To the woods

Abigail and I went to the cabin this weekend to do a little work on the place. We started out by planting onions. I like onions so we started with 60 sets. Abigail loves to get dirty and Emily hates it when she does, so it was a perfect opportunity since it was just the two of us. I emptied a few new bags of soil and a bag of manure (yeah, I bought it…I hope some neighbors will help me out with some next time around) into a raised bed we made. Abigail helped me space them out and we got as much dirt as we could under our nails.

Working in the dirt Working in the dirt

After we licked our fingers clean, Abigail wanted to take a walk into the woods. It was such a beautiful day, how could I refuse a walk in the woods? We started down a path we hadn’t walked before and found a really great log down on the ground for sitting. We decided to sit a spell. It took a few minutes, but after a bit, Abigail stopped rustling around and it got really quiet. She commented how quiet it was in the woods. It was nice…she turned back to the woods and just sat and stared over the holler without another sound. I suppose we sat like that for 10 minutes or so. Eventually, we got up and spotted a deer trail off to one side and decided to follow it in to the woods.

A bleached turtle shell Sitting a spell

We stopped again when Abigail spotted a hole in the ground. It was right where the deer trail went so it was easy to find. We stood still for a second and heard running water. There wasn’t a stream to speak of, but we heard running water down in the hole I suppose we discovered a spring though we never saw it come out anywhere. It didn’t matter…we had already cleaned our fingernails anyhow!

Mystery tree with silver bark Queen of the lichen rock

We continued on and spotted a small standing pool of water and another spring and an old bleached out turtle shell. We watched a pileated woodpecker for a few minutes and sat a few more spells on a couple of rocks. We saw some really cool trees that looked like birch trees but they were a a lot larger than any birch tree I have ever seen. We talked and picked out our favorite lichens. I must have brushed up against something on our walk as I now have a rash over my entire body. It’s just the price one pays I suppose. It was well worth it to have this great opportunity to spend some time with my daughter when she told me she wanted to go to the woods. It just doesn’t get any better!

6 thoughts on “To the woods

  1. What a beautiful way to spend the day, Warren. The woods over there have changed so much since I last walked in them that I doubt I’d recognize them now. The trees you saw are probably that copse of Quaking Aspens. They’re beautiful in the wind, the leaves just shiver and shake. And they turn a beautiful yellow in the fall.

    Sorry about the rash. I wonder what could have caused it?

  2. Granny Sue – I am sure you are right…they are probably quaking aspen. I have never ever seen them so big though…those are huge trees! There is a lot of wood down from the storm back a number of years…if I ever get the cabin done, I will def try to get down in there and make it a more walkable woods! It’s beautiful either way but I think there is work to be done.

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