A day of firsts

Firstly I want to thank you all so much for your lovely comments and stars on my birthday blip yesterday. I never expected it to become my first spotlight but it has and I can't tell you how overwhelmed I am by it. Thanks again to all of you! :)

I also hadn't expected to have another first this afternoon. It was a dull and grey day again and I still hadn't found a blip for today when I stopped at one of the rose gardens at the park during my walk with the sanctuary's male Rottweiler cross Pacha. As usual a few crows and magpies were waiting for me to throw down a few dog treats for them and I'd just got the camera out of my bag to try and get a photo of them when a very small bird landed among some twigs. It was only after I'd managed to get a couple of shots of it and looked at them on the camera screen that I noticed that this small bird was a Goldcrest. Yes, it's not the greatest photo and yes, there's a twig in the way but I'm so chuffed to have seen my very first Goldcrest that this just had to become my blip for today. I did have one other shot in which you could see its crest but unfortunately the rest of the shot was too blurry to blip.

I still have the odd coughing session but they've been shorter than yesterday's and my cough hasn't become worse yet this evening.