New Hiking Partners!, Tuning Up the Bike, And Shin Splints

59*, 30.11 in and steady barometer, 36% humidity, VAR 5 mph wind, fair

This weekend has been busy for me. We not only cleaned house from top to bottom and put up new curtains, but I took the dog and a neighbors kid on their first hike with my husband (who normally doesn't join me on these types of outdoor excursions). We had a good time (even though I have a shin splint from exercising so much more lately) and I learned some new wildflowers:
Cutleaf Toothwort, Spring Beauty, and Rue Anemone, alone with seeing plenty of wildflowers I already knew like trillium and jack-in-the-pulpit. What a great place the dunes are for spring wildflowers!
Here the Kid is studying poison ivy, something he didn't know how it looked.
Enjoying a healthy trail snack.
Contemplating...
It was a short hike as I wanted to make it fun for all 3 of my companions so that they wouldn't be discouraged from coming again. The kid is very excited to go on his next hike and I am glad to be able to share my love of nature with a youngster who hasn't had much experience with the outdoors.

Today, Sunday, after dreaming about buying a touring bike in my sleep, I just had to get my bike out. I tuned it up, oiled and tested it and even pimped my ride a bit with a basket so that I can go to the farm when I want and carry my produce home easily and comfortably. I've never tuned up a bike before...I'm mighty proud of myself for doing it myself. And if you want to feel freedom.....the first ride feels fantastic and it didn't aggravate my shin splint at all as I use different muscles to peddle then to jog, hike or walk the dog. The high I felt after the short ride was fantastic to say the least...I was floating on a cloud.

I spent the rest of the sunny day weeding the garden, cleaning house, and icing my shin splint down. What a good weekend :)

Share the sence of wonder.

There are those who live in families who are not very in-tune with nature. They are raised half blind, not seeing the wildness and wonder around them because they have been taught that such things are insignificant. Raised like that, you just don't know how to look and observe. When the closest they get to nature is a round up sprayed back patio its like a life half lived and incomplete.
My neighors 10 year old son reminds me a lot of my little brother (now in the NAVY) and with his mother's permission I am taking him hiking and showing him what I know and have learned as a forester and from my own studies and observations of the woods, fields, marshes, and streams. Nathan is 10 and he's excited about his first hike, next weekend. He's seen pictures in my house of the trails Mr. Hyper and I hike. I've taught him about the 10 essentials and told him to bring a note book and pen so that he can keep a journal of what he learns. I've showed him the beaver dam in his own back yard and a robin's nest with 3 pretty eggs within that was in easy view of his back patio he'd not noticed. There is a spark there. I can see it. The boy is realizing there is more to life then he ever dreamed about. He's begging me to take him backpacking. I told him latter, after we do some day hiking and it's warmer--His mom, a good friend of ours, is OK with it all--
I'd like to give a kid an opportunity I never had growing up. I never even KNEW backpacking existed until I was 17 or 18! But when I realized there was such a thing I knew that's what I wanted to do. The older boy doesn't show much interest at all, he likes golf and school and that's about all. And the girl is far too young for hiking (not yet 2 years old) so Nathan will go hiking with us. I challenge everyone out there to take a kid hiking :) Just don't forget the ten essentials!