Tyke Hike

About 2 miles from my home, there's nature preserve called the Madrona Marsh. Smack dab in the middle of the city, there are 10 acres of vernal marsh that are home to hundreds of species of plants, birds, insects, mammals & frogs. You can literally walk across the street from Target and get lost in fields and flowers and swamp! I vaguely recall visiting as a kid, prolly on a field trip, but it has been at least 2 decades since I'd been there! (Oh gosh, just saying that makes me feel old!)

Isn't this place beautiful?!







Once a month, the nature center hosts a "Tyke Hike", a guided tour around the preserve, just for little kids. We went with Rebecca, Jack & Sammy (I know, big surprise, right?!) and Nani! I'm always so thankful to have Nani or Grandma come on trips because it's another set of legs to help chase after my boy! But this time I was beyond pleasantly surprised! Austin did so so good! I guess he was having so much fun, he forgot to wander very far!





I think this was the farthest he ever got from us!


At the beginning of the hike, each child got a card with an animal on it, for them to look out for.

Austin's had a bee & was so excited when we spotted several!


and Jack's had wood duck and he earnestly watched all the ducks until we found it!


Occasionally, one of the docents would find an insect or a frog and would pick it up to let the kids inspect and touch it. Austin was so attentive & gentle!





We found the cutest frogs! I was expecting big frogs, not these tiny little things. And they were everywhere!


We came across some wonderful pawprints! It had just rained a few days before, so we found lots of these. I believe the deep ones are either skunk or raccoon and I'm not sure what the very light one is.


We saw a beautiful Great Egret! I spotted this one and was pretty darn proud of myself, even though I didn't have a card.




You may be wondering where McKenna & Sam were! They just came along for the ride. Sammy took a nice nap all wrapped up on his momma, (You can just barely see a few footsies sticking out the bottom)


but McKenna decided there was too much fun stuff to see!


Some other fun finds...

A lady bug! My fave!


A kestrel


Purdy flowers!




It was a great hike! You can tell from this picture that Becca took that Austin was thoroughly enjoying himself!



As always, Jack & Austin really enjoyed palling around together!


After the hike, we went back to the nature center to check out some caged animals and some stuffed ones!

Austin was brave enough to pet a snake! I was so proud!


So was Sammy!


Austin stopped to say "Hi!" to a stuffed duck.


Two last pics of my sweet boy! I needed new headshots to send to his agent and Becca was kind enough to get some since I can't get the boy to sit still and look anywhere near the camera while smiling all by myself! She got some great ones!