This is a Violet-Green Swallow perched on the edge of our roof outside of the schoolroom window. Isn't he pretty? There are tons of them around our neighborhood and they love to come out in the early morning and then again just before dusk - when the weather is soft and calm and all the little flying insects are buzzing around. The swallows dance through the air gobbling up all the pesky flying critters. They remind me of my favorite time of day back in Utah when the dragonflies and the house swallows would come out and dance as they ate mosquitoes and other buggies. I've spent hours watching the dragonflies and swallows, so finding a similar scene here in Washington was a tiny blessing for me. There aren't any dragonflies here that I have seen so far, but when the violet-green swallows dance, they also sing. So lately we have had the windows opened so we can hear them sweetly chirping as they fly by us.
The bigger kids and I will sit at the large schoolroom window and watch them dance through the neighborhood every morning. It was becoming a distraction during the kids' studying, so we changed our frame of mind and made it the main attraction instead. The two little boys are still too little to sit still and just appreciate our dancers, so they usually hang back and keep playing while we watch and listen. Dunks gets curious sometimes when the swallows chirp loudly near the opened windows and he will watch them intently for a few seconds before losing interest once more. That's what happens when you have the attention span of a goldfish.
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