July 3

At the beginning of the summer, I planned a list of possible Friday Adventures for the kids. Some of the adventures, though, were just a bit much for me to do on my own, so I asked Chris if he might be able to take one or two Fridays off to join us on our adventures. Happily, he agreed, and today was one of those days. Even better, when my mom heard what we had planned, she and my sister decided to tag along.

Early this morning, we packed up a lunch. Mom and Jenny arrived at 8:30, and we drove off to the Nature Reserve. Mom had been before, but the rest of us had no idea what to expect. After days and days of rain, we got sunny skies and unseasonably pleasant weather for our outdoor adventure.

We had SO. MUCH. FUN.

So much fun.

Our first stop was the Nature Classroom, where there were all kinds of things for the kids to climb on and explore. They loved this giant climbing tree!

Here they're pretending to be spiders.

We did a book walk, where there were pages of a book arranged on a trail. The kids really liked the story about building fairy houses. Perhaps we'll have to build a few of our own! Mom said that when she was a child, she would spend hours building fairy houses. I love the idea.

I don't think this log bridge was actually as treacherous as it looked, but Caleb and Daisy definitely felt like they had a grand adventure.

Oh my goodness. Seriously? I love this picture. I love that my girl is in all pink, except for her gray Chucks. It's a pretty fair representation of her character.

Caleb thought these bald cypresses were really funny because they grew out of the water.

Lily was so, so happy that Grandma was there with us. Really, we were all pretty happy that she was there.

This funny girl found a vine and wrapped it around her waist, pretending it was a belt.

Jenny was one of the kids and helped the little ones find frogs, tadpoles, and tiny guppies in this little pond.

Lily found a table and some chairs and declared, "EAT!!!", so we ate lunch earlier than we anticipated.

Eli was happy with that arrangement! 

Mostly I think he was happy because he also got to eat lunch. After he was done eating, we had some snuggles and he was so cute and funny. 

I love that his shirt even says "I love Mommy". He's such a cutie!

Daisy agreed, and snuggled up for a picture.

We tried to get a family picture, but Daisy was wildly uncooperative and this was the best we got. Oh, well.

Mom sent me this cell phone pictures she took, too:

This is a pretty accurate representation of my life. Trying desperately to do something important (i.e. read a map) while holding a baby, with Daisy trying to tell me what to do, Caleb goofing off, and Lily running off. True story.

But how sweet is this? I love it.

And Mom's cell phone version of our family photo, sans Daisy: 

(Remember I said that Daisy was being uncooperative? Case in point.)

This is what Eli looked like most of the time. Wrapped on my back, sun hat firmly in place. He took some good naps while we hiked in the wilderness!

After lunch we probably could have called it a day and headed home, but I had mentioned a teepee to the kids, and they insisted that we find it. That meant actual hiking on paths that had very little resemblance to the paths on our map, which meant we walked quite a bit farther than we should have. Still, we had a lot of fun.

Caleb and Lily took off running at first. Lily didn't last long, but Caleb did. Chris and I were really thankful that we've been intentionally working on Caleb's "conditioning" this summer.

Why, yes. That's four-year-old Daisy on Chris' back while two-year-old Lily walks. Daisy was feeling a little whiny this afternoon, and Chris is much nicer than I am. Lily was happy to walk if it meant holding Grandma and Daddy's hands.

Finally we made it to the Sod House and Teepee. It was quite an ordeal with four little ones, but it was worth the effort.

The kids were definitely disappointed that the teepee was missing its hide cover, though.

But that sod house was pretty cool.

Still, it was past noon and pretty hot, with a good walk back to our cars. We didn't linger long.

This might be one of my new favorite pictures. I only wish that hiking + heat hadn't made Eli sink so low in his wrap; I promise he started out higher than that! But Eli was asleep, and Lily was asleep with the Ergo hood over her head. It was such a great adventure!