Merry Christmas to All...

On Monday, our local grocery store posted a sign outside inviting customers to help themselves to the remaining wreaths, tree boughs and pine cones that had not been sold. I took two wreaths, two bundles of boughs and one large pine cone and placed them out on the deck. The boughs were placed between the branches of the bare lilac tree and the wreaths hung on the wooden privacy screen.

Anvil Cloud published a post yesterday about peanut butter and birds (you really must see it) so I cut up some apple slices, covered them with peanut butter and seeds and stuck them with wooden skewers into the spruce, pine and cedar branches. The protective cover of the boughs and the temptation of peanut butter lured the shyest of my bird visitors to pose on the branches. I enjoyed a wonderful show outside my back door.

"Buttons"

When I turned my back, the little red squirrel ( Cheryl D has named the squirrel for me...Red Buttons, Buttons for short!) made off with the apple slices and hoarded them in his little home in the neighbour's yard.

It is the time of gift giving, of feasting and celebration. There are no more grateful recipients than these birds (and squirrels) who are living outdoors in very severe conditions.

How many are your works, O LORD!
In wisdom you made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.

Psalm 104:24

This Psalm is a song of creation, sometimes called Adam's song, a song sung outside the closed gates of the Garden of Eden from which he had been expelled. Jesus Christ came to remove the curse of sin and as we celebrate His coming we can rejoice in the salvation provided for mankind and the world.

Merry Christmas to family, friends, bloggers and all others who stop by here this day.