Spring Morning Magic
Sometimes life hands you a gift you weren't expecting.
Since S is still fighting off her latest cold, I couldn't head to the gym yesterday morning. With Terence gone all day for training in Tucson, I had been debating the whole drive to school about what I could do for exercise. It was a scheduled run day, but the Warrior Dash is Saturday so I'm supposed to take it relatively easy. But I needed to burn some serious calories (got another 20 lbs of baby weight still to lose). I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to take the younger kids for a hike after dropping the older ones off at school.
One of the county parks is not far from the school so we arrived within minutes. Luckily I keep my baby backpack carrier in the van all the time so after shoving some water and a bottle of formula into the backpack, I strapped S in and led K out onto a hike on the Stargazer Trail. We've had a run of hot temperatures lately but yesterday a storm front moved in so we had cooler temperatures. It was windy too, with just a hint of rain in the air, just enough to make it smell nice.
It was perfect! I wish I could have bottled up the memory Harry Potter style to relive later. We saw blooming saguaros (something I had never seen before this spring, never mind that I've lived in Arizona for 9 years now). K got so excited every time he saw flowers on a cactus! The wind sounded lovely. . . it almost reminded me of the wind blowing through real trees (something we don't have much of around here) but I discovered wind blowing through saguaros makes a cool whispery sound also, though it kind of has a reedy tone as well. A few birds were chattering madly-- I think they approved of the weather also. And the smell!! It was renewing to fill my lungs with such fresh smelling air for once (especially since the night before I had tried to enjoy the cool air in front of my house and nearly gagged on the clouds of cigarette smoke floating over from two of my neighbors).
K did really well on the hike, though at first he protested a bit. I thought I was going to lose altogether when we came across a Tootsie Roll that someone had dropped on the trail. It was ground in the dust but still in its wrapper and K could not let it go. It was like it had some kind of magnetic pull on him and we stood in the same spot for a good five minutes while he alternated between staring at it and pleading with me. Finally, I convinced him to walk away from it without picking it up. Phew!
The highlight of the whole experience was about halfway through the hike. We were at the highest point of the trail, and we stopped to take a breather. S was asleep by then so it was just me and K, sitting on a rock and gazing out over the valley. Clouds kept drifting in front of the sun (moving fast), and I guess this was new to K because he thought it was crazy that the sun kept "turning off." It was a beautiful moment of closeness for just the two of us, one that I'll cherish.
Moments like these make it possible to get through everything else.
Since S is still fighting off her latest cold, I couldn't head to the gym yesterday morning. With Terence gone all day for training in Tucson, I had been debating the whole drive to school about what I could do for exercise. It was a scheduled run day, but the Warrior Dash is Saturday so I'm supposed to take it relatively easy. But I needed to burn some serious calories (got another 20 lbs of baby weight still to lose). I made a spur-of-the-moment decision to take the younger kids for a hike after dropping the older ones off at school.
One of the county parks is not far from the school so we arrived within minutes. Luckily I keep my baby backpack carrier in the van all the time so after shoving some water and a bottle of formula into the backpack, I strapped S in and led K out onto a hike on the Stargazer Trail. We've had a run of hot temperatures lately but yesterday a storm front moved in so we had cooler temperatures. It was windy too, with just a hint of rain in the air, just enough to make it smell nice.
It was perfect! I wish I could have bottled up the memory Harry Potter style to relive later. We saw blooming saguaros (something I had never seen before this spring, never mind that I've lived in Arizona for 9 years now). K got so excited every time he saw flowers on a cactus! The wind sounded lovely. . . it almost reminded me of the wind blowing through real trees (something we don't have much of around here) but I discovered wind blowing through saguaros makes a cool whispery sound also, though it kind of has a reedy tone as well. A few birds were chattering madly-- I think they approved of the weather also. And the smell!! It was renewing to fill my lungs with such fresh smelling air for once (especially since the night before I had tried to enjoy the cool air in front of my house and nearly gagged on the clouds of cigarette smoke floating over from two of my neighbors).
K did really well on the hike, though at first he protested a bit. I thought I was going to lose altogether when we came across a Tootsie Roll that someone had dropped on the trail. It was ground in the dust but still in its wrapper and K could not let it go. It was like it had some kind of magnetic pull on him and we stood in the same spot for a good five minutes while he alternated between staring at it and pleading with me. Finally, I convinced him to walk away from it without picking it up. Phew!
The highlight of the whole experience was about halfway through the hike. We were at the highest point of the trail, and we stopped to take a breather. S was asleep by then so it was just me and K, sitting on a rock and gazing out over the valley. Clouds kept drifting in front of the sun (moving fast), and I guess this was new to K because he thought it was crazy that the sun kept "turning off." It was a beautiful moment of closeness for just the two of us, one that I'll cherish.
Moments like these make it possible to get through everything else.
Comments
Sounded perfect! !