Springtime in Michigan

After church last week, some friends of ours were discussing the amazing weather report for that day (highs in the mid 50s AND sunny?!?! Wow!) and how they wanted to take advantage of it before it got rainy the rest of the week.  They invited us to go on a little hike with them that afternoon and we decided we had to go (certainly our Vitamin D levels are shot after this winter!). 

As it turned out, springtime in Michigan means there is still snow on the ground in places (we sorta forgot this might be the case because most of the snow around us has melted) so this is what the trail looked like: 

The little boys wanted to walk but weren't super steady on the snow, so they got some great assistance from the big people. 

Also, photographic proof that we do have friends! 

I really loved seeing fallen leaves making impressions in the snow, like this one below:

Jesse did his father proud and pointed out some birds for us.  We were all very impressed.

We also came across a set of train tracks just as a small train was coming by--the two train obsessed toddlers loved it!

A little creek ran along the path at times, and once crossed our path.  No worries though--this cute little bridge spanned it for us. 

Sometimes the boys got tired and rode on shoulders. 

(also, can you tell how lovely the sun was that day? It did good things for my soul!!!)

After awhile (like 30 minutes) we reached the end of the trail and headed back, this time showing the boys how to play Pooh sticks on the little bridge:

They didn't really get it but it was cute nonetheless!

After the somewhat muddy hike (and stepping in the massive amount of mud next to the car), this is what my shoes looked like:

I think this is both a sign of a hike well hiked, as well as that I should probably invest in some hiking books sometime soon ;) 

Hooray for Springtime in Michigan!