Tag Archives: birds

winter solstice

It’s official: winter is here and Christmas is almost upon us! And believe it or not, I’ve watched almost all of my favorite Christmas movies, and I’m done making gifts. Done making gifts before the last hours of Christmas Eve, truly a miracle.

Under our tree is looking full this year, and the tree itself has a total of five strands of Christmas lights wrapped around it. At night it absolutely glows, and Dad has said on multiple occasions that it looks like it belongs in a movie.

I’m working on using every last day to post Christmas content on my YouTube page, because this seasonal aesthetic must be taken full advantage of!

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bird merch (launch day)

Exciting news: I’ve partnered up with Riley Mae and Mom to design some bird merch for Riley Mae’s YouTube channel, and yesterday we official launched it 🎉

I was excited to get to design some simple, straightforward birds that are now being printed on t-shirts, mugs, pins, hats, and more.

All of these designs were drawn directly from some of Riley Mae’s photographs, and then painted with black acrylic paint before I scanned them onto my computer and turned them into transparent PNG files that can easily be uploaded to all of our projects.

carolina wren, ruby-throated hummingbird, sanderling, blue jay, northern cardinal, northern flicker, turkey vulture

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the seaside

The fam and I returned from our 6 days of seaside vacationing on Tuesday, and ever since then I’ve been sifting through hundreds of videos and compiling them into aesthetic YouTube shorts (these are pretty much purely for my and my family’s entertainment, but there’s a slight chance that somebody else might enjoy them too).

I was originally throwing around the idea of making a longform video about the trip, but after spending the whole first day of the vacation capturing aesthetically-pleasing footage (think: sanderlings running along the surf in front of a pastel-pink sunset), my camera decided to throw a fit, mess with my SD card, and ultimately lose my gorgeous footage.

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snowflakes

Everyone who lives somewhere where it snows knows that there’s snow…and there’s

❄snow❄

Riley Mae tied some branches onto the bird feeder by the kitchen window; she set it up for photo opportunities, and it works perfectly because the birds will even come to the feeder while I’m sitting on the glider just a couple feet away from it. This is a little dark-eyed junco (left) and a house finch (right) a.k.a a Hollywood Finch

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learning FPP

Aside from watching the flowers grow, I have also been succeeding in catching every illness that Taylor brings home from the office (she hasn’t caught a single one, she just gives them to me). Which has meant that I’ve been making my health my #1 priority, since my immune system is obviously struggling at the moment (I allowed too much stress into my life, and it’s left me compromised). I’ve just survived a not-as-horrible-as-it-could-have-been-but-still-very-not-good case of what I suspect was strep, and thank God for essential oils and Epson salt baths.

But despite my body testing my patience, my mental health has been doing pretty well.

I’ve had to take a little break from work over the past few weeks (what’s new), since sitting hunched over my desk all day has exacerbated all my symptoms, so although I’m still taking orders (and have some patiently waiting in the queue), there will be a slight delay before I get to starting on them.

And if you find yourself starting to wonder: don’t her parents care that she’s not working?? Just know that I was originally very uncomfortable with taking more time off work (and also living with a much smaller income), and it was my dear mother who suggested it and encouraged it, because health and happiness are of paramount importance in our house.

it’s hard to pick a favorite, but the goldfinch is definitely one of them

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snowy day

For much of last week I was down sick, but honestly, I wasn’t even upset about it.

Morally I couldn’t take any more time off of work on my own (since I’d just gotten back to work after my little Christmas vacation), but being passed out with a beautiful sweaty fever for a few days forced me to take some real rest time. Which I really needed. Mentally and physically, I just hadn’t been spending enough quiet time with myself, and I had really been starting to miss it. If I’m being honest, I feel like I’ve been in go-mode since October, and although a lot of positive things have happened since then, I just haven’t had the time to simply allow myself to calm down. Or even process everything that’s happened.

So cue the 12-hours of sleep every night, lazy days, and wasting time while rotting — unshowered — on the couch with a weird feverish rash all over my body (Mom said it was nothing to worry about).

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the hermit

The other day I was sittin’ with Mom and Riley Mae and we were all watchin’ frogs sunnin’ in the sun. We watched as a little guy swam up to a rock, slowly streeetched, climbed up, and settled down into the damp mossy algae like a loafing cat.

“You know what I don’t believe?” I asked rhetorically. “I don’t believe that frogs actually eat. I mean, have you ever seen one eat? No, you haven’t.” Two minutes later this same little cozy frog launched forward and caught two bugs.

It was almost as cool as the time we saw a lil crayfish 3 seconds after Mom said “but we never see crayfish” and 1 second before Dad texted her “are you looking for crayfish?”

What are the odds??