Winter Bird Feeders

We've been noticing a few more birds that usual around our backyard the last few days.  Not sure if it's the cranberries lying around from the decorations we made or if it's the warmer weather - perhaps a combination of both.  Anyway, we decided it would be a good idea to feed these birds so we set out to make some bird feeders.  We gathered our supplies - pinecones, peanut butter, string and birdseed.  

We started by tying a string onto the top of the pinecone.  Then we spread peanut butter over the entire pinecone.  

Austin and Victoria are my kids that don't like peanut butter . . . as you can see from Austin's face.    LOL!  

I'm not sure if more peanut butter got on Denver's pinecone or in his mouth.  Hmmmm . . . . 

Once that was done, we rolled them in some birdseed to cover up all the peanut butter.  

When they were all complete, we took them outside and hung them up.  We purposely didn't hang on the fence because we didn't want the squirrels to get them.  

The next morning after we put them outside, I heard the kids laughing so hard in the kitchen.   When I came to see what was so funny, the kids pointed outside to a silly squirrel.  Those smart guys climbed right up onto the gazebo, took the string of the bird feeder and pulled it right up to eat it.  When we kept chasing them away, they got even smarter and chewed the string off so they could just take the whole pine cone with them.  So much for feeding the birds!  

Poor Frodo was on squirrel alert all day long.  He sat at the window on guard . . . barking every time a squirrel would show up.  Every time he would bark, the kids would let him out to chase the squirrel.  He definitely got his exercise that day!