Local Hikes…

I am always on the hunt for interesting local hiking spots that I can take the girls to and spots that may be a little more advanced that I can enjoy without the girls. I packed a lunch and my camera today and set out to make the most of my lunch hour. With a quick google search for hiking trails around Canandaigua I found a gem of a spot that is well known to, well, everyone but me apparently. It’s Barnes Creek Trail situated right next to Onanda Park on West Lake Rd. Lucky for me it was a short trip down the road, so I headed out and started my one hour clock. It took me roughly ten minutes to find the park and finish my lunch, but I found it and was pleasantly surprised to find the place deserted. It should figure that no one would be there at 11 AM on a Thursday, normal people work, right?

I followed a path to a set of stairs that led me down to the creek which at this time of year was nothing more than a trickle. The creek was pretty easy hiking and there are “trails”/ledges along the creek bed that allow you to navigate without getting wet. It was beautifully quiet down there, except for the occasional sound of leaves falling from the canopy and the alarm calls and rustling of leaves from mischievous chipmunks as they scurried out of my way. I hiked at a slower pace so I could take pictures, I was upset though because I forgot to pack my new macro filters in the bag so I couldn’t get some more of the up close artistic shots, but I was short on time so it was probably for the best. I didn’t make it to the first waterfall, so I definitely am going to take some time real soon while the weather is nice and go back for an extended hike.

I have noticed a lot lately that people never tend to look up, when you see people walking most of them are focused on the ground in front of them or straight ahead. It never seems like anyone takes the time to stop and look up. I always try to look at my surroundings from all angles, it’s just the paranoia in me I suppose but I always look at the higher ground first to make sure nothing is coming down on me. As I strolled back I was looking up and I saw this platform mushroom growing about 20 feet up, then a bit lower I noticed this:

Yup that’s a rock that the tree has grown around. I have absolutely no idea how this rock got 10 feet off the ground, but it was interesting to see.

I finally made it back to my Jeep when I spotted a sign for another more manicured trail for the “Uplands”. That trail will have to wait for another day as I was out of time, so I packed up and headed back to work.

Overall, it was a pretty cool place for a few short hikes. I am definitely planning to go back soon, hopefully with the girls, but possibly on my own with my camera.

Keep exploring!

Starting Out…

This weekend was pretty crazy as usual, it seems like we have somewhere to go every day of the week and this weekend wasn’t any different, but one of the nice things we got to do was to go over for pizza at my youngest brother’s new place. He is nineteen and he made the decision to move out from my parents and get a place with his girlfriend Megan. They really lucked out and through a family connection ended up with not just an apartment, but a whole house a nice size lot in the country, not bad at all for a first place. In fact, Aaron’s first place is nicer than my first 4 apartments and better furnished lol. I remember how big a step it was to make that first move from my parent’s house and how I nervous I was. I’m sure he is nervous too, but he isn’t showing it yet. I’m proud of him for making that first step to true adulthood and managing his life.

Here he is with the girls, he looks pretty relaxed, right?
I am relieved that he found such a nice place and didn’t have to go through what I went through. I have always been stubborn and always did things my way even if that made my life harder than it needed to be. I have lived in some pretty shady places, scraping by and living on furniture that we found on the curb. Hell, I lived in a camper in the middle of nowhere without electricity or running water for 6 months. I have fed myself dinner by making the rounds at Wegmans and Tops for the free samples, if you ever find yourself in that position they sample givers normally start to get suspicious of you around round 3 lol, then its time to find another fishing spot. But even though my life hasn’t been exactly easy I did learn a lot from those years of living rough and it is that advice that I will pass on to Aaron in person. I don’t want to get into it on here because there are too many things I’ve learned through embarrassing moments that don’t need to be made public.
But one thing I will share is that you can weather the greatest storms in life if you have the love of a good woman. Lean on each other and know that all things seem to work themselves out for the better even if you can’t see it when you are going through hell. I have gone through so much and always made it through because L Bird was by my side and when we had nothing we still had love. Love you L Bird.

New photo toys…

So I have been reading another blog that does a lot of photography and they have a ton of close up shots that I really admire. After a little research I found I could get the effects I admired so much from macro lens. So I bought a cheap pair from Amazon to try them out and I was pretty impressed. Here are some of the shots I took on lunch today, these were just me trying to get a feel for how the lenses work, I definitely need more practice shooting with these.

Teasel at a +4 macro

Golden Rod at a +10 macro

Honeybee at a +10 Macro

+10 Macro

Pretty cool, huh?

New Beginnings…

Well, it’s the start of a new school year and a whole year of new beginnings for our little family. A Bird started 1st grade and so far is loving it, she is also cheerleading for the first year so there are a lot of firsts for her and us this year.

On the first day of school she chose to wear an outfit that she picked out herself while she was school shopping with my father. She has a sense of style that is all her own, she wore a pleated khaki skirt, with a t shirt that was covered with a denim vest, that’s right my little girl is bringing denim back so dust off your White Snake jean jackets, because they will be hip again, maybe…. a big maybe.

She is enjoying cheering but it is our first experience with a “team sport”, so we didn’t realize what a time commitment it really was. She cheers for the flag football team, so before school started she was practicing 3 nights a week for an hour and a half, now that school and the games are starting she practices 2 nights a week with a game on Sunday morning. I guess I didn’t realize that at this age they would be drilling them so much, but she seems to enjoy it. It has causes some stress around here as both L Bird and I are running on practice nights, but it’s a short term deal, the season is over at the end of October, so we just have to muscle through a another few weeks.

This is a big year of firsts for Nat too, she will be 9 months in a couple of weeks. It seems like she is a couple of weeks in front of where A Bird was developmentally at this age. She is spitting, sputtering, jabbering and has turned out to be quite proficient at crawling and squealing. She is pulling herself up onto everything and you can’t get away from her now. If you go to the bathroom, you hear a “thump, thump, thump” of her crawling on the hardwoods after you, then the banging of tiny fists on the bathroom door and squeals and spit flies until you come out. She loves A Bird, she follows her everywhere and routinely laughs at  A Bird’s antics.

Other than that not much is going on, the house is still on the market, things are still stressful, but life goes on right? Life goes on, one day at a time whether we are stressed or not. On that note, I have a crawling baby that is starting to get grouchy and two other ladies that need some help waking up, so grouchy pants, Linus and myself have some work to do. Wish us luck!