at our condo in Ft. Myers.

Lovers Key State Park is a must visit. I love walking the beach, collecting shells and watching the shore birds. The water is great for wading - but not for swimming as it drops off too quickly. Some days there are so many beautiful shells - you can't collect them fast enough and other days the beach is clear. We arrived just as the tide was beginning to recede - the wrong time to collect - but that didn't stop the kids from finding some neat shells and several sand dollars. We walked out to the point on the far south end of the beach where I watched these little Sanderlings play at the water's edge.

It's no wonder I have trouble keeping all the birds straight - this is an immature Little Blue Heron. According to Wikipedia, white Little Blue Herons often mingle with Snowy Egrets. The Snowy Egret tolerates the white birds more than Little Blues in adult plumage. The young birds actually catch more fish when in the presence of the Snowy Egret and also gain a measure of protection from predators when they mix into flocks of white herons. It is plausible that because of these advantages, they remain white for their entire first year.

Sure enough, a Snowy Egret was close by!

After we returned to Ocala, we took the family to Cedar Key. We arrived at an extreme low tide, so could not take the boat ride out to the barrier islands (Cedar Key National Wildlife Refuge) that we had planned. They have a small beach and a picnic area where we enjoyed our lunch and watched this Semipalmated Plover look at his reflection in the puddles.

Since I joined the camera club, I'm working on picture composition, instead of (or more correctly - in addition to) just getting a good picture of a particular bird. This is a common Laughing Gull with his twin behind him. One of the locals told me that when you see a group of gulls or terns - they all face the same direction - into the wind. Interesting!

On the way home from Cedar Key we stopped for a short hike in Dunnellon. The Piliated Woodpeckers were everywhere! Across the road, we saw a sign advertising kayaks for rent - $15 for the entire day.

We got all the information and the next day we kayaked down the Rainbow River. I did not take my camera so I don't have any pictures to share - but it was wonderful!! Rainbow Springs is a first-magnitude artesian spring, the fourth-largest in Florida, producing between 400 and 800 million gallons of crystal clear water a day. Rainbow Springs forms the headwaters of the Rainbow River, which empties into the Withlacoochee River. As we paddled and floated the five miles from the headwaters down to Route 484, we watched schools of fish, turtles and other underwater life. The birds were everywhere. At one time, glass-bottom boats took tourists down the river, but now it's a State Park. There were several snorkelers, fisher-people and even swimmers. I will definitely return - maybe with a water-proof camera.

The next morning as we relaxed in the Florida room I spotted this lone coyote walking behind the house. He headed over to the golf course and disappeared over the hill.

Bill spotted this cute little bunny trying to nap under the bushes in our front yard. Look how sleepy his eyes look.

The Mourning Doves are plentiful in the back yard - under the bird feeders. I thought this one had especially nice shades of blue on his wings.

Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary

Most of the time having two winter homes in Florida is just plain silly, but I didn't think so last week when we left Ocala for a long weekend in our tropical paradise further south. Fort Myers may be only a couple of hundred miles away - but the weather, birds and landscape are completely different. We needed to get our condo ready to rent for "season" - January through April - but still had plenty of time to play.

The sunrise was beautiful as we headed to one of my favorite places: Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary.

We were one of the first people out on the boardwalk that winds through the swamp, so we got to clear the spider webs for the people behind us.

There were lots of noisy Carolina Wrens, but not much else on this visit.

Oh yes, the little Blue Heron was still looking for food - but they are so abundant that they hardly count. We still had a great walk on a beautiful day. We met several nice people including a new birder from Massachusetts who was on a whirlwind trip through Florida hoping to add to his life list. We shared adventures and information on hot birding spots in the state.

After we left the swamp, we decided to go down some of the back roads in the area and that's where I spotted this beautiful Red-shouldered Hawk sitting on a fence post.

I'm trying to get more action shots - birds in flight, but when you freeze the motion, sometimes they don't look natural - maybe it's the way his legs and feet hang straight down.

Along one of the canals, this Anhinga had just caught a catfish. He kept banging it back and forth against the rocks.

I'm still trying to get a decent shot of a Belted Kingfisher - but they are shy around people and don't sit still very long.

Shakin in the Shell!

Shell Knob, Missouri that is! We stopped to visit our very good friends, Mike and Mel for a few days on our cross-country drive from our summer home in Colorado to sunny Florida. Over the weekend we went to a real down-home country festival in "downtown" Shell Knob.

Great music! Check out the special seats for the audience.

There was even a car show. This was one of my favorites - lots of potential.

Young and old alike had a great day. There were stands with crafts, lots of food and beer, an "Ugly Dog Contest" and an extremely messy pie eating contest for the kids.

Back at Mike and Mel's, I spend my days on their beautiful porch overlooking their own nature preserve bordering on Table Rock Lake. The hummingbirds were thick at the many feeders.

Most of the hummingbirds were Ruby-throated. This one looks different with tuffs of white - but maybe it is a juvenile that hasn't lost all his baby fuzz yet.

We watched a huge variety of birds, including this White-breasted Nuthatch. The weather was perfect and we had a wonderful visit. Neighbor Tom took me fishing one afternoon and I caught a Kentucky Bass. Tom is an accomplished fisherman and caught a dozen fish to my one. I'll do better next time.

Back at our winter home in Ocala, one of our first jobs was to put out the feeders. After seeing this beautiful Cardinal, we went out and bought a humongous feeder with seating for a dozen birds and a 20 pound bag of that expensive bird seed that is supposed to attract colorful songbirds. We haven't seen a bird since. This shot was taken from the Florida room - through the screens - so it's a little fuzzy.

We went for an early morning walk in the park where this Great Blue Heron posed in the pines.

I have no idea what these beautiful berries are - but the birds liked them.

I'm still learning how to use my new camera - especially the manual focus. Many times, when a bird is sitting in a tree, the auto-focus will focus on a branch or leaf closer to me than the bird I want to photograph - so I'm hoping I can learn to get clearer images. This is a Mockingbird - the State Bird of Florida.

Here's a great example of a picture I would never have gotten with auto-focus. This cute little Tufted Titmouse was hiding in the leaves.

Another picture I tried in vain to get in the past - a spider in his web. I won't tell you how many pictures I missed - or how many I took to get a couple of good ones - but I'm learning.

Last week, we bought Bill a new gas stove with five top burners and a convection oven and a new propane grill with a searing unit. The food is always good at the Cruff house (Bill is the cook NOT me!) but this should make it even more fun. Yesterday, we started an exercise class to work off those extra pounds from all his new delicious recipes. I am one lucky lady! There is so much to do here at OTOW - Bill is out at the RC Flying Field and we are looking into continuing our line dancing classes. I will probably join the birding and camera clubs, take some classes at the "Master the Possibilities Center," and Bill is joining the wood shop.

Out and About - a Lovely Stoll Along the Trails at The Fountain Valley Nature Center

Yesterday, Bill and I went down to the Fountain Valley Nature Center to walk and see if we could find any interesting ducks.

This was a very nice surprise - a Yellow Warbler (male) and a new life bird for us both.

Yellow Warblers are not especially uncommon - we just had not been fortunate enough to see or photograph one before. According to my guide book, the males arrive back in Colorado in late April followed a couple of weeks later by the females. We did not see the female.

One of my favorite birds - a Great Blue Heron. His colors are more distinct than most I see - less overall grey and more white and dark blue.

Fountain Valley has Red-winged Blackbirds everywhere! This male has his full breeding colors on.

This is the female Red-winged Blackbird and you can see just a touch of orange on her wing.

Barn Swallows were thick in the air around the Nature Center building. They fly so quickly that I can never get a decent picture. I don't often get the opportunity to photograph one that is sitting down. Pretty birds.

You can't mistake the profile of a Belted Kingfisher - sitting in a tree over the lake hunting for fish.

The ever-present Canadian Geese were along the banks of the lake - but it was obvious they had spent time walking along the trails as we side-stepped their numerous "presents."

According to the signs, beavers make their home at the center. I didn't see any yesterday - or on previous visits - but did see this tree they had obviously cut down.

As we were heading back to the car, I spotted this adorable little bunny sitting very still by the side of the trail.

Back at the feeders in the yard, we had a couple of Blue Jays come to visit. It was interesting to watch them as they repeatedly displayed - bobbing up and down. I had never seen that behavior before in a jay. They reminded me of the way the Burrowing Owls signal they are uncomfortable with your presence - but we were watching the jays from inside the house. This picture was taken through the kitchen window.

In other news, Bill and I just began a free trial of Netflix - DVD movies by mail. So far we've watched "Avatar" and "The Bucket List" - and tonight it's "It's Complicated." Since we've never been to the movies, all of the selections are new to us. So far the experience has been good - there is a huge selection of movies and TV shows to choose from and the DVDs arrive quickly - within a day or two. We have learned to clean the discs with window cleaner before viewing them to prevent picture distortion. I love that there are no commercials and it's much cheaper than upgrading our Direct TV service. However, its likely to be expensive in the future as now we are considering a new flat screen HD TV and Blue ray player - but I want to wait until our current dinosaur dies and we are sure we want to continue watching movies instead of TV.