A day in Nature

Around here we have a custom for birthdays...if it's your birthday the day is yours.  The birthday gal or guy gets to choose where the day takes us.

Sooooo, on my big day I took us out to nature!
We hit the road and took a ride around the "Cades Cove Loop".   This area is just beautiful and chock full of wildlife.  It's actually a valley within the Smoky Mountains National Park and is a historic landmark for all of it's preserved homesteads and churches dating back to the early 1800's.  It's a great trip because its a loop around the valley with little pit stops at various landmarks along the way.  And again, the nature and wildlife is just amazing!

My family were great troopers too.  We stopped and explored and ate snacks (and yes, Sammy napped in my arms while we meandered through the woods)  But we truly had a fun family day and it goes in the books as one of my favorite birthdays ever.  All of the giggles, the oohs over each new discovery, the joy over every animal we spotted....it all warmed my heart over and over.

So on to all the fun photos.

Within the Cove there are a lot of historic buildings.  We got to walk through them and see what it was like (sort of) back then.

 Here's one of the churches.

 

Once inside the church it was so simple and so beautiful

And outside- reading all of the dates on the cemetery headstones was amazing.

We had some walks

And some air time

And plenty of playing in the leaves time!

More walks to cool destinations

And then there's the wildlife....

We ran into a gaggle(?) of wild turkeys

Some deer on the field.  Sammy decided to head on out to see them.  He told me he was going to pet them.

We saw so many deer- it was just awesome. 

Ohhhh...or maybe whoooooo.  We also saw an owl!  I thought that was just the coolest!

And there you have a day planned by me.  Well, sort of planned. 

Really a day in nature can never be planned, just enjoyed!
J