Birds! Oh the Difficulties.

Let me just say I admire anyone who is a birder. Mr. Webb, I respect you so much. For some reason identifying plants comes way easier to me than identifying birds. I'm getting there I promise. I have over 28 birds to learn by "next week". I've broken them up and here's my first seven:

1) Snow Goose Chen caerulescens (Anseriformes Anatidae)

As far as I can tell, I should look for the white body, orange beak with the black "tooth" line, the black wing tips, and the bigger body.

I need to identify the call of this one too. If anyone has tips on that . . well let me know.

2) Ross's Goose Chen rossii (Anseriformes Anatidae)

This one looks a lot like a snow goose - white with black wing tips, orange legs and bill - but it's smaller and has a shortened beak and more of a squashed head. It's easier to identify when they're side-by-side.






3) Canada Goose Branta canadensis (Anseriformes Anatidae)

Everyone seems to know this bird but me. I know I've seen it, but I'd never be able to tell you that's what it is. It has a black head and bill and a brown body and has the white "stripe" under the eye and head.

I have to know this bird by call too.


4) Greater White-fronted Goose Anser albifrons (Anseriformes Anatidae)

Ok. A small picture, I know. This goose has an orange bill with white right above it. It also has something called mottling - which I honestly don't . . . .  know about yet.

5) Brant Branta bernicla (Anseriformes Anatidae)

A brant has a brown head and top of body with a white neck ring. The bottom of the body is white.

6) Tundra Swan Cygnus colombianus (Anseriformes Anatidae)

So a Tundra Swan is a large bird that I can only describe as "graceful" looking. It has a long black beak with a yellow patch (hard to see in this picture) under the eye.

7) Wood Duck Aix sponsa (Anseriformes Anatidae)

I honestly think this bird is pretty. It has a brown chest with white spots. The male has a green head and a bright red eye. I think the male has some blue on the wing too but I'm not really sure. There's some pretty white stripes dividing clear areas of color.

My Step Into Controversy

So I usually avoid topics that I think are controversial. Not because I'm scared to proclaim my beliefs. I just don't enjoy how angry people can get when they come up. Anyway, this is me dipping my toe in the ice cold water. I won't summarize the podcast. Maybe then whoever reads this will actually listen to the podcast. The Science of Violence Now, I wish I could say I went into this and had my mind changed, but let's be honest. He basically just provides the science that backs my previous beliefs. Not gonna lie, I was worried I'd go into this and have to change some of my ideas. No such thing. Turns out I'm "right". 3 points he covers: Gun control, Disabilities, and Violence in Media. Controversial? Yes? Am I finally right about something? Yup.

Darn Socks

So about a third of my socks are holy. Teehee. Probably another third are holy . . . but have been darned. I never actually learned how, so it's not real darning, but I just sew the holes closed. That's my idea of fixing the problem. Funny enough, I don't darn my socks because I lack the money to throw them out and get a new pair of socks. Instead, it's a random combination of love for the brands of socks I already have and the fact that it actually takes less time for me to sew them closed than to go to the store and buy some more. By the time I've treked to Walmart to get groceries, I've forgotten that I need socks.

Once There Was A Snowman!

Last night Andrew and I made our first snowman together! It was actually the first snowman I've made in a long time and it sure was harder than I remember it being. Nevertheless, our snowman turned out great and I wanted to post the video and took of it. It's going to be so fun to show our kids these videos one day. ;)

Buffalo Chicken Soup

You've got to try this amazing soup. Mom, Sierra, and Caiden might find it too spicy for them though so . . .  oh well. Andrew and I love this soup and it's one of the few dinners I've made multiple times. I always half it because I never have enough ingredients for a full batch, but here's the recipe for a full batch.

Ingredients:

• 6 cups half-and-half
• 3 cans condensed cream of chicken soup
• 4 cups shredded cooked chicken
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 cup hot pepper sauce (any works fine but I seem to prefer the buffalo flavored sauces)
• 4 diced carrots
• 3 diced celery stalks
• 3 peeled and cubed potatoes
• 5 oz crumbled blue cheese (even if you don't like blue cheese it melts into the soup and gives a great flavor. Andrew doesn't like blue cheese, but he dutifully allowed me to mix it in and he loves this soup. All I'm saying, is give it a try.)

Directions:

1. Combine all of the ingredients (except blue cheese) in the crockpot.
2. Cover and cook on low for 5 hours.
3. Add blue cheese (mix it in) and cook on low for 1 1/2 more hours.
4. Let it cool a little bit and then enjoy!

We like to eat it with tortilla strips. They go great with it! My mouth is watering just thinking about it. You may also want to add more hot sauce afterward. I know it looks like a lot of hot sauce, but it actually turns out pretty mild.

Gingersnaps

So after I gave away gingersnaps to a few people, they wanted to know what recipe I had used. Technically I used one from Allrecipes.com but I changed it, so I'm just going to put what I used here.

As a note, these are super easy to make and you're going to want to double or triple the batch. Trust me. The recipe makes fewer than you'd think.






Ingredients:

• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1 egg
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cloves
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1/3 cup white sugar <- this is for decoration and kinda acts like flour to help against the stickiness so you'll probably need more than this and it's totally an imprecise measurement.

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
2. In a large bowl, mix together brown sugar, oil, molasses, and egg. 
3. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda, salt cloves, cinnamon, and ginger
4. Stir the flour mixture into the brown sugar mixture
5. Roll the dough into 1 1/4 inch balls. This is going to seem really difficult and you're going to get messy. Utilize the sugar. You really can roll them, just make sure your hands are covered in sugar as they get stickier. The dough clings to itself so cover the parts stuck on your hands in sugar and you'll be fine. 
6. Once you get a ball of dough, roll it in sugar and place it on an ungreased cookie sheet.
7. Do that for all of the dough, keeping the balls 2 inches apart.
8. Bake for 10-12 minutes in the oven (or till the center is firm). Keep an eye on them. I started to burn the bottoms of mine (still tasted great though) so the time will probably vary a lot by oven.
9. Cool on wire racks and enjoy!

They're really good cookies and truly easy to make.