Birdie Buffet, and stuff.

The spring version of our birdie buffet is in full swing. We are enjoying such a wide variety of birds, so much so that we have had to refer to the birdie bible.
This golden beauty is a male Goldfinch, the Iowa state bird, by the way. 

Male and female Goldfinch, dining together!

The much anticipated star of the spring buffet, the Baltimore Orioles, have arrived - we are still awaiting the appearance of the Hummingbird and Indigo Buntings.

Oh my gosh, people...these guys are so beautiful and as orange as the orangest orange!
They eat the flesh from the oranges and word has it they love grape jelly too.

My guess is that this is either a female or a juvenile.  She looks a bit unkempt and mangy but is was a rainy day and who doesn't have bad feathers hair days when it rains?!?

Just added to the buffet today - this feeder to serve up the before mentioned treats!

In other news...We have been busy planting flowers and making landscape alterations.  I have been pleasantly suprised at the number of flowering trees, shrubs and plants around the neighborhood.  Springtime is my favorite time of the year and experiencing it back here in the Midwest is like a whole new world!  I love my walks at dusk with Tanner -after the wind has died down and the fragrance is heavy in the air.

The neighborhood garage sale was this weekend. 
Oh. My. Gosh. 
A quote from The Big Bang Theory kept running through my mind...
see the video clip here.
"Bitches be CRAZY!"
I did not plan to participate in the sale, after all, I did a thorough purging before the move.  However, the peer pressure got to me and I set out to try and find a deal. I made it to three garages and went home.  I tried, I really did. The garage sale is just not my 'thing.'  I have plenty of my own junk and it un-nerves me the way people sit in their lawn chairs and stare at you while you judge their junk.  Eeesh. 
Once I arrived home from my abbreviated garage experiment and saw how ravenous these people where I decided to put my white wicker chairs on the curb...they were perfect for the sun room in Texas but we really do not have a place for them here. I made a couple of  "FREE" signs, taped them to the chairs, and this is a true story...before I got the second chair to the curb a couple had stopped and were shoving the chair into the back of their SUV!  I also disposed of an old metal shelving unit before the days end.  Amazing.