So I woke up on Mother's Day feeling just as crappy as I had the previous 3 days: sore throat, cough, headache. I had momentary thoughts of staying in bed and hiding out all day. But then Sean knocked on my bedroom door and brought in a nice breakfast of 2 fried eggs on toast (Dave's Killer 5 grain-my favorite), a bowl of strawberries and some orange juice. So I thought I'd better eat it. Then a 1/2 hour later, the other kids came in: Thomas had a card that he had walked a mile to a store to buy all by himself the day before and Milla had crafted a pretty impressive paper rose for me that she had written a bunch of sweet messages on the petals of. As you can see from the picture, the two gifts matched perfectly (although unintentional). So that was sweet and woke me up a little. Then Brandon asked if I wanted to go on a walk with the family that morning. So I just decided, what the heck, no reason to let a little sore throat dictate my life. So I didn't. And we had a lovely 2 mile walk around a lake on the Rocky Mountain Arsenal (a chemical development turned nature preserve area north of Denver). I got 2 new birds for my life list: lark bunting (CO state bird- about time) and the Bullock's oriole along with seeing a bunch of Canada Goose and their hatchlings, tree and barn swallows and, of course, the ever present red-winged blackbird. We also decided we had just enough time before church to do the nature drive where we spotted a good herd of wild bison and some deer. The kids continued to spend time time with their mama after church playing an escape room board game and a paint matching game that Milla had crafted. So much fun to laugh with Brandon and my kids. Just the medicine I needed.
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| So this is actually just south of the preserve- a shot of a flock of pelicans (and a couple cormorants) that I spotted while waiting for my train one day after school. Cool! They are just such massive birds. I'm always surprised when they are able to take to flight. |
Obviously not my pictures, but just to note the birds I saw on my hike!
