spring break - mountain hiking

not intentionally, but i was up to see the sunrise over the mountains this morning. we also saw some deer behind the condo. since we were going to be relatively isolated, i had packed up pancake ingredients and brought our griddle with us to make breakfast. however, i did not account for altitude. yep, those were some dense pancakes. oh well. we had a lazy morning around the condo and ate some lunch before heading out to hike some of the local trails.

i had picked up some notebooks for the kids to draw their observations during our hike. we stopped several times for the kids to draw rocks, mosses and mountains.

an awkward photo of mommy and a reluctant manning

nothing but blue skies

once again mason was the most interested in pictures

 more exquisite views in every direction. there was still some man-made snow on the slopes.

stopping at an outlook for sketching

look at this happy guy! enjoying a much needed relaxing vacation.

maddux asked for a picture with the first flowers we found.

it doesn't quite show how steep things got for us.

stopping to rest

looking back at the incline that left manning in tears.

we gave up on our trail and cut through some yards when the trail became very narrow and very steep - way too much for manning to handle. we decided to walk back on the roads but manning was done. so matt left us to sit and enjoy the sunshine while he ran (he said it was very generous to call it "running") up the mountain to where we had left the car.

"king of the stump"

another outlook along the road up to the condo

playing "war" as we relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.

madelyn's "frozen" pedi to match mommy's

after dinner we drove around trying to find another playground we had seen earlier but couldn't find it. instead we found a double rainbow! you could even see how it went in front of the trees. i had never seen anything like that before.

we did finally find the park and played a little catch before it got too dark to be out.

snuggling up as four kids in a bed for our last night of vacation. so much fun! love.