A Battle Creek Hike

 Since my horrible cartwheel attempt a few weeks ago I realized I'm not as flexible as I used to be so I've started doing stretches every morning to help with that. If Meadow is around she usually copies me or climbs on me.

I thought you just wanted to stretch more?

 I was out of ideas for breakfast so I made Scott take over.

Maple Syrup caramelized apples with crepes it was.

 We couldn't feed them to Meadow fast enough.

She was trying to skip the apples, but eventually caved in. She's so picky sometimes.

 I did finally end up canning a few days ago. Strawberry Rhubarb Jam. Out of the three jars 2 actually sealed. 

Meadow runs to our mudroom whenever she can and stands on our cooler. She loves looking outside at the yard.

I sometimes walk in on her and Peanut fighting over who gets to stand on it. 

 While driving back from our Illinois trip I spotted a park off Hwy 61 in St. Paul. Since it was actually going to be nice today I suggested we check it out.

I had actually suggested Battle Creek Regional Park on a different occasion, but Brooke doesn't hear me from time to time. It must be my mumbling.

Some guys name was chiseled onto the side of the bluff when we entered. Apparently he was the "Father of Skiing." I still don't condone carving your name into natural artifacts.

 The park is basically a lot of trails for biking and walking. I want to come back in the winter and try snowshoeing.

There are a bunch of man-made waterfalls that tame the Battle Creek. It's definitely a different experience compared to Minneapolis' creeks.

Eventually we hiked into the Maplewood section of the park.

 Meadow was getting antsy in the Ergo. We let her out in this big open area to stretch her legs.

She's been walking around in circles at home so we figured she could use practice in a natural environment.

 She walked in shoes for the first time this week. She's walking full time now, but still hasn't perfected it. The grassy area was too difficult for her so we moved back to the path. 

 She walked and walked and walked.

Meadow kept on turning around after heading in one direction for a long time. We ran into a caterpillar and she kept her distance.

Next time we go here we'll have to get into the backcountry trails.

 Eventually we put Meadow back in the Ergo. All that walking wore her out.

By the time we got home it was dinner time. Since we had skipped lunch, Brooke called it, "lupper." I'm not sure I can support such silly words.

 Since we had lupper at 5 we didn't know what to do with the rest of our day. Normally we eat dinner around 7. That's when I heard the neighbor kids outside so we joined them.

They had found a litter of kittens in the alley, created a makeshift home and fed them.

They were worried about the kitties being cold and one of them ran home to grab something to cover the box with.

 I figured Meadow wasn't going to be using her pool again and deflated it.

Then the kids wanted to try my fancy camera.

 We had our first frost the other night. I hope we covered our plants well enough. I was really thinking we would get more tomatoes this year. I guess I will have to get some from the farmers market to can.

 Some of the neighbor kids are moving in a couple weeks so we wanted to get a photo with all of them together.

They acted like goofballs as usual.

After I let one of them borrow my camera they all wanted a turn. 

I'll miss these kids even if they come over and ask to play GTA every week. I always say, "No. Come back when you're a teenager."

 We played all kinds of games with the kids.

Once the sun went down all the little ones disappeared and we put Meadow down for the night.

After Meadow goes to bed we usually watch a show. We continued our Curb Your Enthusiasm marathon. I am usually knitting one of my many projects during this time. Tonight I worked on a dress for Meadow.