SewingSew

I live in a very wooded area in New Hampshire. I have two front doors on my house. One of the front doors is rarely used. A couple of years ago, I tried to turn the light on at that door one night and realized the bulb needed to be changed. The next day, when we went to change the bulb, we realized that a Robin had made its nest on top of the light fixture (of all places). So, we watched the nest and baby Robins hatched and flew away. We removed the nest in the fall. (Robins can have two broods a season, I believe.) End of story--right? In May, we went on vacation for about a month, and when we returned, there was another Robin's nest on top of the light fixture. Last week, my husband said, "Look, there is a Fox in the back yard. We watched it go around the house and later it dawned on me that the Fox may have been after the Robin's eggs. I haven't had the heart to look.

We have had Flycatchers make their nest, year after year, underneath an overhang on our house.

When we lived in North Carolina, we had a large brick gas fireplace. A guy from the gas company came out to inspect it prior to use and he put a tag on it and told us it wasn't safe to use and that for about $500 he would come out and replace the defective tubing. We never called him and we just didn't use the fireplace. Several years later, we were getting ready to sell the house and I called the same gas company to fix the fireplace. The man who came to the house told me that the other guy was running a scam, that he had been fired, and that there was nothing wrong with our fireplace. Nice, huh? Anyhow, during one of the years we lived in the house, we heard fluttering in the chimney area behind the wall above the fireplace. Turns out we had a nest of Chimney Sweeps living in there. We waited for the babies to grow up and fly away, and then we sealed the chimney off.

Another time, when we lived in Ohio, we heard a frantic fluttering noise in the wood stove in the basement. We opened the door and a bird flew into the house. And once, in North Carolina, we found a live bird trapped in our gutters. And finally, here in New Hampshire, we have found both a Chickadee and a Hummingbird trapped in our garage. Thankfully, we were able to free them.
Superstition has it that if a wild bird flies into your house, you are destined for bad luck, and there may possibly be a death in your circle of family and friends. We have Whiporwills perch in our back yard and keep us awake every summer. The first time we ever saw one, it was on our roof. That is also supposed to be a sign of bad luck. If that is the case then I am doomed!