I have a new addiction!

It's called birding.

I'm afraid to say it outloud because I can't tell the difference between a wren and a female red winged blackbird.

My daughter has a love for counting the hawks; I thought they were all red tailed but I have since learned that I was wrong. Only the ones with red tails are red tailed hawks. There are others I am told.

So, I am addicted; an ignorant birder; but addicted.

It all happened one day as Hannah (my 4 year old)was counting the hawks while coming home from LUTZ children's musuem. Coming down 91 south, she is counting them, "there's another one, mommy, that's 7".

We merge onto 9 south and this day there wasn't so many hawks.

As we drive close to the Bridge, she spots 2 HUGE hawks in a dead tree on the right side of the highway. I PULLOVER QUICK.

Those were NO hawks!

They were bald eagles! I was stunned! I thought, "it can't be....."

The only bald eagles that I saw growing up around Middletown Connecticut was on posters in history class.

We get home and type in "bald eagles".

We find out that YES, BALD EAGLES ARE ON THE CONNECTICUT RIVER!

We find a really cool blog..... The Brownstone Birder...and we find that there is an EAGLE'S FESTIVAL IN ESSEX.

Yes, we went!

Hannah held a saw whet owl on her arm. We saw eagles. We saw all kinds of birds.

We picked up some binoculars on vacation in Pennsylvannia. We are officially BIRDERS now.

IGNORANT, BUT ADDICTED BIRDERS.