cats, pizza, a package and a daring sea gull

my sister's photo of toby the cat enjoying some cool morning air before the sun hits the deck.

the athenian maker was participating in a fundraiser to help some families in gaza and i purchased a pair of beautiful knitted and hand dyed fingerless gloves from her. the mail carrier brought them all the way up to my floor as i had to sign for the package . . i was very surprised as i had forgotten that i would be receiving an overseas delivery. it as also kind of him to walk up (it's so hot!) as everyone usually asks us to walk down to the lobby.

greg and i had leftover pizza for dinner this evening . . cricket and zuzu had their eyes on it too.

korrina sent a video of a seagull stealing someone's food on the beach while they were away from their blanket . . 

he went back for more! he's so funny how he slips quickly away and then quickly back again!

which beach?

it was cooler today, with a strong wind blowing from the north, so hanging out at south lake was not comfortable, much to chanda's distress (it's her favorite beach). we spent a good amount of our time beach hopping . . trying to figure out which beach was the warmest! we found lifeguards at nick's beach and at ditch. unfortunately, none were at kirk's . . which is where we like to be when not at ditch. but ditch was too chilly today, so nick's was chosen. we settled close to the dune for maximum wind protection! morgana went for a swim, but c and i felt too cold.

we had a really nice lunch, and observed a different beach clientele. since we were hanging out by the hotels this time . . there were more europeans. we really enjoyed watching a nice german family . . they didn't mind the cold water at all and also didn't mind changing on the beach, which we always like to see because we always change on the beach also, (just something you never see many americans doing.) another family also had their beautiful little children running in just their birthday suits on the sand and in the water, which always does my heart good because my kids were always without their clothes when very little and by the water.

we read about seagulls from seashore life, and did some sketching. gulls mature around four or five years old, when they usually mate for life. i know they like to eat ginger snaps (a monstrous gull stole my bag of midel ginger snaps during our last beach visit) but i hadn't realized that many of them also like to eat other shore bird's eggs. the young herring gulls are mottled and brown before growing into their grey and white feathers.

we mainly see herring gulls around here . . but when looking at pictures of the different gulls (like the california gull, the western gull and the lesser black-backed gull) they all look the same to me! if you'd like to figure out the differences you could try studying them here.