Our hummingbirds arrived on May 2nd this year. Nice to have them back!
(Yikes! I am so behind in my ABC-Along ... )

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better than Patch in my yard the other day, I had another surprise visit today.

Count ‘em! FIVE BABY BEAR CUBS! In my yard/driveway! Two weeks ago they were sighted by my neighbor Luke, and also had their photo on the front page of our local newspaper when they happened to visit the community down the road from us, but I never thought they’d show up in my driveway! Last week Luke and I trudged up one side of the mountain and back down the other in search of this family unit with no success. Go figure.

You have to agree that they are just totally adorable. They didn’t stop to visit so I had to be quick and shoot the photos through the upstairs window (with screen) so the images are not as clear and sharp as I’d like, but at least I managed to capture them.

Look how eensy the littlest one is! I don’t know how old they are exactly, but I’ve had puppies bigger than this at 8 weeks of age! My goodness!

“Wait for us momma! We’re trying hard to keep up with you!”

And oh, as for a name ... uhm ... how about Myrtle? (As in Fertile Myrtle.) Luke has already named the cubs “The Fantastic Five” which I thinks fits them extremely well. I don’t know how usual it is for a female to have five cubs, but here they are!

I had a visitor yesterday afternoon. She made herself quite at home in my front yard.

“Ho, hum, I kind of like just laying here licking up seeds.”

“aahhhh ... time for a little stretch!”

“hey, did I say you could take my picture?”

“well, okay, go ahead then.”

“pretty, aren’t I?’

At first when I saw a tag in each ear and the darkish face of this bear I thought it was Minor, the cub from the year before. But after I looked up the photos of Minor I could see it was a different bear. The ear tags are in different spots. So, a completely new bear, and a young one at that. Probably a cub from last year turned out on her own.

I took these photos from the upstairs window that does not have a screen. She only looked up at me when I opened the window enough to get the telephoto lens of my camera out; she didn’t move an inch. She acted like she was right at home. She stayed until the mailman came by and he spooked her into the woods.

She came back twice more yesterday, the third time being after Rick had come home, so he got to see her. I had told him about the bear visits, so as he drove past the bottom on his way home he was looking for her. He saw her roaming around down there in the woods. Not ten minutes after he walked in the door we got a call from neighbor Kim alerting us to the fact that she was once again laying in front of our windows. We watched her for quite a while, but it soon became obvious she wasn’t in a hurry to move on. She scratched and pawed and found seeds that I think may have been buried all winter.  She did a lot of just laying there like an big, black, overgrown dog. Lazy bear. She reminded me of Doris who was always the lazy one and did the very same thing. I wonder if this is her daughter?

New bears have to be named. This bear had a distinguishing feature (other than the placement of her ear tags): a triangular patch of brown on her chest. So, by the authority vested in me by the black bears of my neighborhood, I hereby name thee “Patch.”

We’re hoping she’s taken up residence in our woods. Come back soon, Patch!

EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it! The word is finally out. Leaflets bearing the news are being distributed all across the townships and counties of New Jersey. Aided by the sun, wind, and rain, the leaflets are reaching a rapidly growing audience with their important news.

And what exactly do the leaflets say? Simple!

More...

My sister left yesterday and I accompanied her into NYC on the train. We parted there: she to make her connection to the train that would take her home to North Carolina; while I went on to meet fellow blogger Lettuce, who was visiting from across the pond—London. This was my second trip into the city this week as my sister and I came in to shop on Monday. Now that I am proficient at taking the train I wonder why I haven’t done it by myself before? (Kim, if you are reading I see a day in the city headed our way this summer!)

I’m sure you’ve seen Lettuce’s comments on this blog. I love her photography and her writing style. While she lives in a gorgeous brick mid-late Victorian terrace house in London, I live in a center hall Colonial house on 4 acres in rural, small-town New Jersey. She takes scads of photos of buildings and other other city related subjects, while I focus on nature and countryside. A perfect yin and yang. Plus, we share the mutual grief of us both losing our mothers last year. Tough stuff, that. She had many wonderful words of wisdom to share with me after the death of my mom.

It’s a bit strange meeting a fellow blogger. Strange in a good way, that is. You already “know” them from sharing your separate lives through blogging, so it’s not like meeting a stranger, yet you’ve never met them face-to-face before.  I am not a very out-going sort of person. I probably talk more and share more information about myself through my blog than I do on a daily basis with people I know. I am actually kind of shy. So it was a pretty big leap for me, but I did not want to miss meeting her. Who knew if the opportunity would ever present itself again?

We had arranged to meet at the Penn Station entrance at Madison Square Garden. She actually found me first even though I was looking all around. We decided to walk up to Central Park and chat along the way since she had not been there yet and might not get the opportunity to before she left. I was amazed at what she had seen and done over the two days that she’d been in the city. A food and cultural tour of Greenwich Village, walking across the Brooklyn Bridge and viewing the cherry blossoms at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens,  the Empire State Building (that very morning before she met me.) After our brief visit she was meeting her friend at MOMA and taking the Circle line boat tour of the harbor in the evening. Today she met up with more fellow bloggers and more sights. All of these things I have yet to do!

The weather this week has been absolutely glorious with sunny, warm days. Not a cloud marred the skyline. Just beautiful. A perfect day for walking.

Central Park was lovely. The trees are just coming into leaf with that new “spring green” color. People were out enjoying the above-normal-temperature day. We grabbed a hot dog from a Sabrett vendor and then sat down on some rock outcroppings for a bit.

Funny, I had always thought by her blog name (Lettuce-Eating) that she was vegetarian. Not so at all! If I had read her blog entries from the beginning I would have known where the title came from (sorry, Letty!). Not because she was a vegetarian at all, but because when she started the blog she was having difficulties sleeping and therefore ate LETTUCE for the sleep promoting qualities found in tryptophan. Note: (I have always called her Letty which, of course, is not her real name. I won’t reveal her real name here, but suffice it to say I had a hard time calling her by her “real” name. How silly!)

All too soon it was time for me to head back to catch my off-peak train. We parted with a kiss and a hug. I am so glad we had the chance to meet. Now reading her blog will have so much more meaning having met her in person. I hope she has a wonderful time with the rest of her trip, meeting up with old friends and other fellow bloggers. I can’t wait to read her blog on her return and see all the fab photos she took of everything she saw. I love seeing things through other people’s eyes. It’s fascinating; as is this land of blogdom. How very wonderful.