that is not a bug

Now that Gordy is "a big kid" he frequently helps me out with the compost.  We sift through it to separate out the stuff that needs a bit more time to decompose from the composted material which we load into buckets and then distribute on the garden.  Gloves are mandatory for me, but Gordy always ends up taking his off so that can "use his hands better".  And, while playing in the muck is fun, we have to be very mindful of what's in our hands because almost every time we compost, we come across at least one centipede.  Our best plan of attack is usually for me to watch the thing while Gordy grabs the snippers.  We find it, snip it, toss it in the driveway, and then Gordy gets to have a turn with the snippers to make sure it's life is over.  The whole thing is very exciting for him and he always ends up showing off the centipede remains to our neighbors, Todd, and anyone else who will listen to him.

our little fish

Gordy has recently gotten to a point with his swimming that we can almost call him water safe.  He can tread water for quite some time, can swim with digger arms (free-style) for about 10 meters (with a few head up stops), can swim backstroke for 10 meters without stopping, and as long as he has goggles, can swim underwater quite comfortably.

This summer we spent many days at Laniakea where Todd would surf and Gordy and I would go back and forth between catching non-breaking anklebiters on our little mini softtop, using the board as a diving board, and snorkeling/diving around the reef.  He got so comfortable in the water, in fact, that one day at Waimea, he dove down approximately 10 feet to touch an algae-covered rock!

Now that summer is over and the winter swells have started rolling in, our snorkeling/diving days seem to be close to over for the time being.  However, we scored a pretty calm day this last weekend at our beach and I brought my camera!

It has been pretty amazing to dive/snorkel around with Gordy and to experience all that the ocean has to offer with such a tiny human.  While underwater, we've seen a ray at Waimea, tons of turtles, a purple sea slug, and many many sea cucumbers, wana and fish.

Already looking forward to next summer!

almost lost

Each weekend, in order to keep ourselves sane during these pandemic days, Gordy and I have been going on some kind of adventure - a bike ride, a hike, a picnic lunch, etc.  And, while our adventures are always fun, they've been getting less and less exciting because we find ourselves repeating the same adventures over and over again.

So, we pushed ourselves out of our comfort zone and found a new hike to try.  Our google researching led us to believe that the one we selected was a 2-hour easy/intermediate hike with rewarding swimmable fresh water pools and a waterfall at the end - yay!.  

To get to the hike, we drove to the back of Pearl Heights and parked near the entrance to the forest reserve.  We started down a wide dirt path with incredible views on all sides of the surrounding mountains and valleys.  Soon, we started our decent down the mountain and the trail got narrower and narrower.  If not for the LOUD family in front of us, we may not have been sure that we were even on the right path.  Things got muddy, slippery, and occasionally treacherous (had to use trees and ropes to keep ourselves upright), but we decided to keep at it because this was our weekend adventure!

After about an hour, we (and the LOUD family) crossed paths with another family who told us we had at least another 30-40 minutes to go... Everyone was pretty devastated, but we had already gone so far that we couldn't turn back now.  Instead, the LOUD family took a snack break and Gordy and I took the opportunity to sneak past them.  We were both pretty certain that we'd made a great decision and were enjoying our serenity when we finally landed in a dry riverbed... no pools, no waterfall, and no people.  Gordy saw the look on my face, realized that we may have been lost and began to get worried.  I told him not to fear, we retraced our steps and about 30 minutes later we arrived back at the spot where the LOUD family had taken a break.  We took a rest for water and a snack and realized what had happened - we had been so excited to sneak past the LOUD group, that we ended up on the wrong path and went the wrong way down the mountain.  As much as we wanted to go swim in the pools, we were both pooped (I had carried Gordy for about 20 of the 30 minutes back out of the riverbed) so we decided to go back to the car.  

Three hours after we began our walk, we arrived back at the rav covered in mud, sweat, mosquito repellant, and very hungry.  In the end, we did have fun, we definitely had an adventure, and we really weren't very lost - maybe only for a few minutes.