Heron Report and RIP, Martha.

I really haven't been able to walk over to the park and around it because of my sore feet.  But, I drove over there today and walked up close enough to get pix of the herons.  WOW!  It was really breathtaking!  (Of course I'm so easy!)  There were 3 juveniles in the two bottom nests and then in flew an adult to the top nest!  I never heard such a clatter as all 6 of those juveniles made in hopes that the adult would feed them. He made a couple of jabs at the middle nest, but I didn't see any feeding happening.  I'm wondering if there might be babies in that top nest!  It was really wild to see all these juveniles, though.  I can't believe I missed their baby stages.  The second pic is of another adult that was fishing over on the other side of the lake.  I got 51 pix, but I'm not going to bore you with all of them.  It was hard to choose the ones to share.  It's really cool that I got to see 8 herons; 7 at the nests and one fishing.  Wow!

I thank God for this treat, though!  I love these herons!  I'm so thrilled that our lake is a good place for their nesting.  I hope these will all stay and raise families next year!

Today was the funeral of a dear friend who Don and I used to see really often as we were walking at the park.  She and her husband were good friends and my heart aches for him and their family as they lose her. Her funeral was a celebration of her life and it was as close to that as we could get.  You can't get away from the tremendous loss, but she was such an awesome person it was easy to find opportunities to laugh and smile at her service.  (That was a good time to blow my nose and wipe my eyes from the tears that kept coming.)  I thank God for Martha Alford in our lives.  She was an inspiration so often.  Her husband, Tracy still is; God bless his broken heart.  Martha was 81 and she was recently diagnosed with acute leukemia. She didn't have a long battle, so that was good. I'll bet she enjoyed the herons at the lake, too; I'll think of her whenever I enjoy them.  RIP sweet Martha and, Tracy, hang tough!