I live in Texas and it has been my desire to see hummingbirds. I know that they are around but the little devils are so quick it is hard to spot them.

I had hummingbird feeders up last year in one of my flower gardens and I had planted plenty of salvia to attract them. The hummingbird feeders attracted no birds but there was a plethora of bees and ants which were frequent visitors to the oddity in my garden. (No, I did not invite the ants. The bees are fine because they are honey makers and the poor little chaps can’t find their way back home these days, so I try to be kind to the lost souls.)

The salvia I planted became a staple for some exquisite butterflies but alas no hummingbirds.

On my way back to Nebraska my boyfriend and I stopped in at my aunt and uncle’s home to have some yummy homemade pizza and some even yummier homemade cherry pie. They live in Kansas, the land of Oz.

While I was inside talking with my aunt, my boyfriend was outside talking with my uncle. Apparently they were visited by some hummingbirds. (Dagnabit! My uncle is stealing my hummingbirds and I love that guy so this is a real problem.)

I had no idea that they were spotting hummingbirds. I would have continued in my ignorant bliss if my boyfriend had not told me during lunch. He not only told me he had sighted the glorious beings but he also told me why I was not the main attraction in Texas for these elusive creatures.

According to my uncle you have to put fresh food in the feeders every day if the temperature gets above 90 degrees. My mouth dropped open. Did I mention to you that I live in Texas? In Texas 90 degrees is a cold day, during most of summer we hover around 100 degrees. (wiping the sweat off of my brow just thinking about last July)

My uncle went on to say that if the feed gets too warm, bacteria can grow in the feeders. My mouth dropped open further and my eyes grew wide in horror. I wondered how many sweet little hummingbirds had been poisoned by my two month old sugar water, left to be a petri dish for bacteria, last summer.

My mind raced through all of the important things I intended to do this summer. I intend to go back into nursing to actually make an income next week. I hope to continue to be a power blogger. I am working on a shopping mall to accompany my blog. I am trying to make my partnership with Nerium international a money making venture. I am also planning on putting my novel into production within the next year. The last thing I want to do is change out hummingbird water on a daily basis.

He repeated again that the sugar water needed to be changed daily. Once I got my wits about me I merely squeaked out “That is not going to happen. That is just not going to happen.”

Besides I didn’t even have a shepherd’s hook to hang my feeders on and I have no money so I figured I could just check that off of my to do list.

That was until I went to my mother’s place and there was a shepherd’s hook in her front yard, totally unused and begging for hummingbird feeders. My mother said she had no intention of using the shepherd’s hook. Sooooo… I asked my sweet boyfriend if he could get that shepherd’s hook out of the ground.

He couldn’t do it the first day. (I did not take this as a sign from God that maybe I should just give up on hummingbirds. Nope, I took it as a challenge to overcome! Funny how I interpret God isn’t it?)

I persisted on pestering my sweet boyfriend about the shepherd’s hook and with my Dad’s help that sucker came right out of the ground on the second day.

Guess where that shepherd’s hook is right now?

You guessed it, in my backyard, with two hummingbird feeders, fresh sugar water and a pitcher full of more sugar water in my fridge.

I am such a pushover!.