Desoto Falls

I am going on about 6 weeks where I have only seen the sun probably 2 times.  I'm feeling a little depressed and am upping my Vitamin D as I have a history of it plummeting to extremely low levels. So while I hang out inside feeling unmotivated, I thought I would go back and finish some posts that I didn't have time to do when the weather WAS nice and we were spending all our time outside and I wasn't posting anything.  So I can remember the nice outdoor days and look forward to them again...spring is coming...spring is coming.... in the mean time lets revisit one of our previous hikes and look forward to doing more of that soon!

Desoto Falls was a great hike to do with the kids.  It's located in Lumpkin County, Georgia.  There is a little history to this area, it is named Desoto falls because a breastplate of armor was discovered in the 1880s that came from the men under Hernando Desoto that were in the area in 1541.  There were originally three falls you could hike to on this trail, but one is now closed after the storm of the century in 1993 and the upper falls are now inaccessible.   

We enjoyed our hikes to both falls.  When you arrive you come to a trail head (with a marker giving the story about the breastplate from Hernando Desoto) that give the history of the area and then you can go either left or right.  We took the trail to the right first, visiting that fall and then walked back and visited the fall to the left of the trail head, which was smaller and a shorter walk.  Both trails are not too long and easily doable with young children.  

This hike is very easy, more of a nature walk than a "hike"

Length : about 2 miles

Parking: $3

Directions and additional info about the trail Atlantatrails.com

Exploring an Old Homestead

We recently had the pleasure of a wonderful outing at our friends historic family homestead.  We started with a picnic by one of the waterfalls on the property and then hiked around and even got to see old indian markings on the cliff rocks.  There was even a cave where my best friend's mom and her sisters used to build fires and cook noodles as kids.  This land in Cowiche, WA was breathtaking and amazing in the middle of winter, I can't wait to go back in summer!  I hope my friends turn this family property into a wedding venue after they fix up the 100 year old barn!  If I still lived in WA my friend and I agreed we would totally go into business together doing something special out here!

Chicks 3 weeks - Such Chickens!

Chicken Chicks!

This is Trouble.  

See that tail? My kids are determined that means it's a rooster-which would be disappointing, we were looking forward to blue eggs!

So here are the chicks at around 3 weeks old.  After talking to a local farmer who raises chickens and other animals that also is part of our local Classical Conversations group was talking about getting her chicks out on pasture and mine were a whole week older so it was warm out and we gave it a try.

I first took Trouble out and tried to put him/her on the grass....that chick was REALLY chicken and scared of the grass...Trouble kept jumping back up onto my lap and chirping at me like "Save me mommy!"  When my daughter brought out the other two, the 2nd largest one (Trouble is the biggest) did the same thing, flew into my lap and was terrified of the ground.  The runt was the only one who hesitated for a second before walking around and exploring.  After a while the 2nd barred rock was watching the other and decided to give it a try...finally Trouble was like "OK, I'm the Rooster/Top Hen around here, those 2 are making me look bad I guess I'll try it out"  So he/she hopped down, tried walking on the grass for a few seconds and then got so terrified, he/she flew up towards me, landed on the back of my hand and then RAN flapping it's wings al the way up my arm and onto my shoulder, where Trouble then immediately pooped and it landed right in my lap....which I quickly shook off my dress but BUMMER because I have to wash that dress by hand!  ugh!  But in any event, the whole thing 

was quite amusing.  

Tyler, my hubby is definitely the chick magnet.  They like him the most, but he likes them more than I do too so I guess it's mutual.  Don't get me wrong, I like them well enough and think they're cute...I'm just not real comfortable/natural with animals...I had some hamsters growing up and a dog that was untrainable and a horrible pet and some cats that I really enjoyed, but I really haven't spent much time around animals in years and being a mom of 3 littles, cuddling with animals just isn't something I even think about.  So anyways, my hubby comes home and sweet talks the chicks, holds them and pets them...the love it.  My daughter also gives them lots of attention and is really good with them.  At night the chicks make a lot of noise, My daughter told them it was time to stop and be quiet...they listened...or so it seemed.  She now thinks she has magical animal powers or something lol, I told her that maybe God blessed her with a gift to be good with animals, not so much "magical powers".

These things grow so fast I can't believe it, By the time I uploaded these pictures they are already outdated!  I was looking at them today and they are really filling out!  Oh and last week when they turned 3 weeks old we picked up 3 more chicks, we got 2 Rhode Island Reds and 1 Buff Oprington...they are so cute and this batch of chicks seems even more friendly and chill than the first.  The Araucana definitively likes attention, but it's a bit more hyper and just different.  The Barred Rocks will let you hold them but they probably prefer to be left alone, whenever my husband is trying to pick them up, The Araucana (Trouble) flies onto his hand...such an attention hog.