I spent Christmas day with the sparrow family this year.

A humble and yet heartfelt reminder of God's blessing was the sparrow's table. Mother Sparrow labored tirelessly to build a feast for her hungry and happy nest. They were peeping and fighting all night long with nearly no rest coming to them until just at the midnight hour. Some of them still believe in Santa and the other ones tease them that they are going to stay up all night to show them that he is not for real. The argument escalated into a fight and mother sparrow had to give them each a pluck with her right wing to calm them down and make them mind. They were quiet after that, not a peep out of them until the morning.
Father Sparrow was in the stores until the breaking of the day. They got tired, mother and father and wanted to sleep, but there was still all of that wrapping to do. Each little peep got a perfectly wrapped Walnut shell box with a bow on it filled with something heartsent and thoughtfully devised by father sparrow. He considers it his yuletide blessing to donn their holiday with a gift that bestows a prayer to God for them and an intention of his heart for their usefulness in the world. They tried to explain to me the meanings of the gifts, but it loses
something in the translation. All of the peeps seemed ecstatic to open the gift and see, a worm and a twig and a sesame seed and some of the other little items that he could stuff into a walnut shell. I really don't know how he found all of those shells the week before Christmas, with all of the stores so swamped?

I didn't know that you led your fledglings in sleet formation, said Mother Goose.

I didn't know there was a sleet formation. I said, surprised that she noticed our formations as I notice hers. You are missing 2 of the goslings, I mean Walkerlings, she continued. Alot to do, I said and I couldn't really continue the conversation. But I was grateful that the sleet formation was a new secret that Mother Goose and I could share on this dreary day.

2 Big red ants

Beat about 200 little black ants in the best football game I ever saw.
An earwig was dead on the ground when I was on my break the other day. Mrs. Bluejay had her eye on devouring those suckers whole, both the earwig and the ants that clung to it. She had no conscience about it and didn't even consider it gluttony to do so. I was sitting there at the table and bluejay decorum demanded that she wait until I left to pick up the tastey catch.
In the meantime, an entire colony of ants capitalized on the protective situation to their own advantage.Their entire colony would dine sumptuously because Mrs. Bluejay was kept from her hopeful prize. It took about 50 or so of them to drag the earwig in the direction of their hole in the cement about a foot or so from the seat where I sat. The other 150 were clearing the path and working rather diligently to do so. While I was watching, 2 large red ants came up out of the ground and one grabbed the earwig and the other seemed to immoblize 5 to 10 ants at a time. It looked like a game of football. the 2 red ants against the bunches of black ants. I had to leave before the end of the game. My break was over. I bet when I left, Mrs. Bluejay devoured them all.