NATURE!

Its been beautiful and sunny here the last few days (Shocker, I know.  Winter in Tucson.  Someone's got to do it.) Saturday, after spending a few hours at Seth's track meet, we came home and spent a few hours working in the yard.  (Remember those cacti I transplanted a few days ago?  Still alive! These thumbs may be green after all!)

While we were watering and setting up a table for planting (this is getting serious, folks!), we had some close encounters of the natural kind.



There are some sweet little humming birds that call our front yard home because we have these beautiful flowering succulents, and the hummers feast on them daily.

 I love watching their little green iridescent bodies dart back and forth from flower to flower.  Sweet little chirps come out of their beaks, but man do their wings make some noise! They are flapping so hard and fast what emerges is a deep, throaty vibration so counter to their lilliputian size.  It's fascinating.

One little bird in particular not only visits the flowering plants in the garden, but regularly roosts in a small tree in our courtyard.  I began to think that maybe this hummer was a mama, and our courtyard held her tree house.  This weekend, Joe found the nest!  And inside it, two of the tinniest babies I've ever laid eyes on.   We marveled as mama hummer flitted back and forth from the tree, feeding and patrolling-- keeping an eye on these most prized processions.  I will be sad when they are finally big enough to spread their wings and fly….but I'm hoping that the babes like the neighborhood and stick around to build their own nest too!

This little guy, and his many counterparts, are starting to emerge from beneath the rocks and gravel as the weather warms up.  They give our dog, Duke, quite a shock when they come scurrying up from their subterranean hibernation hideouts, but after they find a spot on the warm brick they are happy to hang out for hours.  The combination of cacti and lizards right out my front door do a lot to remind me that this city has sprung up from the desert.  And, while we build houses and lay asphalt over the top like fashions of a modern era, it's bones will forever be ancient.