A bird in hand

Just a couple of images taken today, starting with what may be a first for my blog: a photo taken by someone else. In this case, my mom did the photography honors while I held a goldfinch that had stunned itself flying into a sliding glass door. It barely broke 20 here today, and we were all worried that it would freeze before it recovered enough to move again. So I brought it inside to keep it warm until it felt better:

And a few photos I took of the goldfinch from my perspective:

The good news is, shortly after I took these, the bird started acting much more alert. So we went outside, where I opened my hand and placed it against the porch railing. It sat there for another moment, so I wiggled my fingers a bit. That seemed to do the trick, as it took off and flew to a nearby bush, leaving me with my photos, my memories, and a dash of bird poop on my hand. Quite the way to begin the new year.