I’m off to the beach and am not taking my blackberry or my computer.  I need a break from technology.  I’ll see you back here next week, with more bedroom updates and a gorgeous house tour.  But first, a bit about why my life is “for the birds.”

One of my favorite things about working on my porch, morning or night, is the “wildlife.” When things are quiet, like they are on my suburban street in the middle of a weekday, the birds are active, flitting to and fro as they go about their daily business.

Even with the dogs lounging at my feet, and my cat perched on the table like a lazy sentinel, the birds feel free to hop throughout my yard.

In just a few weeks I’ve come to recognize most of them.  There’s the robin, who is quite active, and probably is the owner of the nest behind my fence.

The handsome cardinal, who flies from branch to branch looking like a little sentinel, is harder to get a photo of…

Then there’s a larger, more unique bird, who makes graces my yard less frequently.  At first glance, he appeared to be black in color, until he flew off in a hurry, exposing a beautiful navy blue breast.  Any idea what he is?

The little brown birds are everywhere, and are the most brave.  Just yesterday I caught one of them on my porch, not more than 3 feet from my cat (who was lazily stalking it).  Needless to say I made an intervention, so that they both could live.

The foxes are a whole other story.  I always know when one is nearby, as the dogs take off on a determined rush to the back corner of the fence.  I walk over to peek, and inevitably – the young fox is there, in the backyard catty-corner to mine, looking over at us with a slightly fearful expression.  He’s (she’s?) amazing to watch, as he trots quickly out of sight, hopping over fences like a clumsy cat.  Every sighting brings me a little excitement, though.  I feel so fortunate to have just a few signs of wildlife in my suburban backyard.

For more animal cuteness, you must hop over to Posy the Porcelain Pig and see what precious little critter Mikalah photographed today!

Tonight:

I should have exercised after work.

I should have worked on sewing the drapes for our bedroom.

I should have worked on creating products for my shop that I plan to launch in the Fall.

I should have worked on a communications & marketing consulting project I’m doing for a furniture designer.

I should have written a blog entry.

I should have done some laundry.

I should have . . . done a lot of things.

*****

Instead,  I planted some flowers out front and did some weeding before the storms came. I smoked a steak on the grill.  I pet the dogs and cats.  I enjoyed dinner with Ryan, and then we took a long, leisurely walk in the rain to get ice cream.  We stopped along the way to watch a small-town baseball game. It was pleasant and relaxing – from the clinks of bats hitting baseballs, to the cheers from the handful of onlookers, to the warm raindrops falling on us as we walked.   Oh, and the ice cream.  That was more than pleasant – it was just sinful!

And now just look at the time.  Tomorrow night I’ll get to the “should’ves.”   Right now, aside from my day job, I’ve got a lot of projects going on – some paid, some unpaid, but all driving towards career goals.   I’m finding that it’s easy to work all night and all weekend on these things, because I’ve got deadlines I’d like to meet, but once in a while it’s nice to just spend time with Ryan, my biggest cheerleader.

And when I found myself feeling just slightly guilty for not having a blog post prepared, I thought “why not just write  exactly what I was thinking as I walked along the darkened trail with Ryan tonight?”