Out For a Stroll

 Thursday, I had a little time with just the two year old.  The five year old was at preschool, and the ten year old was at swimming lessons, so the little man and I took a nature hike.  I gave him the option of going to the park or going for a hike, and he wanted to hike. 

I love seeing my boys interested in nature.  Here he is chasing a spider across the path. Wish I would have set the camera on movie mode because this was hysterical.  He would run up to it, stomp wildly, miss, then chase it down again and try again.  No worries all you animal lovers. The spider escaped.

 We also found a stick that has bug trails on it.  It was fun to see the little pathways on the stick.  I've always thought those were cool.  The only thing I remember taking to kindergarten for show and tell was a big stick with ant trails on it.  I thought it was so cool.  (Oh, and now that I'm thinking of show and tell, I remember taking a coral arrangement my mom had.  That one is noteworthy because I was sick on the bus on the way home and threw up all over it.  That must have been really fun to clean with all those little grooves and all. Sorry Mom! If it's any consolation, I almost made it home.  We were pulling up to our stop when I became ill.)

 Okay, back to better topics.  We came across a big pile of pine cones.  He had to pick one to pack along for himself.  He always does, but they rarely make it home.

 The snow is really going away fast.  This is the same place where we took our first hike, and where we saw the moose.  Back then, we were hiking on top of a foot of snow, with big banks on either side of the path.

I love how clear our water is out here.

 I had to snap this picture because several years ago - when the five year old was less than a year old, we had family portraits done out here.  This was one of the locations. :)  Good memories.

After our hike we went back to the pool to watch the end of the ten year old's swim lessons.  Then we played with the I spy game while waiting for him to change.  I got to thinking that the nature hike was a lot like a real-life I spy game.  You have to really be studying nature or you miss so much. Maybe I'll have to make up a list of things for the boys to find on our next hike.