God's playground

It all began the night before last. We needed a few more items for supper. The weather was quite accommodating, John wasn't going to be home for a few hours, so I decided that we would walk down to Hy-Vee and could get our grocery necessities for the evening meal. Lillie wore her purple puppy book bag so we could carry home our lettuce, tomato, and cheese. We only live six blocks away from the market, but I could tell the kids thought this was so cool

We were on our trek home when I ran into my friend Lori. Lori definitely is one of those that I am glad SHE calls me her friend and allows me into her fairy tale life. They live very simply on a farm south of Lincoln, but as I wrote her in a note once "Your children won't realize until they get older how perfect their childhood really was." What I am most grateful for is that she invites our family along on a lot of her adventures. I met her about a year and a half ago at a conference. Instant friends.

What made us kindred spirits is that we both share an insatiable thirst for knowledge and are so curious about everything. As we both said, "The world just isn't big enough for all the things we hope to do and would love to show our children. We made small talk and then she said, "Hey, I found the most incredible trail and wooded area just south of Lincoln. Do you want to meet tomorrow morning with the kids and hike up the trail?" Man. I have been reading for some time Resolved 2 Worship blog. One particular place she always takes her children is a certain wooded area where they can tromp up and down streams, build huge forts out of really tall sticks and leave the construction each time to be finished the next time they are able to get back out to continue further. I loved that. I wanted to have our "Little Narnia." I hoped for tiny streams that the kids could run up and down in on hot summer nights.  I wanted some place that once those shallow streams were frozen over we could tromp up and down cracking the ice.  I found it right off Saltillo Road. John said, "I've been looking for a place like this since we moved back to Lincoln."

I can't imagine what beauty this place resembles in the summer and fall because it all its barren state was silently stunning. Once we arrived and began to walk, John remarked "This is God's playground." We could only walk a couple feet and the kids were enamored by the next cool thing we discovered. It might have been a short creek, or a huge tree that had fallen over, or the coolest thing out there: Huge Grape Tree vines that were like bungee cords. If you held onto them, you could bounce up and down. They were everywhere.

Joseph spent his time collecting seed pods. Two year old heaven. He was determined to collect all 7,000,000 of them.

Tea Time in the forest.

The higher they could climb the better. We could have left these two to wander all day. So many things to see, sticks to fight with, trees to climb, forts to make, life plans to talk through, lego collections to discuss.

Truman was overly adventurous as we kept having to corral her back to the group. Pocohantas. She dug up everything, stuck too many sticks into too many badger holes, tripped on every broken branch and had the time of her life.  Robin hood and Little John running through the forest.