All This and a Belted Kingfisher Too...Really!

Feeling kind of bummed today...so I wasn't going to blog, but I didn't feel like getting up from the computer to do anything else...so I guess I'm blogging!  Why am I bummed?  Our neighbor next door decided to cut down all of his shrubs along his fence line.  These shrubs were great for all the wild birds to sit in as they waited for their turn on our feeders.  Now they will have nowhere to sit and feel safe.  Yeah, the shrubs were messy and wild, but the birds loved them.  Oh, we have other trees in our yard, but I loved watching the birds in these shrubs.  I guess I'll have to plant some of my own on our side of the fence. 

Here's a pretty little flower all sunny and bright.

Like the little fuzzies on this plant.

 My little friend, Mr Duck.  There are two ducks that I normally see along Kingfisher Trail...I'm not sure where Mrs Duck was at this moment.

Ok, you're going to have to take my word for it, because I know you really can't see the bird very well at all in this picture...but this is the best you're going to get and I just HAD to include it.  In the middle of this picture there is a blue and white bird (he looks as though he's sitting on the limb that is bending to the left).  Believe it or not, that is a Belted Kingfisher.  I've never actually seen one before, and I only caught glimpses of this one.  He kept swooping from tree to tree just as I would get close enough to possibly get his picture.  This is the best I could get.  As soon as I got home I looked up the Belted Kingfisher in my Stokes bird book.  The picture in the book looked exactly like what I saw. 
Imagine seeing a Belted Kingfisher on Kingfisher Trail!

Here is what he looked like.  This, of course, is not one of my pictures.