Saturday, January 14, 2012

Caswell Memorial State Park

We had a pretty busy day today, which is cool when its spending time with your family.  When its life stuff, work, blah blah blah...no one wants to do it.  But when its with family its cool to run around and stay busy all day.

So today we went to Caswell Memorial State Park for a short hike with the kids.  We've been wanting to do some more active things as a family and the weather was so perfect it seemed like a great day to get outside.  Caswell is about 25 or 30 minutes from the house and had a couple of trails to hike.  It was pretty nice but really limited.  I found this great web site today for finding, logging and rating hiking trails, All Trails.  It totally syncs in with facebook, you don't really have to do anything but say log in with facebook...it does the rest.  Turns out there are a whole lot of places to go hiking within 30 miles of the house.  So we'll be exploring more as a family.

Here are some photos from our day.

Lincoln doing the right thing and opening the door for the ladies.  Unfortunately for him he doesn't have a drivers license.


Scout waiting patiently for this train to get moving.  That patience didn't last long, she literally asked if we were almost there when we pulled out of the drive way and turned around the corner.  Crazy.


We arrived quickly.  Here's the map of the park.


Lincoln's first time hiking and as you can see, he was pretty excited about it.


They did have some really nice picnic areas, this one especially had beautiful light in it.  Think I will come back here for some portrait sessions.


I told Scout the river was just up ahead...it wasn't.  but I got a good photo out of it.  Muahahahahaha!


Made it to the river and Scout's athleticism quickly exposed itself.  If I remember right it took her about 4 minutes to get down a 12 foot river bank.  Lincoln passed her.


He wanted in.  Little side note about Lincoln's hair today, it looks awesome!


Looking for gold pieces.  Unfortunately we didn't find any.


"Seriously with the camera dad, how many photos do you need to take?"  As many as I want, now look cute, now!


Once again...the athleticism.


In case you didn't know.  Don't spread New Zealand Mud Snails.


You didn't know that Lincoln could write already.  You're 1.5 year old can't?


Again I did something to get a face like that out of Scout.  Not sure what it is that I do, but I do it well.


Family trail portrait.  I've started taking these everywhere we go, I really like them.  Its funny because the kids even know right where to stand.  One frame, perfect picture.


Wait MOM!


Caught you!  And now you're gonna pay, carry me.


"Seriously another portrait?  I told you that you had to wait till after snack time!"  Wrong Scout, I don't make deals like that...look happy.


And again with the camera.


A solid 15 minutes into our trip everyone was tuckered out and needed a snack.  This would be the reason we need to be more active as a family.


Mom, he's standing on the table again.  You don't let me do that.


Dad I love granola bars...and oranges, and chips, and bananas, and string cheese, and fruit snacks, and cereal...  That kid eats like a horse.  I'm not kidding.  This morning he had three bowls of cereal, a granola bar and some string cheese.  Not normal.


These shoes haven't seen a hiking trail in far too long.


Who's that trip trapping across my bridge?


The first overlook of the river.


Where I found this sweet downed old tree.  Which I of course had to walk out on.


Bry said I looked handsome.  Almost 9 years in and she still makes me blush.


How's this side of my face look?


Scout please go stand in that light right there.  Scout, "What light?"  The only light shining through on the trail.  Scout, "Where?"  Yeah that really happened.


The hair fully illuminated.  Beyond awesome.


She's going potty!  Thats what Lincoln yelled and ran and pointed at.  (For the record, he doesn't actually talk, I make all this up for him.)


He makes it look so easy.


One of her many incredible poses.


He already cheese's.  Not sure what to think about that, but its kinda cute for now.


The sun felt really warm on my face so I did this.  P.S. check out that sweet nose hair hanging out.  In 20 years I'll look back at this and wish I only had this much nose hair.


And so did Scout.


We all thought it felt good.


Except for him.


But he did make these exceptional faces.  I love how happy he can get!


Is that a rooster on the back of his head?  Nope.  Its the remainder of a nap.


And why wouldn't the bathroom be closed, my 5 year old didn't have to pee at all.  I like how they don't specify exactly how long the "Season" is.


Inseparable.


Scout fell off a parking block and scraped her leg.


Lincoln thought it would be good if he showed his big sister that he could climb on it and not get hurt.  Jerk.


Who's the jerks now?  We're leaving you meany pants.


Not if I'm driving dad!


We had a great day, thanks for reading.  God Bless and Go Texans!



6 comments:

Mrs. Kelley Dibble said...

Love to the nth. The memories this post conjures.

And may I say that Striped Scout is a beautiful Scout indeed. As a firstborn I too repeated uh, repeatedly, "You won't let me do that... never in a million." The babies of the family got away with murder. Still do! HA!

Love the sun-on-face pix. You have a lovely crew there, Dad.

Amy said...

Love it david! Awesome! Looks like you guys had a blast. I am ashamed to say that I lived in Stk more than 9 years, I have no idea where this is?!? So I'd say you guys get a medal for venturing out. ha love you all.

David Sowers said...

Kelley, Scout is becoming really beautiful, which scares me a little bit. I'm not sure what kind of "my daughter wants to date who" kind of dad. More than that though I can really see the "grown up face" she is going to have, and it makes me sad that the little girl face is slowly fading away. More and more I'm glad I'm doing this blog everyday now. I'm capturing more memories this way than if I just casually shot. It forces me to shoot more every time I shoot. Amy...I knew there had to be some good parks and trails near here. Alltrails.com showed me exactly where they were. We had a blast. I'll take your medal you're offering me and hang it next to my thanksgiving day family cook off trophy!

Tyesomething said...

What a fun day! I love it when I see these! I feel like I went with you!

David Sowers said...

I wish you had Tye!

Anonymous said...

this story kept me engaged the whole time. I love the light on the trip. And come on! you can't go wrong with caswell park - Classic!