Breaking News.

Literally.  No, really.  Literally.  1st hummingbird egg just broke.  Little One is still laying on part of it.  Looking adorable.  Adorably ugly.

Zoomed in … egg fragments, Little One lifting head (stoopid noisy shutter!), one remaining egg.  Size perspective:  egg & baby are jelly-belly bean sized.  Itty bitty teensie weensie TINY.

A Hummingbird Tale

Once upon a time … (on Mar 25) … we spied a lovely little hummingbird lady on a nest right outside our front window. And she sat and she sat and she sat … on her two tiny eggs, until she hatched two very tiny babies (Apr2) – two very tiny, very hungry little babies. And she fed them and fed them and fed them. And she fluffed them.  And cleaned them. And little by little they grew (Apr7 - next three pics below).
Until, sadly, on Apr12, a bigger [bad] bird stole away the babies.  And we were very sad.  (By the way, all the chicken wire you see was our attempt to stave off this kind of a bigger bird encounter.  Darwinists, we are not.)

On Apr30, Mama came back and laid just one egg.  May2, she laid a second egg.
And now she sits and sits and sits.  And we wait.  And watch.  And hope for a happier ending.
Oh, and Mama lets me come much closer now.  Happy sigh.

Galaxy-ography: April edition

Hummingbird babies hatched and delighted us until they unexpected & sadly disappeared (likely nabbed by a larger bird).  Succulents and wildflowers flourished.  I scoped out a photo session site (for young children) and was somewhat dismayed to find my rather large rattlesnake friend.  Beach date in the middle of the week with my mister and Jane Eyre.



Pepperdine new student reception with the Teen (how is this even possible?!?).  Little Dude was rather enamored with the campus.  5 more pounds of Kauai coffee beans delivered: best way to start the day, par none.  Middle Dude got a new tshirt.  We let the boat out of the garage :-).  River bound.  The Teen powered down Ayn Rand’s Fountainhead and penned & submitted an essay in a week (in an attempt to win a scholarship). 



Every desert drive needs a stop at the junk pole.  Went to Vivian Maier movie.  Mixels are Little Dude’s current Lego fav.  And they make good Train markers for dominoes.  Middle Dude adds another snarky tshirt to his arsenal (this one for his weekly ultimate frisbee games).  I read a bunch of fairytale-ish YA fiction. 


Happily, Mama hummer came back and layed another egg (and a few days later, layed a second egg).  All is well in the world again.  And we reinforced the chicken wire around the nest.


all pics courtesy Samsung Galaxy

Game On …

Uh oh.  Messy hair is happening … Messy hair is prescient warning of imminent upset … And game over.  I’ll allow you to conclude who won and who didn’t.

Beautiful Life … on the Eve of Graduation :: Orange County Senior Photography

I still vividly remember meeting this young man in the check out line at the grocery store nearly 11 years ago.  And I'm having a very difficult time wrapping my head around the idea that he's starting college in the Fall.  Behold, a seven year old, all grown-up ..



Oh yeah.  I totally let my peeps chimp.