Birds Cross-Stitch

Day 9: There was more than one time during the stitching of this piece that I thought I'd never get it completed, although none so intense as when I started. I began with the birds and round nest in the center and had placed fewer than a hundred stitches and discovered that I could not tell where I'd put a half-stitch using one thread of light yellow and where I needed to put a full cross using two strands of the identical colour. I had had to have the pattern enlarged in order to distinguish the colour codes, but that didn't help as much as I'd hoped. Working the piece on 18-count fabric further complicated matters, and after a couple of weeks at that first nest, I laid it aside and moved on to other projects. Unfinished works have a way of nagging at my subconscious, though, and when I found myself needing a project I could lay down quickly so that I could attend a mischievous kitten, I said, "Eh, I might as well work on the birds." Toward the end of the first nest, I realized that I needed to work all the full crosses of any given colour first. That way, there was no possibility that I'd cross a half-cross unintentionally. I chided myself for not thinking of that earlier, and from there, the work proceeded more quickly than anticipated. I still had trouble reading the pattern...black n and dark blue n were horrendously difficult to tell apart!...but soon, I had the nest and the house immediately above it done. Then I moved on to the birch house in the upper right...the one topped by a "haystack"...thinking to get one of the hardest bits over with before my patience ran out. Oddly enough, it went quickly. Once I really settled in to working on the embroidery, each nest and its birds took roughly 3-5 days to finish. The frame was delivered yesterday. I hung the piece above my desk, one of few pieces of stitchery I've kept for myself.

One Bird To Go

Day 362: When I started this piece, I honestly wasn't sure I was going to be able to complete it. My vision is no worse than it was a couple of years ago, but it has always been poor even with glasses. I had a friend enlarge the pattern, but even that wasn't much help because the kit dated back to when patterns were only printed in three colours (black, red and blue). The canvas is 18-count Aida, and lemme tell ya, even if it was 11-count, it's not easy to split four threads seven way when you're doing backstitch, and damn near impossible on anything finer. That's what you get when you have computer-generated patterns with no relation to the physical impossibility of performing a task. That said, I have one bird and its nest to go, and then this piece will be ready for framing. It is the last of several kits which were passed along to me by a friend about eight years ago, and the only one I have kept for myself.

Screen Change

Day 328: It's time to change screens again, which is to say the embroidery hoop has to be moved to a fresh section of canvas so I can work on the next part of the design. As arthritis makes holding a hoop more painful as I age, I seldom use one larger than seven inches. I've tried various types of stand, but all of them have one major drawback in that it is never easy to change colours. When you're working on something as detailed as this, you have to do that a lot. With a hand-held hoop, it's simply a matter of flipping it over, finishing off the current colour and attaching a new one. With a stand, you have to remove it from whatever type of clamp holds the hoop or alternately, loosen the clamp, reverse the work, add the new colour, turn the work rightside-up again and then retighten the mechanism. Or I suppose you could get out of your chair, get down on your knees and approach the solution from the underside if you were truly a glutton for punishment. None of these methods works for me. With the advent of computer-generated patterns, colour changes after three or four stitches are more common (sometimes they will be the only stitches of that colour in the design), but on several occasions, a kit has shown only one stitch...one lousy stitch!...of a different colour. Yep, it's times like those that I much prefer a hand-held hoop. And no, using an established colour instead is not something I would ever consider. Another thing: I'd like to take a sledgehammer to whatever program tells you to do backstitch in black over black cross-stitches. Technology was supposed to make our lives easier, not give us more nonessential work to do.

And A Bird Flock In A Fir Tree

Day 72: It's not a pear tree, and there isn't a single partridge in it. It is a fir tree (artificial), and it has at least a hundred and fifty birds in its branches. I haven't counted, but I can confirm that three dozen of them were originally toppers for swizzle sticks, scored at Pier One Imports and repurposed by means of glue and paint to become ornaments some forty years ago. Most of them are wooden, although the census includes ceramic, resin, feathers, metal, glass, shell and felt. Many have particular personal significance, such as Cocoa's ornament (center) which represents my Cockatoo, the love of my life, gone now over twenty years. His avatar is always the first to go on the tree...always. Carlo, my husband's parrot, is also represented, as is Friend, a special Evening Grosbeak who shared my home for a little over a month as he healed a broken wing. There are a few other creatures among the flock of birds: sheep, a caterpillar, cats, a beehive, but anyone who comes to my home knows immediately that birds have a special place in my heart.

Corn Cob Birds

Day 60: Many of the ornaments on my Solstice Shrub are at least partly hand-made. In this case, the birds were store-bought, but I designed and created the corn cobs by beading them over a felt core tightly rolled around real cornhusks using #6 beads. Later, I took the process to extremes and made tiny end-of-thumb sized baskets, each holding three corn cobs made with #13 beads, so small that a standard beading needle wouldn't pass through the hole. Now as you might have guessed, my tree is full of birds of all sorts: resin, wood, felt, terra cotta, ceramic, metal. It's no wonder the chickadees sit on the shepherd's-hook outside the window looking at them. I'm sure they'd love to come inside to join the flock.

Mis Libros Favoritos

Day 9: Estos son mis libros favoritos. ¿Por qué? ¡Porque los puedo leer en español! Yes, I'm working on Spanish again, and I'm progressing far better than with any previous attempt. Why? First of all, I have been using several different methods of learning, including DuoLingo's quirky, semi-functional website, as well as following several "comprehensible input" teachers on YouTube. I refer to Google Translate for pronunciations and definitions of unfamiliar words, and sometimes type in paragraphs so that I can read them aloud along with the robotic voice, improving on its inflection. However, the thing which is making the most difference in my learning curve is that I am reading books on subjects dear to me, specifically birds, plants and the sciences. Relevance matters! I am not the least bit interested in hotels, taxis and airports, but I find that I retain more if I can infer meaning from context when reading that a bird's wing ("ala") is flat ("plana") on the underside ('por debajo") and curved ("curva") on the upper surface ("por arriba") so that the pressure of the air which passes over the top is less than that which passes underneath, thereby giving the bird lift. This is what is meant by the phrase "acquiring a language," as opposed to learning its grammar and vocabulary by rote. I'm sure I will have many more opportunities to discuss the fact that a fifth of a bird's body cavity is occupied by air sacs than I will have chances to repeat DuoLingo's phrase, "My dog doesn't shower every day."

Tvistsöm Birdies

Day 183: My tvistsöm birdies have been waiting in the wings to be mounted until I could finish up a second project which was going to use the same chartreuse bias tape. I was afraid I might not have enough for both pieces, and since I had bought it to match the colour in the larger one, the tvistsöm had to take a back seat until I ascertained how much I had to play with. I wound up with a one-inch scrap at the conclusion. These little birdies, as you may recall, are worked on 18-count canvas. The technique is tvistsöm, also known as "long-armed cross stitch." I hadn't done any in a long time, and figured it was time to make a piece for myself. The basic pattern for the birds is from the only English-language book I have ever been able to find for tvistsöm, but of course I changed it up a bit to suit my purposes: using different colours to suggest a variety of bird species, lengthening and shortening the various branches, adding leaves and flowers of my own invention and so on. Long and narrow, it was designed to fit the 6" section of wall space between the frames of the bathroom door and the linen cupboard. That's my "seasonal space," and now with the birds in their tree for spring, I have summer (sheep in krokbragd), autumn (acorns in hardanger) and winter (poinsettias, also in hardanger). For a person with no Scandinavian ancestors, I do tend to lean toward Swedish and Norwegian fiberarts!

The Bird Tree

Day 67: I'm sure if you'd given it a moment's thought, you could have guessed that my Christmas tree would have a strong natural history theme, and you might also have assumed that the decorations would be mostly birds. There are a few cats, some sheep, a couple of frogs, a caterpillar, snowflakes and icicles, but other than a very small handful of the traditional balls which were gifts from friends, at least 90% of the total number of ornaments are avian. Cardinals dominate by virtue of being associated with Christmas already, but there are other recognizable species: Canada jays, nuthatches, chickadees, parrots and cockatoos. There are carved wooden birds from Bali, stylized birds which I harvested from cocktail stirrers, glass birds, resin birds, feather birds, little birds, big birds, birds in nests, birds in straw houses. I've never counted them, other than 38 similar wooden birds which get packed away together, but there must be something in the neighbourhood of 200, maybe even 250. And they take forever to hang, and almost as long to put away in January. Sure, I could simplify decorating by weeding some out...and I could lighten my grocery bill by not filling the feeders quite so often. Nope, not gonna happen, not in my world.

Tvistsöm Scaled Down

Day 53: In contrast to the tvistsöm embroidery I am working on a handwoven table runner at roughly eight stitches per inch, there little bitty birdies are set at 16 stitches per inch, and my old eyes are protesting the scale. There was a time when I could do counted-thread work including cross-stitch, hardanger, and especially drawnwork over two threads on 52-count canvas without a magnifier, i.e., at 26 stitches per inch, but no longer. Sixteen is about the best I can manage now, 18 in optimum light, and even so, I have to take my glasses off and hold the cloth a mere needle's-length from my eyes in order to see the holes. And no more working on dark fabrics! That said, this would not have been my first choice of canvas or thread for this particular project, but apparently three-strand crewel yarn is a thing of the past, now only available from hoarders on Etsy and Ebay, specialty producers, or in dedicated kits. Floss it is then, and if I look cross-eyed in my next selfie, you'll know why.

Paint A Mile Of Canvas

Day 227: They say once you have "painted a mile of canvas," almost anyone will notice that their skills have improved. I have now illustrated over 30 birds and a small handful of flowers in addition to making a portrait of my kitty, and I am definitely becoming more familiar with what to expect from the various media I'm using in my sketches. I'm still exploring "style" and am discovering that it may need to be flexible when working with different subject matter. Inking a few feathers on a bird is one thing; applying it to a flower's center is another. I have yet to attempt watercolours seriously, having only recently begun to accumulate the hues I want in my palette. These were rendered in Prismacolor pencil and watercolour pencil, a combination I am coming to appreciate more and more. From the top left: Downy Woodpecker (possibly my best work so far), California Scrub-Jay, Red-Breasted Sapsucker, Northern Flicker, Western Tanager.

Yard Birds

Day 205: I don't want to bore my readers with too many posts of my sketching attempts, but on the other hand, I'm rather proud of what I've accomplished with the help of "Laws Guide to Drawing Birds." Each of these was based on a photo I've taken of the respective species: American Goldfinch (Spinus tristis, formerly Carduelis), Chestnut-backed Chickadee (Poecile rufescens), Purple Finch (Haemorhous purpureus), Pine Siskin (Spinus pinus). In the case of the female Purple Finch, I changed up the background to reflect a behaviour I observed recently. Several Purps settled in on my blueberry bushes in late afternoon and began plucking the blossoms! Cornell advises that they consume nectar by biting the base of the flower. The bushes are now netted and outfitted with mylar ribbon, and now I understand why I didn't get many blueberries last year. The drawings were executed in a combination of ink and coloured pencil, and the wing detail in the Pine Siskin was a real challenge to maintain.

The New Kid

Day 66: We do not have Cardinals in Washington. That said, I love them and my friends know it, so many years ago, one of them sent me an adult male. Or so I thought. Female Cardinals are brownish. In fact, a novice birder might mistake a female for a Cedar Waxwing. However, I was in for a surprise. After several years of caring for the adult "male," I entered the nest box one Christmas and was startled to discover a fully-feathered fledgling (also male). I named the youngster "Pik-pik" and took to referring to the adult as "Mom" despite physical evidence to the contrary. Pik-pik and Mom have returned every subsequent Christmas and roost among the holly on my mantel.

Now either I need to go back to school for a biology refresher or the field guides need to revise their descriptions because last night, another fledgling appeared in my little family of "males." Clearly, something is going on here which I do not understand, but I most certainly welcome it. You can never have enough Cardinals.

You Know The Drill

Day 41: You know the drill...or do you? Can you identify who's been pecking your trees by looking at the holes? Red-Breasted Sapsucker (frequently misidentified as a "red-headed woodpecker" by novice birders) typically drills horizontal lines of evenly spaced holes as shown in the image on the left. Contrary to common belief, Sphyrapicus ruber can't be blamed for killing trees. These birds are drawn to wood which has already been weakened by other stresses (disease, drought, detrimental bugs). Although the name suggests that these birds might feed exclusively on sap, it has been shown that they often drill holes without feeding, and return later to dine on the insects which are drawn to the exudate. Sapsucker likes his bugs sweetened!

Northern Flicker, Colaptes Auratus

Day 86: While walking through the snowy, dim stillness which is Longmire's wintertime Trail of the Shadows, a small movement drew my eye to the base of a tree and caused me to stop my walk until I could identify its source. It was no easy task, the light dimmed by overhanging cedar boughs, but when a few seconds later, a bit of brown-flecked "bark" moved again, it revealed itself to be a Northern Flicker, foraging in a cavity. Intent on its business, the bird plunged its head time and again into the hole, emerging after several probing thrusts with its beak to look 'round for potential predators. It must have felt I wasn't dangerous, because it allowed me to move closer until I had a clear view through the lens, although it continued to perform its safety checks between bouts of searching in the hollow until I moved on.

The bird we call "Northern Flicker" is a member of the woodpecker family. Colaptes auratus is further broken down into "Red-Shafted" and "Yellow-Shafted" members (western and eastern variants respectively). Our Red-Shafted Flicker males can be told from the females of the species by the bright red malar ("cheek") marking. In flight, these birds reveal reddish underwings and the distinctive "beat" which gives them the name "Flicker."

Tie-Tack Sparrow

Day 46: Summer or winter, Tie-Tack Sparrows are frequently seen at my feeders. Ooops! That would be Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia, identifiable by the convergence of reddish-brown feathers centrally on the breast, i.e., the "tie-tack" reference in the whimsical name I use for these charming little birds. Novice birders often mistake them for a female Purple Finch, but the tie-tack should end any mystery. Easier to identify by its voice, Song Sparrow is true to its name, singing a complex series of single notes and trills.

Contrary to popular belief, recent observations world-wide are proving that the females of many species are also singers, at least those which live outside urban environments. I can't vouch for Song Sparrow, but there is never a shortage of bird-song in my yard.

The Guy With The Racing Stripes

Day 177: Several species of sparrow come to my feeders during the summer months, notably Song Sparrows (back), the guys with the racing stripes (White-Crowned Sparrows, front), and although they haven't shown up yet, Golden-Crowned Sparrows as well. Today seemed to be bath day, every puddle hosting a bird or two. The juncoes and jays were also active, as were half a dozen Spotted Towhees and much to my delight, a couple of Rufous Hummingbird females. Time to lay in a good supply of seed!

Fables And Feathered Friends

Day 98: The Russian language has always fascinated me. I suppose part of its appeal lies in the Cyrillic alphabet's unusual characters, several of which look like Roman letters but have different pronunciations. Over the years, I have made several attempts to learn the language, but with no way to practice with another person, I've only come to the point of being able to limp through reading simple children's stories silently to myself and singing a few folk songs. That said, in the process of building up a small library, I also accumulated a nice collection of trinkets and china made in the old USSR, as well as an electric samovar which had to be rewired for US current.

Birds are a recurrent theme in many Russian stories, most notably the Firebird, a magical creature somewhat similar to the Phoenix, but smaller birds also play roles in many tales. They may be messengers, magical or otherwise, interacting with humans, or they may simply be anthropomorphized characters who join with other talking animals in the traditional style of the fable to accomplish a task or teach a moral lesson.

Birds are popular in design and decor, and as toys such as the key-operated wind-ups shown here. The three smaller birds in the photo shuffle along on their feet, pecking the ground as they move. The larger one's tail and wings flutter, and its head turns from side to side as the beak opens and closes.

January Porch Parrots

Day 81: A mob of porch parrots showed up a few days ago, cleaned the feeders and left as swiftly as they had arrived. I didn't see them again until this morning when a flock of a dozen, both males and females, appeared within seconds of the time I laid out the seed. They have my feeders marked on their maps, but January visits from these beautiful birds are scarce, and always bring me great pleasure.

"Porch parrot?" I hear you asking. Blame my late husband. He dubbed them "parrots" for their huge beaks, and when Mt. St. Helens blew in 1980, hundreds of them were shifted off their normal flyway and into our yard. When the windowboxes filled with them, the "porch" part of the nickname was a logical extension. Technically, they're Evening Grosbeaks (Coccothraustes vespertinus), a robin-sized bird which some say resembles a Goldfinch on steroids. During mating season, that big beak turns a vivid chartreuse green, making them even more colorful. Their call is a somewhat petulant, inquiring "Churp?" and a sound I recognize as my cue to lay in a few hundred pounds of black-oil sunflower seed to keep them happy during the spring and summer. This bird is a male. The females are greyish-green.

The Spirit Of The Season

Day 56: The tree is up and decorated, the house smells of freshly baked cookies, the wreath is over the mantel and the jingle bells are on the door; I'm over halfway done with a second shawl (a gift), plus I made this lovely card for you, my friends and followers, to wish you all the best for the holiday season, however you elect to observe it. Don't forget our little feathered neighbors while you're thinking about goodies!

The House Of Chirp

Day 260: Once again the swallows have raised a successful clutch in the House of Chirp. This year's tenants are a pair of Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor). They seem to have a time-share arrangement with the Violet-Greens, although I haven't been able to follow their annual occupancy schedule. As for the kids, I've only seen a glimpse of the top of someone's head at the door so far, but it won't be long now before sweet little faces pop out to await feeding. This morning, Mom and Pop were both on the wing, hunting up bugs for breakfast. They waited patiently on the phone line while I filmed, despite the horrible fuss the little ones were making.