an autumn outing

Yikes! I don't want to leave that rant up here too long! And, we did something fun and photo-worthy yesterday...

Remember our 10th anniversary trip? Bill suggested that we take the boys down to that area for the day, hike around and have a picnic. We decided to stop at the first area of the park that we came to. Unfortunately, we didn't remember that this area was the most treacherous. I literally remember thinking when we were here before "I would never bring my kids here- I would be terrified." Ooops.

Tommy was so very excited, and just hopping and jumping around like he does, right near these slippery drop-offs. And we worried about Henry just as much, for almost the opposite reason: he is so weak and uncoordinated that he might just stumble and fall down and panic...

So we just held on really tightly. And of course everything turned out fine.

I ended up being the only one who slipped at all. On one of these broken steps. I was holding Henry's hand at the time, and made a big deal about how he "saved" me.

Henry pulled the same routine he had at the pumpkin patch: I'm not going to look at the cliffs. I'm not going to hike on the trails. I just want to wait in the car... But it was easier since Bill was there with me- one adult to talk Henry down and the other to be excited with Tommy. Henry ended up enjoying himself, as always. He specifically asked me to take this picture:

There was lots and lots of step-climbing, and we were so proud of Henry for the way he kept up. I had visions of carrying him up and down steps when he was 5 years old and just didn't have the strength, or his little legs were too short. But he's a big boy now and didn't complain once. He even enjoyed balancing on some of the stone walls: "It's like a balance beam!"

Stamina is never a concern with Thomas, and yesterday was no exception. He could have stayed twice as long, climbing and jumping and making up adventures. In the picture below he is holding a piece of rock that he found and had declared to be "a dinosaur's tooth!" (This picture is kind of dark because we were under a huge rock overhang- I don't know if that's technically considered a cave, but that's what we called it.)

This picture was taken from inside one of the cave areas. Can you blame the old man who made this his home? If you take out all those people wandering around, what a gorgeous retreat.