Forest Adventures

 Well, it's a little quiet around here right now.  "Where'd everyone go?" wonders Gus... who is now the new downstairs barn cat and rotund keeper of the workbench.

Our days of adventuring came to a close late yesterday afternoon as I drove two dirty, tired, happy kids back to their parents.

Our somewhat quiet little world, here, certainly comes to life when there are children running free across its land!  To me, there is nothing more wonderful for children than to have acres of safe land to explore.  Imaginations come to life.  Seriously, children who have a forest at their disposal have no need for toys!

The Littles always want to help with chores... even early morning chores!  And so, their days start very early.  (Sleep is never a problem, as exhaustion carries them directly in to LaLa Land.)

This gal has always loved to climb and was climbing pasture fences years ago.  She's graduated to climbing trees; and without me to keep her at a safe height, most likely, she would end up in the top of the tree!

And, this guy, who has had a love affair with farm vehicles since he was old enough to sit up, loves to help Muppy (what the kids call Hubbs) with tractor chores.  Turning the manure pile is their tradition.

Later, yesterday morning, we headed to the woods in search of fungi... and ended up building teepees instead.  After lunch, the kids divided themselves (Anna's girls were here to play as well) into two teams and had a building contest.  Hubbs helped Mackenzie and Caroline, while I helped Easton and Becca.

The other team built a luxury teepee...

while, these two (and I) built a tiny home.  

We went for the minimalist approach, whereas the others made their home as lavish as possible!

They even made fern mattresses!

I do have to share that Easton's teepee came complete with an outdoor toilet that he dug himself.  The boy has his priorities!

It was quite a magical time.

As we were playing around the farm, we found this white-marked Tussock Moth caterpillar.

It's definitely one of those look only-no touch caterpillars as its hairs can be quite irritating to the skin.

We are enjoying a stretch of fabulous, sunny weather... low 80'w with low humidity... just how summer was meant to be!  We have a chance of getting a little more rain this afternoon... which would be lovely.  I'll still be watering the garden this morning, however.

PS:  We have an insane amount of hummingbirds visiting our feeders right now!

Much of the morning and evening, every spot on our three feeders is filled... with more flying around vying for space.

Comments

daisy g said…
I wonder what critters might use the teepees as shelter? It would be fun to put a game cam out there and see if you have any visitors.

We have noticed more hummers too. How is your butterfly population there? We have not spied any caterpillars on either our milkweed or our parsley. I'm ready for Monarchs, in any case, with over 20 milkweed plants in the garden.

Enjoy this cooler week!
Linda said…
It's a full time job keeping our four hummingbird feeders filled right now, requiring almost 2 quarts of syrup a day. I think I'll be happy to see them begin to migrate this fall.��
I look forward to your blog posts each weekday.
This N That said…
You are great at coming up with creative ways to entertain the kids..It almost makes me want to be a kid again..Enjoy this beautiful day..
THE BEARDED ONE said…
WE ARE EAT UP W/HUMMINGBIRDS..THEY ARE EMPTING QUART BOTTLES OF FEEDERS ALOST EVERY DAY AND I HAVE 4 OUT...I SURE LOVE THEIESE POSTS..AWESOME !!!