A Hike in the Woods, It's Good for the Soul

My Sunday started with church like many Sundays.  

Then I wanted to go check the cattle and walk fence with my farmer to take pictures.

The next thing I knew, we were in the barn with 5 kids, our nieces and nephews, and my husband was talking to them about taking a hike in the woods.

Now when I hear "the woods" all of these memories from my childhood flood my mind. 

As children on the farm, we lived on a small piece of land 

which was surrounded by pasture full of cattle and "the woods".

I think of the time when I fell 3 times in the creek and soaked my pants with mossy creek water.  After trekking to the house after the third time to change my pants, my mother opened up the door and said, "I'm sorry, go back into 'the woods'".  Then slammed the door in my face.  

My sister and I had 3 forts in our woods, and a valley called "The Sound of Music Valley".  To this day, I could walk you to each fort and sing you those songs in that valley.

So....while I had 8 things on my "to do" list on Sunday, I thought maybe it might be good to take a walk into "the woods" for old times sake.

Before we left though, they had to jump around on the hay bales....and pose for Aunt Katie.

We left the farm and headed for our adventure in "the woods" together.  The kids talked and talked about what they would find, where Uncle Brett was taking them and how excited they were.

Their wonder and excitement made my heart melt.

And they had no idea that someday these memories will be so special.

Come to find out, Uncle Brett really wanted to check his game cameras for his hunting purposes.

But it worked, the kids love to look at pictures and the fact that they 

came from a camera on the tree was even cooler.

The girls quickly found an ice patch to skate around on, but I soon pointed out Uncle Brett's tree stand.  They said, "wait....can we climb that?!"  I said, "no, that's Uncle Brett's private tree house.  No kids allowed."  And then they were back to skating and acting out scenes from Frozen.

We walked through the woods, with arms spread out in front of us to avoid the twigs and brush.  When we approached the creek I heard, "Water!  More Ice!  Oh my gosh, how cool!"  So we stopped and played some games in the creek, watched the minnows swim under the ice and made Uncle Brett get chunks of ice for us to throw.

Little Eli wanted a chunk of ice to throw, but first, he had to taste it.  Nothing like some good creek water to make you a stronger young farmer.

 Of course I noticed the girls' bright and fancy outerwear before our adventure began.  But I was truly proud when I saw them getting their hands and boots dirty wearing that pink and leopard print.  

My little Fancy in the Country girls. 

When we turned away from the creek, they were on to their next adventure.  

"I found more ice!  Come on!"  

So they ran to the next ice patch....this happened about 4 times until we reached the end of the adventure.

The girls skated on each patch and the boys jumped up and down to try to break them and create a disaster.  

Pretty typical with this crew. 

 At one point, Brett found some deer tracks and pointed them out to the kids.  As we continued to walk through the woods we heard little Eli mumbling something.

"I am going to go deer hunting with you Uncky Brett," he said as he made his way through the rugged corn field with the stalks left from last fall taller than his little knees.  

He said it in a way that was as if they were going to do it tomorrow.

But then he got tired and Uncky Brett had to carry him.  Eli then became the binoculars that could spot the pink jackets from afar.  "I found them!  I found them!" he proclaimed.  

We had such a great time with the kids.  We got home and I said, "that was good for my soul, I needed that."

And as we continued to talk about our adventures the farmer said, "I wish I could be purely excited about the small things like them."  

Each section of the woods and at each turn there was a new adventure.  

We should probably remember that life is kind of like that too--new adventures at every turn.  And we should try to be purely excited about them because it's good for the soul.  

Now go take a hike!