Breakfast With the Sandhill Family

We had some breakfast guests this morning! Meet the Sandhill Family...mommy, daddy, and baby! These are Sandhill Cranes and they're everywhere around here. They are highly annoying birds to the natives around here, but we Texas folks think they're pretty darn amazing and we're fascinated by them, as you can see! The girls were outside eating donuts that were left over from a church event last night. Cary and I looked out the window and saw the girls feeding them pieces of their donuts, which I'm pretty sure is illegal, but the birds didn't seem to mind! And the mommy bird would take a piece and give it to her baby. So sweet! We thought they might not need to be eating donuts, so we got out some birdseeds for them instead and they ate that too. And for my Texas friends who are looking at this picture thinking..."Is that your neighbor's house behind you...where's the fence???" Um, yeah, fences aren't really a popular thing here in FL. I think it's bizarre too. Like my neighbors really want to look at the swingset, sandbox, and trampoline! Not sure why the no-fence thing is okay with people here. In Texas, you buy a house, it comes with a fence! You can't have without the other. It's like oreos and milk, peas and carrots, pizza and tomato sauce! So yeah, this has taken some getting used to for me. Having to walk the dog on a leash is getting old!

You may have to click on the picture to get a nice big, clear view!

They were covering their ears because these birds do make a very loud, squaky, pterodactyl type of sound, it's actually quite beautiful, but freaks out my kids. The birds had just seen Candice in the window so they were sqauking..."Big, spotted dog, about to eat us, fly, fly away, save yourselves..."