Mother's Day Weekend Hike in New Canyon

These pictures go from the end of the trip to the beginning so this is at the end when we were almost back at the cars.  We're throwing rocks into the stream below.  We could've done it for hours, but we (the adults consciously so) were really hungry for lunch.

Caleb found that when he scraped the little rocks on the big rock it "wrote" in white.  Annika saw and so wanted to be apart of it.  Caleb was quite the cute big brother and helped her and together they wrote with their rocks.  I can't remember who came up with some fun activity to top this, but somehow we were able to keep walking.

She loved the mountains.

We got Caleb to come down the road pretty well by having him run to "get us" at intervals.  He ran most of the way down either by "getting us" or tag, or races.  

Annika also loved it when I'd run along with Caleb.

I love this picture.
Notice Annika's smile at getting kissed by the dog.  I guess she belongs to both sides of the extended family.  I would've been grossed out by a dog kiss, but not my little animal lover.

I laid down and Annika started putting dirt and rocks on me.  My dad thought it was hilarious and took a picture.

I forgot my sunglasses or a hat and it was really bright so my mom loaned me hers.  I feel like a dork in this picture, but the point of the picture was to capture how Annika looks like a rag doll and I don't have a descent photo shop (or the skills or desire) to crop the picture.

My dad let Caleb carry around his $700 pair of binoculars to look at birds.  True love--and a true desire to make naturalists out of his postarity.  Caleb loved it!  He was so excited and knew it was a big deal to carry Grandad's binoculars.  My dad got a bunch of pictures of him pointing the binoculars at different things.  He'd shout, "I see a bird!" and sometimes even throw out names.  My dad has successfully taught him the names of many birds.