Jonas the Ornithologist

Jonas is becoming quite the avid bird watcher. His favorite bird is a Blue Jay, which is fortunate because there is a tree visible from our yard the is teeming with them most days. He likes to draw birds, especially interesting new sightings.
Today he spotted what may or may not be a Yellow Warbler. He saw it perched on a Black Eyed Susan in our neighbor's yard. He described it to me with such enthusiasm; as if it were a new ship in the Lego Mars Mission series. We set off at once to Google his findings. It seems that is was indeed a female Yellow Warbler, though it's somewhat late in the season for spotting them, I'm not sure what else it could be. He was pretty insistent that it was not anything like the other yellow birds that came up. We referenced our Birds Of Ohio library book, and the description matched well enough to satisfy him.

In the end it was decided that I got carried away and embarrassed him with my excitement, but that he would like to have a book to record his findings. Good thing I'm headed to Boarder's tonight anyway.

The impregnable cuteness of a girl in pigtails

There's something troublesome about how I feel when my kids look cute. It doesn't seem fair that if they sneak ice cream with sticky fingers, dirty faces, and a frumpy too small/too big combination of clothes that they picked out themselves and have since rolled in dead fish and mud puddles (or so it would seem) I am much less likely to let it slide as when they look cute to me. I am much less prone to loosing my temper and being snippy with them when they look more appealing. Is this my biology at work, the reason babies come out adorable with big eyes and helpless expressions and such, or is it something sinister? Should I feel guilty to acknowledge this phenomenon and use it to my (truly their) advantage? Perhaps I could purpose my perception to be always the same, or just better master my impulses so as to appear unbiased.

In truth I think this is fine and reasonable and unchangeable. But it does still worry me that I can feel so very different about this same little creature depending on the presentation. It's human nature to be sure, but that's doesn't mean I like it.