Though I am definitely in nesting mode here at the cottage, the title of this post refers to two other forms of nesting. First up, I looked out the window of my studio the other day. To my left, I can see a few of the branches of the Sugar Maple.
Now that they’re bare, I saw this (taken with my zoom lens):
A perfectly beautiful and well constructed bird nest It’s always amazing to me how these nests stay up there in wind and rain. We’ve seen a few more nests on the property – way up in the trees – as well as on our trail walks. One or two are, I think, squirrel nests.
Thought I hate seeing the trees bare before the end of October, I do love seeing what was once hidden revealed. By the way, not all of our trees are bare. There are still leaves on all of the oaks, which spurred me on to take a walk through our woods the other day to count them. We have eight! A few of them are rather young in age, but there are also several stately and grand oaks.
The other ‘nesting’ reference? My Squint Box arrived in the mail the other day and the theme is Nesting.
Starting from the lower left: a kitchen towel set, a rustic sign, dried lavender, a lunch bag snack with a sandwich, cookies, and fruit, ripened bananas with a recipe for banana bread, and a knitting basket.
Adorable and thoughtfully chosen by Darren. Thank you!
The best way to start the day today was a text from my sister with photos of my nephew, Little Z, in his Halloween costume. Oh my heavens, he is simply scrumptious! I could eat him up. I won’t give it away since I think Meredith will be posting about it tomorrow.
And a Happy 23rd Birthday to Meredith’s oldest son, who is away at school in Ohio! He’s a great guy, that one. I miss him!
Wait, I forgot: Happy Birthday, as well, to my brother-in-law Ron, Don’s little brother!
Today may bring some mowing. Maybe the last time? The grass is rather long, so I’m thinking we should tackle it.
Today marks the first day of what will be a daily reminder: VOTE.
Some of you are fortunate enough to have early voting in your states and I know you’ve already fulfilled your obligation and right as a citizen of this country. I have been eligible to vote in Presidential elections for over 45 years and I have never missed one. When I was away from home I voted using an absentee ballot. Your vote matters. The enemy of our collective power in the voting booth is talk of ‘rigged’ elections, or the belief that your state will automatically go blue or red, so why bother? Or using a false equivalency when comparing candidates. Do your research. Make a choice. Stand up for your rights.
This has been an unbelievably difficult and stressful campaign, I know. All the more reason to not become complacent, to not give in to voter exhaustion.
Not voting is unthinkable to me. I’m not exaggerating when I say I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t vote. And I will.
Happy Monday!
This nasty woman voted last Wednesday. I am looking forward to all the little goblins tonight.
Good for you, Brenda! Enjoy those little trick or treaters!
I can’t wait to see Little Z’s costume! Not sure what Tiger & Scout will dress up as. I know their yard is decorated as a graveyard and Tiger loves it! The neighbors are having a ‘spooky walk’ in their yard, so I might have to go check it out with Tiger!
Oh, that will be fun for Tiger and Scout!
I have been gob-smacked with an awful Fall cold. ugh. Lots of resting which really does help. So far no sign of the hacking cough I usually get, so I am thankful for that. We are to be in the 60’s here most of the week, and my rose bushes have several buds. Crazy!! I love finding the hidden nests in the tree when the leaves are gone, too. So far most of our trees are still pretty leafy.
Love your minis!! And we voted last week. I am happy to miss the crowds. First time we had to show ID’s…… voter fraud,,,, yeah, right. Have a marvelous Monday!!
Oh, no! Fell better, Chris.
Yes, the oft mentioned voter fraud that never happens – except by the Trump supporter in Iowa the other day.
Yes…the falling leaves do expose those hidden treasures for all of us to see! I’m looking forward to seeing Little Z’s costume…and all the little, and not so little, trick or treaters in the early evening hours. It’s hard to judge from year to year how many of them we will get. It seems so dependent on night of the week and weather. Do you get many trick or treaters your way? Time to get my pumpkin on…we plan on voting tomorrow! ;)
Gosh, I wish we had early voting in NY but we don’t! So we won’t be able to vote until Election Day.
No, we get absolutely no trick or treaters. We’re on a country/county road with no sidewalks. We haven’t had trick or treaters in years!
I always vote absentee, but we walk to the polls to deposit our envelopes, since my daughter wants to collect the “I Voted” sticker. I pointed out that she gets a “I Voted by Mail” sticker with her absentee ballot, but she wants both of them. She actually sticks em all over her cell phone. Our street used to be the street to do trick or treating, because I live in a circle where there is very little traffic so it’s fairly safe for little ones. But, now the local small shopping area has a store to store event and most families go there. I used to give out school supplies every year. My late husband thought the kids weren’t as receptive to pencils and rulers as they would be to candy. One year, I opened the door to a small group of boys and one was excitedly telling another, “Last year we got pencils. I wonder what they’re giving out this year.” The whole group of them loved the stencil rulers I distributed. There’s only so much candy one can eat…
I miss those stickers. We got them when we voted in CA, but I never get them here in my area of NY State. Maybe because we’re a small town? Not sure about that one.
I think it’s neat that you gave out school supplies, Wendy! Something practical and useful!
We all get to vote by mail in our state. I love nests, too. The tiny ones made by humming birds are so amazing. We recently found one low on a tangled mess of ivy and still haven’t figured out what bird owned it. How do they do this complicated task while no one watches?
I have no idea! I always wonder about that, too!
I love seeing the nest in your tree. So amazing what animals can do.
We voted last week in Texas. I’m so glad to see that the turnout here has been really large. Speaking of voter fraud, there are signs hanging at the polls here in Texas that state you must have a photo ID to vote and it’s not true! There are other options for people to vote in Texas that doesn’t have to be a photo ID. Makes me furious to see these signs up. And apparently they are not only in my area.
I’m nervous for this election but I am so ready for all of this to be over. Question is what will the world be like that we wake up in on November 9th…….that’s the terrifying part.
Have a most lovely day!
Can you take the signs down? Or complain to the police? If they’re not legal, they shouldn’t be there! Maybe the election commission could take them down?
Gosh, that kind of thing makes me SO angry! It is indeed voter fraud, but not the kind that Trump is talking about (that kind of fraud almost never happens.) I’m nervous too, but I am also, as I’m sure you are, so tired of the whole thing. I pray we have a good outcome, Belinda.
It has been brought to the attention of the officials in the county but the signs are still there as far as I know. Others are complaining. I pray they are down soon.
I do, too. That is simply terrible.
I’m in a conventional neighborhood…many houses all in a row with wide sidewalks…and we hardly ever have trick or treaters anymore. Maybe parents have thought twice about it in an uncertain world. I guess it depends on where you live. We have a well-attended community event for the children (games, food, prizes, free stuff) which they seem to prefer to go to on Halloween night rather than hitting the streets (although I surely do remember that crazed and fun ‘wildness’ of doing just that, back in the day).
I always remember Halloween for three things. 1) Santa Ana winds billowing my costume as we went door to door; eerie to be out at night and in the wind. 2) My mom did not like Halloween. Deeply affecting her youth, Mom’s beloved grandmother was almost killed in a very serious auto accident on Halloween { pedestrian, hit [and dragged] by a drunk driver in a big, heavy 1930s-era car}. 3) On a lighter note, after the school-sponsored costume dance [having grown ‘too old’ for trick or treating], my boyfriend of 2 years…we’d known each other since we were age 7…asked me to ‘go steady’ although we’d yet to hold hands or share a chaste kiss at that tender age of 12-going-on-13. It was a big night for this girl. A big deal. I was the envy of my friends!
Heavenly Squint Box. Love your bird’s nest; I never see nests.
Funny, I somehow wrongly thought Don didn’t have any family; was an only child. I have no idea why I got that impression or idea in my mind.
Have a good rest-of-the day, Claudia. Tomorrow, November 1; wow, the time…it doth fly.
We had rather magical Halloweens when I was a kid. I was brought up in a post-WWII suburb full of kids and we walked for blocks and blocks and it seemed like it went on for hours. Just a wonderful way to celebrate Halloween. I am so grateful I grew up in a time where we were safe and the thought of anything happening to us was simply beyond comprehension.
Don has a brother and he also has two half-brothers and a half-sister. His parents divorced when he was young and his dad remarried and had three more children.
It’s been interesting to hear about the various voting practices in other states. I just assumed every state had early voting or community polling places. Our state has already had a record early-vote turn out and it continues through this coming Friday.
The trick-or-treat route for our neighborhood does not come down our street, so my husband and I walk the dog over to the route and take in the scene. We are setting a temperature record today, mid-80’s, so it should be a very nice stroll.
Nice weather, Kaye! It’s going down below freezing here tonight, so I have to drag the porch plants back inside for the night!
Lovely miniatures!
We enjoy watching the magpies at the university build their nests in the spring and are always doubly impressed when we see the final product in the winter-bare trees.
I know! I think each nest is a little miracle!
Loved what you’re saying about voting. And over the weekend I heard the best reason ever – “Fascism rose in the 1930s NOT because it was strong, but because democracy was weak…”
PS – I should note that this was said by the Republican political strategist Steve Schmidt [an architect of Sen McCain’s 2008 campaign] who came out against Orange Adolf MONTHS ago – because it was crystal clear then that DT was a pathological liar, mentally-unstable, wholly unqualified & completely dangerous for the country.
I really like Steve Schmidt. He’s pretty no-nonsense and incredibly articulate.
Those nests are gems to find, aren’t they? I so cannot wait for next week to be over. I wish we had early voting, but not in PA. We were away over the weekend in a different part of the state and it was frightening how the entire area was pro DT. How blind can people be?
I don’t know, Vera. I am continually astounded by the level of willful ignorance. Reminds me of lemmings being led over a cliff.
What a perfectly built little nest…are you going to take it inside for your little nature collection?…or do they use them again?…This month’s Squint Box is just adorable…even ripe bananas to make banana bread!…and those tiny skeins of yarn…how sweet…I must check Meredith’s blog to see the little man in his costume…He always makes me smile…I will very definitely be voting…I will wait until afternoon so it is not as crowded, but I will be there….
No, it’s way up in the tree. But I would leave it there anyway. I don’t move nests unless I find them on the ground.
Little Z looked unbelievably adorable, I can tell you that!
That nest is beautiful Claudia. I wonder who made it? There’s no trash visible so it’s not the dreaded house sparrow which is good! I saw one murder a chickadee right before my eyes as he was taking over a nest. I almost cried.
Can’t wait for Tuesday to be over. I don’t think I can stand much more. So disheartening.
Deb
I am inclined to think it is a robin’s nest, but I can’t be sure.
I cannot wait for next Tuesday. It’s interesting: time in general seems to go so fast for Don and me – suddenly a week has gone by – but at the same time the days leading up to November 8th are passing by unbelievably slowly. How can that be?