Normally I’d be posting about Martinmas today, as yesterday was the night to head out on the traditional Martinmas lantern walks. Unfortunately, a trip to the indoor play place with our homeschool group last week got Eleanore sick. Every time we play at one, we end up sick. I don’t know what I was thinking. So, we had a quiet day at home. We did read our usual martinmas stories, but both girls were so tired, we didn’t even get to walk outside in the yard with our lanterns as I had hoped. A candle at dinner while we shared our meal was enough for this year’s celebration.
Even while dealing with runny noses and sore throats, we’ve all been having a wonderful time watching the birds outside our dining room window on the suet feeder. We’re using our National Geographic Field Guide to Michigan birds to identify them (perfect pictures that make it easy enough for even Eleanore to do so!)
So far we’ve seen male and female cardinals, red bellied woodpeckers, chickadees, blue jays, white breasted nuthatch, dark eyed juncos, male and female downy woodpeckers, tufted titmouse, and just today we spotted a carolina wren for the first time.
Eleanore’s been enjoying it so much that I decided to join Project FeederWatch. Once we receive our packet with materials, a calendar and poster, we’ll be keeping track of all the birds we see visiting our bird feeder and submitting the data to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for their research. They even have a homeschool guide!
And when we emptied a milk gallon yesterday, we couldn’t resist making another bird feeder. We cut a hole in it, punched a twig through beneath it, filled it with birdseed and hung it on the other side of our suet feeder. The nuthatches and chickadees are loving it!
as well as the 
.
