A bit of cheer

It was a dreary, stay-inside type of day here on the Bayou.  There was just enough drizzly rain to make meandering about the hillside most uncomfortable.  This is all well and good as I do have a number of projects to keep me busy.  This seems to be a most busy time of year with folks all wanting to purchase gourds and other handcrafted items as Christmas gifts.  My living room is cluttered with all sorts of half-finished art projects that really needed tending.  So I pulled a chair up to the window overlooking the Bay and  busied myself with several gourds.  Over the course of a couple of hours, I found myself staring out that window about as much as looking at the gourd that I should have been painting.

Right outside of this window is the arbor that has the Seven Sisters Rose growing on it.  While it is quite void of roses now, this past summer it was covered with the clusters of blooms.  This rose vine also provided a great housing area for a family of Cardinals.  The parent birds raised three sons to maturity and then moved to another area to nest again.  The three youngsters would still come to the rose vine to roost at night.  I watched all summer as their plumage changed from the drab brown to the splotchy red and finally the beautiful, brilliant crimson.  The youngsters had grown to adulthood within just an arm's reach of my window.

Today, one of the Cardinals came back to roost in the roses.  His feathers were all fluffed out to help protect him from the cold and rain.  I watched as he sat there.  He occasionally snatched some bug as it raced along the canes of the rose bush but mostly he just waited out the rain. His presence brought a bit of brightness to the gloominess of the day.  I do hope at least one of the birds will decide to bring a mate back to the old home spot to nest this next spring.  It will be fun to watch another generation of the Cardinals grow to maturity.