Weekend hiking

With spring here, we are spending much of our time outside. We love to hike in the woods and go down to the creek to play. We love to explore, look for salamanders under the rocks, identify new wildflowers, chase butterflies and just enjoy our time together.



This weekend it was really warm and we spent it cooling off in the creek.
Sequoia never noticed this huge black snake that was laying right across our path. He almost stepped on it's head and never even saw it. Thank goodness it was only a black snake! i yelled at him, and then of course had to take a picture. :) If you click the picture you can see it better.

It's a harmless black rat snake, around 4 1/2 feet long. It hung out and let me snap it's picture a few time, and then we went on our way. i've been told by the locals that Black snakes keep the Rattlesnakes away, so i don't mind seeing these guys around our yard and woods.

The kids were eager to get to the creek. We started off just getting our toes a little wet.

Then we jumped right in.

The water was cold, but felt great!
Sequoia was practicing his 'water bending'. He is a big Avatar (cartoon) fan.




i love coming down here in the spring, before the weeds have really grown up too much. There are wildflowers everywhere. These trillium have just started blooming, the area is covered in star chickweed, anemones, bluettes and bloodroot. The skunk cabbage and mayapples are up, and i am always on the look out for lady slippers which i've been told sometimes grow around the creek. You can see a few more wildflower pictures on my nature page. i've been trying to keep it updated.

Spring always flies by too fast for me. Our days are filled with picnics in the yard, bonfires at night, hiking, splashing, growing and exploring...leaving no rock unturned. We love these days of playing in the sun, digging in the dirt and listening to the music of the whip-poor-wills, bobwhites and spring peepers.