16/02: SATURDAY STUFF

Just a 'bitsy' post today .....

David (hubby) is feeling a bit under the weather today (tension headache etc) but I think its as a result of having to hammer up and down the motorway visiting his Mum in hospital, rather than anything 'nasty'.

   Thanks to everyone who sent good wishes for her recovery by the way.    She's 94 and had just recovered from her fall in September which left her with a broken hip and shoulder when she was taken ill a few days ago and admitted to the actute stroke unit of her local hospital.    Just 3 days on and she's made a miraculous recovery (sheer bl**dy mindedness I feel) and is now back home at her flat with a care package in place.    They don't make them like her these days methinks!   She's scary!!

Anyway,  I did a little more work on the family group portrait today but didn't get a progress photo as I had to go for an eye test mid afternoon .... and that took longer than anticipated so it was dark when I got home.   I'll post another update tomorrow.

The Blue Tits have been regularly inspecting the nesting box on our shed wall so we decided to add another one.   We had a 'robin nest box' on the wall which has been ignored for 3 years so we adapted it to make it more attractive to Blue Tits (hopefully) - basically just filling in the entrance to leave a very small hole so larger birds/predators can't get in.     It will be interesting to see what the reaction is tomorrow.

Another Blue Tit in nest box photo - sorry!!

I'll probably get ejected from Blogger if I call this the 'tit's bum'    ???

I wonder if the 'des res' passed muster?

so ...... we await developments.  I hope both nestboxes will be given the seal of approval and we'll have lots of little tits in late Spring.

These boxes have been ignored for a few years.  I bought them as plain (cheap) boring wood and painted them with ivy leaves etc.   Perhaps they were a bit too garish at the time and now the paint has mostly peeled off the birds find them more attractive?


Just to finish for this evening .....   a simple exercise to help us all stay fit now that January is over and we no longer have to worry about sticking to those silly resolutions (will go to the Gym at least 3 times per week) etc

This was sent to me at Christmas but I think it still has meaning now in February

14/02: LOVE IS IN THE AIR

David and I are so boring .... we don't exchange Valentine Cards or send red roses (but the house is full of daffodils at the moment which I much prefer)!        I am, however, cooking David's favourite Dinner for him tonight which he will appreciate far more than a Clinton card (having said that, its probably bah-humbug people like us that contributed to the demise of Clinton as we rarely purchased their merchandise)!!

But .... love is definitely in the air and on the minds of the garden birds.

The nesting boxes have been regularly inspected over the last few days and I'm fairly certain we'll be seeing young blue tits being raised in the garden this Spring ....

 the snow has gone, and we've had lots of drizzly wet stuff for the last day or two - all the fruit trees were dripping this morning .....

but at least all the bird water trays/baths got filled up with no effort from me. 

This robin had a great time in his bath today making himself pretty

He wasn't too happy about being observed I think

OK a little more progress on the family group portrait.   I've emailed this progress picture to my client tonight but I always get a bit twitchy about sending progress pics too soon - there is still a lot of refining to be done to hair and skintones etc ... but I promised an update today so I've sent it - hope it doesn't scare him too much

My mum-in-law has been poorly and admitted to hospital yesterday so no art yesterday and I'll be hospital visiting tomorrow.  I'll work more on this at the weekend to have another update ready early next week.   This is where I got to today: