Mother's Day Hike 2015: Llandover Woods

We had an absolutely gorgeous Mother's Day this year. The sky was blue, the sun was out, and not a drop of rain fell.

To celebrate the day, we opted to lace up our hiking shoes and explore Llandover Woods, which is a hop, skip, and a jump from our house. Embarrassingly, we'd never taken the time to go there before now; in fact, I didn't even realize it was a good place to tromp around with kids until I read a "secret places to hike with kids in/near Seattle" article online.

The loop that we hiked was just over a half mile long and provided plenty of lush landscape to look at along the way. Even with the ups and downs of the trail, our kids did great!! No one complained about tired feet nor asked to be carried. Woo hoo!!

Along the way, Eric and I pointed out things we noticed, like sprouting ferns, woodpecker holes in trees, thorny plants to avoid touching, etc. The kids soaked it up and created their own backstory for much of what we saw, including a fairy family lived below a large tree with partially exposed roots.

Our hike didn't take too, too long, which was good because the kids had swim lessons later on in the day and we didn't want exhaust them. That said, it was a perfect first-of-the-season hike and an ideal way to spend Mother's Day.

Let's hike!!

Annika and Eric heading off into the woods

Annika just hanging around

Mama and her munchkins

Annika, queen of the woods

Conon, king of silly log standers

Conor found a flower and gave it to me as a Mother's Day gift...

So, Annika found a flower, too!

My little sweeties 

Eric and the kids blazing a trail

Wuv.... twue wuv!

The kids loved the natural benches we found along the way
and had to try out each and every one of them

Conor securing his role as hike leader

We found a few rock/shel piles in a certain area of the woods; it took us a couple of minutes to realize it was probably someone's pet cemetery. Of course, the kids wanted to bring the cool rocks home (especially the heart-shaped stone). After much convincing (without going into too much details about exactly why it was important not to take the pretty items), they agreed to leave the shrines intact. Rest in peace, little fishies and birds who may (or many not) have been buried there

The Olson Four in Llandover Woods