31.3.15

for the birds


At the start of the month, I peeked inside the three bird houses in our garden to make sure they were dry and in good shape for springtime nesting.  Last week, I still hadn't noticed any nesting-action so I decided to sweeten the deal by filling up our birdfeeders and decorating the trees with some festive nesting materials.


I remembered seeing this blog post in 2010 and thought it was a nice idea to wrap tree branches with wool roving, so my little one & I started our project by heading to the garden for a suitable fallen branch.  I set out the materials on the kitchen table and my little one was able to secure wool to the branch on his own.


After that, we went back outside and I tied the decorated branch to a tree. But it seems my helper wasn't finished yet...


He had the clever idea of tucking bits of roving and short lengths of wool yarn into the crevices of a few pine cones.


What I loved most is that I was able to give my son the materials and, with minimal guidance & assistance from me, he was able complete both these projects.


After he was done snipping bits of yarn and tucking everything into place, we went back outside and hung the pine cones near our decorated branch.


But it seems my helper still wasn't finished...


"What about making peanut butter pine cones?" he asked.  So we hunted down more pine cones and I set him back at the table with a butter knife, a bowl of peanut butter and a small bowl of seeds.


Another project which required minimal assistance from me...



We've been having fun watching the birds and squirrels eating the seeds and taking bits of wool. The naughty squirrels like chewing (and stealing) the yarn which ties the wool-wrapped pine cones to the tree, so every few days we hear the pine cones come crashing down onto the front porch, and last night some naughty squirrels stole the seeded pine cones, but we don't mind...  Do you have any favorite springtime bird-projects?

1 comment:

  1. how wonderful he can do it all by himself! I might just have to make some peanut-butter pine cones for our East Coast birds too! hugs!

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