Looking for pregnacy news?  See the post Kicking ‘n Screaming.

My husband keeps taking pictures and saying “you can put this in your blog.” I keep telling him to write his own blog. But, to keep a happy marriage, I’m going to oblige him from time to time and post some of his pictures.

Today’s picture is titled Yin & Yang. Sorry. No commentary on the forces of water and fire or feminine and masculine in constant, balanced opposition. The quick story is that we put a plastic mason jar lid on the floor of the bird cage with seed in it for the little chicks. For some reason the chicks like to sleep in the lid on top of the seeds. Whatever. Normally, they slept with their heads in the same direction, but my husband happened to catch them in this position and managed to get a picture.

This picture is a few days old, and the chicks are no longer small enough to sleep in the lid, but they still try some times. The older chick is flying now and is almost a full fledged parakeet, though he still tries to get his dad to feed him. The younger chick has started flapping his wings wildly and climbing the ladder. He should be flying in a couple of days.

The sad part about the chicks growing up is that they no longer like to be held while hand-feed chunks of fruit. I’ve actually enjoyed holding and feeding them and had started to get attached. Now that they don’t want to be held any more and are almost grown, I’m afraid that I will no longer be interested in them. They will become adult parakeets with absolutely no interest in me other than as a source of bird seed. We will have had less then a month of bonding, so it could be fairly easy to give the two young ones away. Any takers?

Fortunately, human babies stay interested in their parents for at least 5 years, 10 if the parents are lucky. After that, their friends and personal life are more important. But those initial years of having all life revolve around family can supply the time to build the mutually desired bonds that tie families together for life. If I’m lucky, my future children will be the kind of people who enjoy spending time with family but also want to move out and have their own lives as adults.