Don’t Forget to Take Time to Smell the Flowers

THREE parks today – my feet hurt!!  Oh well, it’s good for us and good for the dogs. 

First we had to go check out the Heron nest at Alton Baker park.  Not much activity this morning, too early in the day maybe.  There were 3 herons but mostly they were just being lazy.


This one was still performing its morning toilet – or maybe preparing for a hot lunch date.  It was certainly working hard to get those feathers just right.



Alton Baker is a very large park with areas for fishing, picnicking, jogging, canoeing, and they even have a Frisbee golf course.  One area is a tree “garden” with many varieties of beautiful trees.  I thought this magnolia was beautiful.  It looked strange to have blossoms but no leaves yet.








There was another variety of magnolia that had beautiful waxy green leaves but no flowers – go figure!!





The day was just too nice to end with one park so we went on out to Armitage.   Armitage is the county park where many of you stay when you camp in the area.  It has a beautiful FHU campground, a fenced 2 acre dog park, covered picnic areas, volleyball, horseshoe pits,  boat ramp, and walking trails.  There is an upper trail through the picnic area, and a lower trail that goes right along the McKenzie River.  We wisely chose to stay on the upper trail today, as the lower trail was a bit damp!


We found some beautiful daffodils and Ollie took time to stop and smell the flowers.


…and smell some more…


…and some more…


…and just a bit more!

He’s such a sensitive little guy ha-ha!!

We were having such a great time that we took the long way out to Harrisburg so we could just enjoy the sunshine a bit longer.  We stopped at the park in Harrisburg but by then I was too tired to get out the camera.  I did get a shot of the kids in their seats though.

Come'on Dad, get in so we can get going.

At home, their energy was still not depleted so Ollie begged to play a few games of “ball.” 

“See Dad, the balls are right over there on the table.”


“PLEASE, Dad, I’ll love you forever.”


And so we wore them out with tennis balls.  Jewel settled down for a bit of squirrel watching.




Ollie brought his Nyla-bone outside and gave it a good chewing.


We sat in our chairs and just enjoyed the warm sunshine, our dogs, and our many blessings.