My eldest daughter shares her name with a gorgeous New Zealand bird, so I sent her this painting as a Christmas gift.

The tūī is a boisterous, medium-sized honeyeater, with blue, green, and bronze colouration and a distinctive white throat tuft. Tūī are known for their noisy, unusual, sometimes soulful calls, different for each individual, that combine bellbird-like notes with clicks, cackles, timber-like creaks and groans, and wheezing sounds. They can imitate human speech, along with sounds like glass shattering, car alarms, classical music and advertising jingles.

Merry Christmas, Tui!

^{Photo reference by Sid Modsell, used under Creative Commons 2.0}