Fun photos

Great Egret close up

Did you hear the story about????

Tree reflections at Higley ponds.

You can't see me........

This weeks photos

Flower found on the Salt River bank.

Red Mountain and it's reflection in the Salt River.

The cutest Burrowing Owl.

On a sad note we had to put down our little Katie this week.

So the name of my blog should now be 2catsandus but I won't be changing it.

No heaven will not ever Heaven be

Unless my cats are there to welcome me.

A new year

This year I thought I would pick a few of my favorite photos that I took during the week and share them with you. They still may be mostly of birds since that is what we do the most but I hope you enjoy my efforts.

These are my favorites of the first week of the New Year.

Mandarin Duck found at Kiwanis Park in Tempe

Harris Hawk taken in Usuary Park campground with my little point and shoot.

These are the birds we saw this week that we can add to our life list.

Come back next week, I'm going to try and post on Saturdays.

At some point in life the world's beauty becomes enough. You don't need to photograph, paint, or even remember it. It is enough. Toni Morrison

I've been enjoying a few a books the last couple of months, I really enjoyed The Help, The Big Year, The Christmas Sweater, Finger Lickin' Fifteen by Janet Evanovich and Sand in My Shoes Chasing the American Dream by Julian King.

Review

Looking back on 2011, we had a great year birding, a great year of travel and visiting family.

We added 60 new birds to our life list, we saw about 333 species of birds in 2011.

We have seen 84 species around Mesa, AZ since Thanksgiving.

We've enjoyed beautiful sunrises, sunsets and moon eclipses.

We checked off some National Parks from our bucket list.

We lost Boo but are still traveling with 3 cats.

We enjoyed being able to spend the holidays with my mother.

On to the new Year 2012, another year of birding and travel.

Let's all have a great 2012!!

"One of the wonderful aspects of birding is that it is endless. There's always some new place to go, some exciting new thing to find."

Olivia Snetsinger

(It's not just birding. it could be travel or just enjoying life.)

Happy New Year

I had a little fun making a New Year's card or cards.

You can let me know which was your favorite.

Merry Christmas from AJ, AZ

From Apache Junction

We have been doing a little birding and learning where to visit to find birds.

We have gone on a birding walk at Usary Park with a very good birder, Sandy who helped us a lot with what birds to look for and where.

When we visit Gilbert Water Ranch the birders we run in to there are very helpful with websites and birding spots too.

Here's a few of my bird photos many will be familiar to our TX birders as they are found there too.

I have tallied 74 species here in AZ so far, a couple of special birds are the gilded Flicker,White throated Swift, Red-naped Woodpecker and a leucistic Say's Phoebe. We see the Anna's and Costa's Hummingbirds, the Abert and Canyon Towhees, if we get lucky the Curved billed and Bendire's Thrashers(still looking for the Bendire's), and the Cactus and Rock Wrens. The one we want to get a closer look at and a photo of is the Ferruginous Hawk, we saw one on our bird walk, it's a beautiful bird and a lifer for us.

I watched the Lunar Eclipse Friday morning from the window of our RV.

We've gone to Mesa's Art Festival and went through the Contemporary Art Museum which had a show of bike art.

If you notice on the bottom of the collage above there is a saguaro on the ground which was caused by vandalism in the Usary Park. What a shame!!!

We've been enjoying our time with my mother and Ken has even made a couple of meals for us all.

Hard to believe Christmas is just around the corner, if I don't get another post up before then I would like to wish all my readers a Very Merry Christmas.