Birbs of Saskatchetoon - Blue Jay

Wednesday morning, I was working on another drawing of Bohemian Waxwings, when Finnegan just crept upstairs and very quietly said to me "You should come and take a picture of this..."

For some reason I thought maybe he was talking about something related to the school project he's working on... (There was a project for Communications Media that he was needing me to help him film himself and somehow my brain decided this had something to do with THAT!? ) 

As we went downstairs he said "It's just outside my window, it might not be there anymore..."

I realized he was talking about something else... 

Why do they always have to hide so deep in that overgrown Lilac bush...?! Part of me wants to thin it out... of course, if I DID that, it probably wouldn't BE so appealing to birds... 

It had dipped in temperature - the windchill was about -30°C - so it was super puffed up into a big ball of feathers. 

I've seen lots of smaller birds all puffed up in cold weather. This was the first time I saw a Blue Jay like that - it looked HUGE!? 

Ugh... none of these really turned out... Looks like I'll be making a composite again, rather than working from one in particular... which is okay.. 

I tried to quietly step out the front door to see if I could get a better angle.. but they flew off - to another tree in the yard - turns out there were TWO of them!  I stepped back in to grab boots and a jacket to go out into the yard... but by the time I got out they'd flown off down the street. I could hear them... but despite boots and a jacket - I was still wearing STILL wearing short pyjama bottoms and thus not really appropriately attired to be chasing birds around the neighbourhood! 

Bluejay in the Birbs of Saskatchetoon Sketchbook.