The winter Avian Avenue Sidewalk Sale is coming up this weekend, and this time I'm actually buying stuff. So far, this is my list:

TOPs Crumplets and one or two food dishes for Sydney from My Safe Bird Store
Toys from Things for Wings--I haven't decided which toys yet, but I think this will be where I'll be spending most of my money
Soap from Quaking Canopy

I'm also going to let my parents know that a couple of the things on my Christmas list will be on sale this weekend. I may also add another store or two to my list and spend a little less at T4W. I'll also be ordering something for my secret Santa.

If I had an unlimited supply of money to spend, there are at least seven or eight stores I'd like to buy from, but that's just not possible, especially considering that no fewer than 4 of those stores are in Canada.

The paycheck I receive this week should be bigger than usual because of how many hours I worked last week (black Friday weekend). I also got my last paycheck from the zoo today. It was really small because it was only for one day, but I think I'm going to use every bit of it for the birds.

Last week I won a contest put on by The Cozy Nestbox. The prize was three pounds worth of palm nuts. I'd been wanting to get some palm nuts for ages, but I'd been putting it off. So, when The Cozy Nestbox did a contest, I entered. And I won!

The palm nuts came this morning. I was so excited that I immediately washed them and got Digby and Lenore out. Digby and Lenore LOVED them! I got three different kinds--Christmas palm nuts, queen palm nuts, and fan palm nuts. I got the first fan palm nuts of the season, and I'm so glad they surprised me with them. They're just the right size for lovebirds.

At first, Digby and Lenore didn't know what to do with them, so I got them started. They tasted all of them and then played with the biggest one, a queen palm nut, for a while before deciding the fan palm nuts were amazing. They fought over and destroyed the fan palm nuts. They didn't like the Christmas palm nuts quite as well, but I think they were just distracted by the fan palm nuts.

I gave some to Sydney, but she was afraid of them. I also gave some to Irwin, but he wouldn't try them.

Not too big for me!

Lenore with a Christmas palm nuts

Sharing a fan palm nut for a moment

Give it back, Digby!

(I started writing this a few of months ago and just never posted it, so keep that in mind.)

After many months, I have finally figured out how to tell exactly what kind of toys Digby and Lenore will like. I'm still working with Sydney--she finally started playing with toys a couple weeks ago. I've compiled a short list of things found on favourite toys of Digby and Lenore.

1. It must have something natural that can be shredded. The current favourites here seem to be raffia and crinkle paper. Really, though, any kind of paper is good.

2. Wood is a big plus. This is new. Up until this past week, Lenore was the only one who wanted wood, and he only wanted balsa wood. But the other day, I discovered that Digby is a wood fiend. I had a wooden swing that came with a playground that was hanging in Lenore's cage for months because Digby was afraid to sit on it. When I put them in the same cage, I put that swing in there too. Digby loves it and will sit on it everyday, but she also likes to tear of chunks of wood.

3. Bells! The bells, bells, bells, bells. Both Digby and Lenore love bells. There is only one bell in their cage right now, and it gets dinged quite a bit and they fight over it. I should probably put at least one other bell toy in there. (Side note: I just referenced Edgar Allen Poe twice. Yeah, stuff like that makes me happy.)

4. Plastic pieces, preferably small and not too hard, but not too soft either. Lenore likes to just play with them, Digby likes to break them. Digby doesn't like plastic she can't break.

If a toy has any of these things, it will be well received by Digby and Lenore. Nearly all of the toys currently in their cage have something that can be shredded, and they prefer that above everything else.

I think I mentioned back in August that I was considering getting another lovebird in hopes of getting a friend for Sydney. It took me literally months to find a lovebird. Every lovebird ad I saw in my area and neighboring states was either for babies, pairs, or females. I found two ads that were for adult male lovebirds. I was never able to get a hold of one of the people, and the other person changed her mind (and that was a big disappointment because that bird was adorable).

Well, last week I found an ad for a lovebird that needed a home. The lady that had him did not know if it was a male or a female, and it was younger than I wanted at only six months old. I was leaning more towards not getting it, but then she sent me this picture, and my heart melted:

I still wanted to do a DNA test before committing to bringing this baby home, but the lady really wanted to find a new home before the week was out, and said she was going to sell him/her to a pet store if she didn't find a home by the weekend. By this point, I was already in love with this little bird and I wasn't going to let it slip away without at least going to see him/her. Before I even got to see him/her, I had pretty much made up my mind to get this bird.

How could I say no to this face?

So, now I'm sitting in the QT room/our unused bathroom, listening to the bird and Sydney, who is in the living room, chirp back and forth. The new bird, whose old name is Gigi and who is new name is either Irwin or Melbourne, is very sweet. He doesn't bite and he'll (I'm calling this bird a "he" until I know otherwise) happily sit on my hand once he's out of his cage. He's a little skittish because he hasn't got much attention in the past couple weeks (the lady got him for her daughter, daughter lost interest, so he was only getting attention when the lady had some free time). I really think he'll be a very sweet and loving bird in no time at all.

For now, at least.

I know, it's been ages since I last posted, but I need to get back to blogging. So I'm going to try to get back into this. I have a ton of pictures that I've taken intending to put on my blog and I just haven't done it yet.

I'll come back tomorrow and write an actual post with some zoo updates, but for now, I leave you with this picture: