Noise? You talk about noise? Try living with two 1-year-olds!

The birds must be turning 1 year old soon. We don't know when exactly, as we were only told they were between 8 and 11 weeks old when we bought them last year in the first week of September. But they sure are growing up quick! I think this might be what we humans call their 'Terrible Two's' since they can be horribly grumpy for no reason at all and like to make a show of angrily throwing things to the ground when you give them something to play with. Especially Al'ar, and she makes quite the show out of it too. It goes like this: I give her a piece of paper, she yanks it out of my hand with her beak, and throws it to the ground. Then she stares at it like she's waiting for it to come back up on it's own accord, and if I'm not quick enough to grab it, she turns around and poops on it.

Giving them snacks has slowly turned into quite the struggle as well: We start with giving Al'ar a snack, then when she's busy, we give Anzu his, but most times Al'ar will drop her snack to steal Anzu's. Only to drop it again when we give Anzu a new one. She's a monster, I'm telling you!

See that face? I'm pretty sure she's contemplating her next step in world domination. "Today, this cage, tomorrow, the wooooorld!"

We've been trying to let them fly around the entire living room area now, and no longer fence off the small part of the room with a curtain when we let them out. It's been quite an experience for them. We've got them trained to recognise a wooden perch as a safe spot, so any time they freak out and fly around in a flurry we can hold up the stick for them to land on. However...

They've also discovered that this brick wall makes for awesome snacking, often leaving a massive trail of brick dust and bits behind on my bookcase below.

Luckily for us, there's also moments when they are the sweetest little balls of fluff you can imagine. They are so relaxed around our hands now, that they'll come and sit on our hands if we hold food next to it inside the cage, and outside the cage, we both had a bird hop on our shoulder to reach food. I know, it's still bribery, but it's a step forward! We're also able to get closer and closer to them while they're eating from a sprig of millet, so close, in fact, that yesterday, Al'ar brushed my cheek, and Anzu my nose, with their foreheads just to get to the millet! (which, by the way, was REALLY SOFT.)

But their cuteness just explodes when they're close to falling asleep. They're extremely aware of my camera, still, so every attempt of catching it on camera I have made today so far has fallen flat because they're wide awake the second I start recording, but this is an impression of what has pretty much been all the sound coming from the living room this morning: Al'ar muttering to herself while falling asleep.

(vertical video syndrome! I know.)
There's even a little videobombing by Anzu. If that didn't make you melt, I don't know what will!