They say a bird in hand is worth two in the bush...

The Zenaida Aurita most commonly referred to in Anguilla as the turtle dove is our national bird. It has a certain beauty and grace about it. I don’t know how I feel about one of these birds making their nest in one of my flower pots on the front porch though.

For the first two days I couldn’t understand why every time I started climbing the stairs to my porch a turtle dove would fly right pass me startling me each time. On the third day I noted that it came from the flower pot and that is when I discovered the egg which later became two eggs.

My heart melted and I decided maybe the turtle dove and I could coexist. All was going well until one day the turtle dove got confused and was just flying from side to side on the porch and I was trapped in the middle. I ran down the stairs and to the other end of the yard since I was scared it would fly into me.

Nash who was observing couldn’t stop laughing. The turtle dove then flew between the bannisters and appeared to be stuck. Apparently, Nash says that turtle doves will always provide a distraction to protect their eggs so I didn’t know if this was an elaborate ploy by the turtle dove. Apparently it was.

Fortunately, I made it indoors safely. Despite this setback, the turtle dove and I have still been able to co-exist. He has not displayed any erratic behavior since this day but I am still rather cautious around her.

I hope I am around to witness the little baby birds hatching. That would be so cool. Don’t you agree?

So for right now in addition to our new puppy 'Vision', we also have the company of this turtle dove. Life is just peachy :).

I hope you say yes to noticing and enjoying the small pleasures in life today.

The Newest Addition to the Johnson Family

In life nothing is constant. We grow, we change, we regress and even if we remain stagnant, things are changing all around us.

I say all this to say that it seems that I have gone from the viewpoint, ‘I hate dogs’ to ‘some dogs are ok if they don’t get too close’ to ‘we now have our very own puppy and I adore him.’ Yes, you heard it here first.

On April 08^th 2013, Nash and I visited the Anguilla Animal Rescue Foundation Shelter (AARF). There we were introduced to some beautiful puppies and I even held a few of them (yes, I still can’t believe how natural it felt for me to cuddle with a puppy). They were so cute and we liked so many of them. Unfortunately, we could only take one and we took a male long puppy known in the shelter as ‘Ra’. Isn’t he adorable?

 

The volunteers at the shelter were very friendly and helpful. We would like to extend appreciation to the staff and volunteers at the Shelter for making our first adoption so easy.

We have since renamed ‘Ra’ ‘Vision.’ Don’t ask where the name came from. We like itJ . We took Vision home with us and the funniest scene played out. Our neighbour’s dog which is a beautiful, friendly dog came to greet us as he usually does in the afternoon. He was happy and playful. When Nash took Vision out of the car, the other dog’s countenance changed. He stepped behind me, he looked at Vision and then he turned on his heel put his head high and walked right out of our yard and back to his. We laughed so much.

He even barked at us a bit later something he has never done before. Nonetheless, he eventually came back and we became friends again. However, he refuses to come close to Vision and is quite jealous and we have Vision in a secondary enclosed section of the yard. It will be quite interesting to see how this relationship plays out.

 

Vision is becoming more courageous each day but  he so sweet. We look forward to a fun time and many years with our new puppy. For other blogs on a range of topics, do visit My Anguilla Experience website at http://www.myanguillaexperience.com/.