I had Things To Do yesterday. K. had a day off so I wanted to try to get some of my things done even after the kids got home from school. I had finished up a good portion of said things when K. said he was going to take the kids for a hike. Monkey didn’t want to go unless I was going too, and I waffled for a couple of minutes because a little extra kid-free time was nice to have when I could get it. It was a beautiful day though and the call of the trail was tough to resist. So in an uncharacteristic move, I went for the hike. I also brought my camera.
There are many trails not far from our house (not including some light tresspassing in the woods behind our yard) and the one we walked was a new one for me, but not for the kids and K. I love hiking this time of year when the colors are so vivid and the mosquitoes are practically non-existent. Normally I would have brought the dogs, but I wanted to get a lay of the land first and see what shenanigans they might get into for future reference. No doubt if they had come, I’d have been shooing them away from frogs (or maybe toads?) the majority of the time. But since I didn’t have to fend off CaseyJones the great hunter, and the frogs were happy to pose for portraits (you know, when they weren’t being poked with a stick by small boys and their Daddies…), I took what I like to call “The Frog Series.”
Some are easier to see than others, and there were more frogs than this out there, but these were the ones who froze for us. The Army should think about Frogflage…it seems to work.
It was fun to “spot the toad” as we traipsed around the woods and fields and watched them hop across the trail. When we weren’t doing that, Monkey was scouting out rocks to throw off the little bridge into the brook (his absolute favorite thing to do) and R. was practicing walking with her eyes closed to learn how to listen. Sometimes they ran ahead, and sometimes we chased them. Here’s a little sample of a typical afternoon in the woods.
And finally my favorite image of the day…I like to call it “Angry Tree.” You better not get too close at night.
He had a bad day
I’m glad I skipped the rest of my To Do list to hang with the family in the woods. I really need to remember to do that more often.
1. Glad to see amphibians are doing well in your neck of the woods because they are dying out in many areas.
2. Tell R. she should be listing for chickadees (dee-dee-dee), nuthatches (yank-yank-yank), and barred owls (who- cooks-for-you). These calls are probably all available on-line.
Love the Angry Tree! Great blog M. Now that I know where this site is I can start to send all my Russian Spam here.
Da! Bring it on! Glad you like it though. You know I value your opinion.