Backyard Nature Lesson, Part 2

We have four eggs in our nest:


And a mommy bird to sit on them!



I have learned that it will take 13 days for the eggs to hatch, then about 2 weeks for the babies to start leaving the nest, then another couple weeks before they can really fly on their own. So this nature show will go on through the end of June. And they may lay 2 more sets of eggs over the summer. However, I'm thinking I might move the nest after this batch-- it's risky enough going through this once with small children! I don't worry about my kids so much as other kids who come over to play. (Like tonight we were coming back from a walk and some kid that I had never seen before, probably about 9 or 10 years old, comes up to me and says "hey, can I play on your swingset?" This is the part of having a fabulous backyard that I've been dreading. Pretty soon my doorbell will be ringing constantly-- "can I play in your backyard?" And if I let these strange unknown neighborhood kids come I will have to watch constantly to make sure they don't break stuff or go in my garden or kill my baby birds or hurt my kids... Sigh.)

Tonight as we were going to bed Joey said, "I hope the mommy bird has a nice sleep."