Ordinary days

I enjoy so many of our resident cardinals, mainly due in part 
 to  our neighbors having huge evergreen trees for cover

A day so wonderfully ordinary.  A perfect day if one was not aware of the ongoing drought.  The songs of the birds filling up the air, cool breezes.....even though the temperature is in the lower 90's, the droning of cicadas, dry dead leaves falling to the dusty, dry concrete-hard earth, a lot of the sights and sounds are more reminiscent from a scene of autumn than the first two weeks of  July.

Here I sit under the leafy canopy of one of the maple trees, softly brushing off an occasional red ant or small spider that finds its was onto my skin, witnessing a ruby-throated hummingbird streaking so close to my face that I hear its tiny wings humming.  "Seer-seer doop doop doop" chirps a perky male cardinal that's perched atop a rail post, proudly wearing his feathered cloak of bright red and hearing a robin's beautiful lilting song in the background.

Bathing beauty

Even the squirrels enjoy the "bird" bath.

Yes, it's been this oppressively hot.....

Red-breasted robin listening for an insect from the
 wet ground caused by the water sprinkler

I had the water sprinkler on this morning at 5:30 and enjoyed my devotions
and quiet time while the temperature was not too unbearable yet. This female
hummingbird was lapping up the water off the crabapple tree.....amazing