Birds and Trees...

About two months ago, I was startled one day by a "knocking" near the front door. When I went to investigate, I discovered this little bird pecking at the window next to the front door. We have no idea what kind of bird she is, but she comes daily now and notifies us of her presence throughout the day, by gently tapping on the window pane. She no longer limits herself to the front door, now she also pecks at the kitchen window and also the corner window in the family room. (We have tried unsuccessfully for over a month to get a picture of her, and finally today Jim succeeded!) We do not know what she sees inside the house, but she loves to let us know that she is "on the outside and looking in!"

In our backyard, we have 4 fruit trees. The avocado tree is small and will not produce fruit this year. But the apple persimmon tree (below) is loaded with fruit. This was a new fruit to us before we moved here, but we learned to appreciate the taste and are looking forward to later this fall when the fruit will be ready to eat. (It turns a bright red when ripe.)
Shortly after we moved to California, our good friends Steve and Doreen brought us a "welcome" gift that only "fellow africans" could appreciate--a guava tree! We actually planted it the week before our cold spell in January (when we had frost for three nights in a row), and were afraid that we had killed the tree. But several months later, this hearty little guava tree burst forth with leaves.
All summer long, we have been watering and nursing it along, and are pleased with the growth that it has made. Last week, as I was peering out the kitchen window, I noticed little blossoms on the tree!

I actually counted nine flowers on this little tree! We are amazed that the tree would bear fruit in this first year, but we honestly don't know how old the tree really is. It is just fun to watch the progress as this little tree grows.

We also have a little orange tree, that gave us a few oranges (very sweet and juicy) last winter, shortly after we moved into this house. The tree has a lot of fruit on it compared to its small size. We even had to prop up one of the main branches, as the oranges were weighing it down too much!