First Hiking Trip of the Year!!!

 We had the delight of taking our first hiking trip of the year today. Our final decisions as to where to go was Dry Island Buffalo Jump - as you might suspect, one of those places First Nations People used to kill buffalo. It was an incredible afternoon - so beautiful, and so much fun to explore through the eyes of our 2yr old. 

"Waher, Mommy! Waher!" 

"Dead, Mama, log dead" 

He's just started calling me "mama", and I have no idea where it has come from! 

We explored a washout in the bank that made a really cool fort

Inspecting coyote footprints together

Signs of spring from our afternoon

I LOVE little tiny flowers making their presence known in among rocks and grass and such like. All these flowers were such cheery reminders that Spring is HERE!

Peter heard Josh say something about "carrying" and decided that sounded like a really good idea. When Josh said he could walk some more, he wasn't really thrilled until Josh found him this 'walking stick' to use. =)

The view from partway up a hill

 My men - don't you love Timothy's face in the right picture? 

Peter loves birds of all kinds, and most of them (like this one actually was) are considered hawks, as we have a number of hawks around our place. 

Crossing a gully - it was pretty steep, but we made it! 

We stopped for a few minutes, and Peter decided to go down - and then up - the hill we were on. 

On the way up he crawled the last little ways and got some prickles in his hands, which daddy then proceeded to remove for him. He didn't make a peep about the process! 

Timothy and I decided to do a self-portrait while we waited. The wind was making my ponies look like Pippi Longstocking... 

I loved the way these flowers were set among the rocks... 

Lunch! We enjoyed apples, carrots, cucumbers, rice cakes, havarti cheese, and boiled eggs... 

And this was our lunch view...

"This rice cake is amazing!" 

"This egg is better!" 

This Moby wrap was incredible! I carried him the whole way - 3hrs, and am not at all sore tonight! 

We were delighted to discover a group of 3 deer during our walk. Peter especially enjoyed them, and was disappointed when they disappeared. Josh explained that they were hiding because they were timid animals, and it was a special treat to be able to see them, but he kept looking for them around every subsequent corner. And, when he didn't see them, he'd say "hiding". 

Josh whistled at the deer to make them stay put while I was getting some pictures, and Peter was trying to whistle for them for some time after - it was very cute. :-D 

Crocuses!

Timothy finally falling asleep... 

Peter tripped and skinned his knee up pretty good, and Josh was cleaning it up for him. He actually didn't protest too horribly, but on the way home kept both hands over the offending knee, and was very unimpressed when Josh tried to clean it before bed... 

My sleeping baby

Pursuing an antler discovery 

"Here, you can touch it - isn't it rough?" 

Yup, it was a great day! :-D