BurnsFamily Blog

When we removed all the scrub trees and overgrown landscaping a few years ago our pair of morning doves looked downright depressed and confused. Nowhere to land or explore. And the blue jays that used to “squawk” us awake every morning would fly in occasionally, but wouldn’t hang around for long.

We were worried that we may have made some sort in indelible mark in our “nature karma”, but we kept telling the birds that we’d build things bigger and better for them…soon. In reality, what do birds know about time anyways, so we didn’t bother trying to explain that the Master Plan had “landscaping” coming back in 4 years. But I digress…

This weekend, we took delivery of backyard trees and plants. We spent all day Saturday installing plants and laying down weed-blocking landscape fabric. As we were breaking for dinner a blue jay flew in and started checking *everything* out. It was a nice moment to just sit on the deck and watch him explore his new backyard. Exactly what we were hoping for. And if he likes *this*, he’ll go bonkers for what we’ve got planned for the side and front yards!

Sunday morning we were greeted with several birds chirping away like it was gonna go out of style. Neat! And the family of lizards (did we mention them before?) are running around checking out all the new textures and shady places. This has to be better than the arid, plantless dirt factory we’ve had for years back there, I’m sure.

This week, we get to finally install the drip irrigation (no more hand watering!), which has been patiently waiting to get activated since last July.