Tracy

I have loved nature for my entire life and have come to love watching the birds at my home feeders for years. A friend mentioned the Cornell Feeder Watch program as she's a feeder watcher, too, and we decided to take part together so we could share in the experience. In doing so, I discovered this class and I was excited by the prospect of being able to draw some of the birds that I adore watching and learning more about. As a much younger person, I loved and had a knack for drawing and painting but didn't continue in any structured way into my adulthood. I saw this class as an opportunity to rekindle the joy I once had in doing so. I have a background in science and I like the idea of creating my own little reference book of the nature without and within my home with, of course, notations of time, place and conditions. I especially liked the format of drawings being surrounded by text, and the drawings being both detailed and broad, as in the finer details of a feather vs a silhouette accompanied with a full landscape view. I appreciate each journalist's perspective and after seeing all of them, I feel like I have permission to be experimental and imperfect and let my journaling evolve, or not, as it will.