Our first initiation in the world of cockatiels came when we purchased a lutino cockatiel for Easter of 1992. Here is a chronicle of our journey down Cockatiel Lane.

        Easter of 1992 we purchased a very beautiful lutino cockatiel. The bird was approximately 3 months old. We named the bird Pete, short for "Popcorn" Pete. This is because they where the same color, Pete and popcorn. Also, that popcorn, is Pete's one true vice. This pretty bird had the run of the house. Although, Pete had a small cage about 20 inches high and 16 inch radius, there was really no problem because the door was always open and Pete only used the cage to eat, and drink and to roost at bedtime.
        Occasionally, Pete would come down to the dining room table and have breakfast with us. Pete really enjoyed Cheryl's orange juice and the milk from the cereal bowl and maybe a Cheerio or two. Pete was a happy bird.
Occasionally, Pete would fly to a set of shelves on the dining room wall, on these shelves we had fancy glassware, crystal do-dads and some fragile knick-knack. Pete really enjoyed going to the shelf with these things and pushing a glass or something off the shelf and to watch it fall to the floor and break. We threatened Pete with "Pete-stew", "cockatiel goulash", and/or "roasted tiel", to no avail. Watching these things fall was just so much fun. I don't believe Pete cared to know what we were talking about and didn't really want to know. We eventually placed a heavy stone crock bottle on that shelf. Pete would get between the stone bottle and the wall and try to move the bottle. The bottle would NOT budge. Pete would get so aggravated and fuss and fuss and fuss. Pete would actually throw a tantrum, because the bottle would just not move, no matter how hard Pete tried. 
        Our main worry was Pete did not talk very much. Only "hello" and maybe one or two or three other words that were somewhat difficult to understand. Pete would get rather boisterous at times, especially when Pete felt the need to get our attention. We were anxious for Pete to expand his vocabulary. Pete was a character and we enjoyed having Pete around. In short somebody had adopted somebody. Don't ask me who did what to whom. One week before Christmas, Pete gave us an unexpected present, an egg in the bottom of the cage! ! ! We were astonished. What had happened? How did that get there? We didn't have a girl cockatiel so we couldn't have an egg. Oh, well Pete, was the only bird we had at that time, so it was a certainty where the egg came from. Pete, was still one of the family, and we loved her dearly. Discovering that she was a she, we had to forgive her, her misdeeds of the past. But now she quit talking altogether. I imagine she figured that she didn't have to pretend anymore.
        Grandmother had Charlie a male gray cockatiel that we put with Pete. Charlie's story is quite a fascinating story and I feel more interesting in some ways than Pete's story.
        It started around 1982; Granny was out in her backyard at Loyola Beach, Texas. Something landed on her head and she couldn't see what it was. Granny was very upset and was swatting and yelling at whatever it was, to get off her head. This of course scared the bird, so it flew away, only to come back and land on her head again. This time Grannies' daughter, Annie, came out to see what the commotion was all about. She had seen that the problem was a bird and the bird was a cockatiel. She told Granny to be calm and remain still.  Anne, then  went in the house and got a towel. They used the towel to put over the cockatiel on Granny's head. So be it, as a result Charlie had now became a family member.
        Back to December of 1992. When Pete decided to show us that she was a she, Granny gave us Charlie. Grandmother was seventy-four years old, and she said it was getting difficult to take care of Charlie properly and she knew we would take care of him better and give him the attention she couldn't. She said she knew that she could still see him any time she wanted. When we got Charlie he was not very tame because Granny could not attend to him as she had done in the past. Now all she was able to do was feed and water him, and clean the cage. We had a lot of work to do to tame him again, because he had other things on his mind namely, Pete. When we were able to divert his attention from Pete, he began to believe that we weren't as unfriendly as he had once thought we were. As a matter of fact he was starting to come to us when we called to him, but only sometimes. He did enjoy his being the dominant one and his freedom was precious. The sad part of this story is that Charlie died January 1994. We know that he was in excess of twelve years old when he died.
        We still have Pete and we do have one of the birds from Pete and Charlie's First clutch. His name is Spaz short for Spastic. But that is a story for another time. And thus began our trek down Cockatiel Lane.