It was a busy Mother’s Day around the Owan homestead.
My younger son drove down from Phoenix to celebrate the day with me and spend the night; the three of us enjoyed worship together (ALWAYS a thrill to have my children join me again at a worship service—for some reason, it’s when I feel most like a mother), and listened to popular Christian speaker Cynthia Heald speak on discipleship.
Then we enjoyed a lengthy brunch at one of our favorite local restaurants (First Watch—their Million Dollar Bacon is to die for!) before returning home, grabbing my Shetland sheepdog, Dolly, and heading down to the rehabilitation facility where my mom’s currently recovering from her broken collarbone. Later that evening I enjoyed a lengthy phone conversation with my older son who lives 1,538.1 miles away.
And then there was the new motherhood spectacle erupting (literally) in a pot on our front porch.
Ten new babies—
About twenty days ago, a female Gambel’s Quail inspected the neighborhood and decided the large pot housing a Norfolk Island Pine tree tucked in the corner next to our front door would make a splendid protected location to set up a maternity room.
As a quail lover, I was thrilled and honored at her decision!
For ten days after her selection, we watched spellbound as she laid one, two, three, four…ten dappled eggs—one egg each day over the course of those ten days. Then she stopped laying and started warming. (We contributed to the effort by refraining from watering our tree!)
While Momma quail provided most of the incubating, her male partner put in his share of time (while mom took a well-deserved break) and was the major sitter and warmer when time came for the residents of those adorable eggs to emerge.
Mother’s Day morning the brood started making their grand appearance.
Evidently the chipping and emerging process starts a couple of days prior to the actual eruption, but we weren’t able to detect any of that until Sunday. But by Sunday afternoon, cracked shells, withering shell linings and thimble-sized quail lay discarded, or scurrying around the dirt inside the pot. Dad continued to keep the new hatchlings warm while their siblings continued working their way out and into the world. One egg that had rolled to the other side of the pot in the frantic hatching process was rescued and re-nested by Dad. When Dad “flew the coop” (when we attempted to take a peek from afar), the quail babies wedged themselves under the pot lip for warmth and protection.
When our black Labrador ran his big, snoopy nose in the pot to inspect the nursery, several babies took flight, plopped onto the porch and had to be corralled by Dad or scooped up by my husband and re-deposited into the pot.
It was, indeed, a grand Mother’s Day all around: Kids, worship, fellowship around food, white roses, pink and yellow tulips, and the cycle of life playing itself out in magnificent form on our front porch—we had a delightful, ring-side view to God’s marvelous design for replenishing and renewing. Why we work so hard to find other things to obtain and amuse ourselves with is beyond me.
What provides more true and pure joy than fellowship with the Lord and the basics of life?
The aftermath—
The eggs are broken and discarded, the quail have vacated, and I’m left a little melancholy at their absence.
I felt so blessed to be a daily witness to this spectacle of nature, of God’s creating and re-creating plan. Instead of just dumping the evidence and resuming the watering of my pine tree, I’m going to pluck all of the shells from the pot and display them in a glass jar, a reminder of that blessing, and of all the blessings yet to come in my life.
A reminder of the dedication of a feathered mother to warm and protect her brood until it was their time to arrive, and to make sure they arrived safely. (Honestly, may I say that it was a stark contrast to the haphazard and flippant way many human mothers incubate and prepare for their offsprings’ emergence.)
Now she and her mate are scurrying around the neighborhood somewhere with ten offspring. They’re still protecting and watching over them until they reach adulthood, (quails are phenomenal at protecting their covey), when the offsprings will seek mates and continue the cycle of life—of being fruitful and multiplying.
I hope all of you who are mothers rejoiced on your day; that all of you with loving, nurturing mothers were grateful for your blessing; that all of you awaiting the birth of a child feel blessed by the process and are excitedly anticipating your baby’s birth; and that those of you who have lost precious babies during pregnancy or delivery remember your babies as priceless members of your family.
Until next week,
Blessings,