Day 18, Saturday, 1/26/08, Year Four Dancer & Daedee: Snow Falling on Eagles

Hello Eagle Friends,

Today was a beautiful and balmy 17 degree day here in Southeast Minnesota. I brought my daughter along with me so she could explore and work on her nature journal. She had several pages filled before we even made it to Dancer & Daedee's nest area.

She hadn't been back to the nest area since before the summer flood, and I wanted her to see the area and how it has changed.

Today she really enjoyed helping me "rekindle" my love for the tree work on my old tree book project I started awhile back, just months after she was born. I guess you could say that it is just now, this season, that the book is finally "taking root."

All nests were empty, but we saw the trumpeter swans sitting up on the ice with the geese. My darling has been down with the flu the last couple days so getting her out of the house and into some fresh air really helped her.

However, it was while she was sick that we spent a lot of time watching old movies, like all three episodes of the Wilderness Family. There is a scene in the third movie where the old mountain man, Boomer, is sitting with the kids and the young boy, Toby, is playing "old Jake's whistle" and the sound of the whistle draws the animals to them. They are all sitting down enjoying the animals who are coming up close to them. When suddenly Boomer sneezes
and scares all the animals away. The girl says, "Oh Boomer."

So there Em and me sat watching and enjoying the animals, birds, and pond life on a Saturday afternoon, during our Minnesota winter, and we both worked on documenting the trumpeter swans and geese, Em drawing as fast as she could, and me shooting my still and video cameras. Then it happened. I sneezed.

Suddenly, the swans and geese all lifted their heads to us, and Em leaned up and said, "Oh Boomer!"

It amazes me the witt and things she comes up with. She's quite a kid.

We saw red tail hawks, lots of crows, cows, horse and pheasants. We checked all the trees for my other book and we both looked forward to a good dinner at home.

I brought her over to a creek to show her some raccoon tracks and we found a heart opening in the snow with the water running beneath. That picture captures the love I have for my girl, the love I know God has for us, and my love I have for the area in these woodlands, reflecting right back at us.

I close out today knowing I just had one of those rare God given days of tranquility, and bonding that we both needed after a long month of colds and flu bugs. There is a time for everything, and today was a time for snow angels, laughter, and mom and daughter enjoying God's creation.

I'm looking forward to Day 19, but I know when I hike out to Daedee and Dancer's nest area I'm going to look down and see two sets of footprints. My little girls and mine and I'm going to really miss our adventures of Day 18 today.

I'll see you on the journey--

Lisa