A Big Hug

Early this morning, I was awakened by my husband who said to me, "I really hate to wake you up but there's something I want you to see." My first thought, after having been awake most of the night with Olivia who was suffering with an earache, was, "This better be good."

Randy pointed out the window toward TEN Great Blue Herons across the pond. There were five more resting in the nearby trees and four more fishing near our bedroom door. Nineteen herons at once! More than we've ever seen gathered together on our property. We suspect that there were more, we just couldn't see all of them.


(Click on photo for larger view.)

Located within several hundred feet of our property is the 2nd largest Great Blue Heron Rookery in the state. The first night we moved into our home we were lying peacefully in bed after a looonnnggg day of moving boxes and furniture. We had the french doors in our bedroom open to the balcony which overlooks our pond. The full moon was shining on the water, the bullfrogs were croaking and it was such a beautiful night. We had just finished thanking the Lord for the beautiful home with which He had blessed us when all of a sudden we heard this horrendous screeching which to us sounded like a flock of baby pteradactyls crying! (Not that either of us had ever witnessed a baby pteradactyl crying --but we imagined that the sound we heard was JUST like their cry!) "Oh no, what have we done? What kind of a house is this? What have we gotten ourselves into?!"

The next day, our neighbors assured us that we were not being invaded by alien dinosaurs from another space-time continuum, but had actually heard the cries of baby Great Blue Herons calling for their mothers. What a cacophonous racket!!!

Since then, we actually look forward to the raucous noise they produce. It's sort of like a "comfort" sound for us!

What a nice "Hug" from the Lord this morning!