Mary's Rock

Yesterday was a glorious day.  And the best way to spend a glorious day is hiking in the mountains with 6 children.

Right?

Well, my friend and I were apparently the only ones on the trail yesterday who thought that because we got lots of comments (all positive and many funny) about our troop of kids ranging from 9 years to 11 months old (baby not pictured here) that we took hiking in Shenandoah National Park yesterday.  And the troop of kids did really, really well on our "2.8 mile" (I use quotes because it felt like much, much longer - it could be that we picked a trail that was more or less Mother Nature's version of the StairMaster) hike.  (Note to self: Get a topo map.)

Of course, all good hikes end at a rock formation that is fun to climb.

For this picture, I told the boys to smile like they could hardly contain all their excitement.  Apparently, this is what Ben looks like when he can barely contain his excitement.  I hope all of his excitement doesn't escape out of his mouth.  That could be messy.

 And up at the top of the rocks, my friend got these nice pics of the boys.

It was a fabulous hike.  I couldn't have been happier with how the boys did.  They had a great time hiking and climbing on the rocks with their friends.  The weather was beautiful (chilly and sunny - hooray for Fall!). The only thing that is keeping me out of the mountains this morning before church is the ice pack I have to use on my feet (boo for foot injuries).  Hopefully we get a lot of hiking in this Fall.