Shiawassee National Wildlife Refuge

The above pictures are of some of the beautiful plants along the trail. The second picture is of a monarch butterfly and in the fourth picture there is a dragonfly in the upper right corner. And the fifth picture is of the three deer that crossed our path. I was in heaven when I saw these wonderful beauties of nature. They sat and watched us for a few minutes as I was elated to see them. I wish I could have gotten more images of them but I was so mesmerized with them that I didn't move fast enough to get many pictures. We were blessed to have seen them, at first we thought that there were only two and then the third one came out and I know I was in awe. Asa even reacted to them with a simple "Ohhh". He does this with anything that catches his attention right now.


My beautiful boys.


Here we have another Monarch Butterfly, what I believe is a Fox Tail Wildflower, some Thistle and then a dead Monarch. There were Monarch Butterflies all over the place out there. I had hoped to see some more wildlife but was content with what I did see. It is a beautiful place out there. I would like to go back since we have gotten all of this rain in the after affects of Hurricane Ike. When we were out there it was on the dry side. I can imagine all of the water out there now and the wildlife it is hosting especially as we are in the midst of winter migration.


Lastly we have a little bird on a wire.

Nicholas's Baptism

Here are the pictures and video from my nephew's baptism. Nicholas was baptized three weeks ago. Wow I can't believe how much time has gone by but this week without internet has not helped on keeping up with my blogging. Hopefully I will have my internet back soon so that I can keep up better. I have been going to my grandparents and bootlegging theirs so I can keep up a bit but I can't do this everyday. So this is what I have for now.

These two images are from before he was baptized.

Here is the video of Nicholas being baptized.


These two are from after he came up out of the water.

And this last image is from after the service at the small fellowship they had afterwards.

At Stacy's house

When we arrived at Stacy and Charles' house, the kids were enamored with a stray kitty that had found its way there. Stacy or Charles had brought out food and water for it to drink and the kids loved playing with the little kitty. Another stray kitty that has adopted the house as his attacked one of the nearby birds. It was amazing to see this. The bird did get away so don't worry about it. It was still a neat thing to watch the cat do this.


Charles then spotted a doe at the bottom of the hill down by the river and he offered to take Asa down with him to help give the deer food. Here is the sequence of photos that I took. We have them headed down the hill, then some of the doe, it was funny to watch the doe because she circled around watching Asa knowing that he was not a normal part of this routine. It was so much fun to watch this event in my son's life. I am really hoping that my boys grow up with an appreciation of animals and nature.


Finally we have Asa getting geared up to go out on the boat for a ride around on the river. I know, I know. He is in a pink life jacket but that is what Stacy and Charles have at the house for Maddy. We are not near much water where we are at so borrowing someone else's works even if it is pink. With the rate kids grow buying a life vest when you almost never go out on the water is not a necessary expense. If and when going out on the water becomes a regular event we will definitely invest in life jackets for all our children. When I get the pictures from Stacy that Chris took out on the boat I will share those as soon as I get them.


Hope everyone enjoyed the pictures and hopefully this week I can get caught up with the events that have taken place over the last two weeks.

Sarett Nature Center - Benton Harbor

The nature center was a pleasant trip. We saw many things. Here are two beautiful butterflies. A Great Spangled Fritillary and a Black Swallowtail.


Here is a Calico Pennant Dragonfly.


Here is Eli getting Asa. He sure does love his older brother.


I loved that this observation deck was built around the tree rather than the tree being cut down. As well as the only picture that I got of the whole group of us that went out to the nature center.


Here are some of the pretty flowers at the entrance to the trails. This is the second time here because we went around once then went around again taking a different trail when one merged with the main boardwalk path.


Another of Eli and one of Asa. Asa didn't want to really cooperate with getting his picture taken. He is becoming more enamored with the display on the viewing screen. So when I get the camera out he instantly wants to see what is on the view screen and doesn't want to stay long enough to have his picture taken.


Some more pretty flowers. The first is Queen Anne's Lace and the second is Goldenrod with a beetle of some sort.


Finally a Black-Eyed Susan and the back side of the Black Swallowtail Butterfly.

McDonald's in Charlotte

Here are pictures of the boys playing in the McDonald's play place. We stopped in Charlotte for lunch on our way across the state. It is roughly the halfway point between Flint and Saint Joseph. Now I don't typically take my camera with me when going to McDonald's. But since I had it in the car and I noticed that they had a really cool play place so I took it inside. Now Eli didn't actually play in the play place, we just set him at the bottom of the truck part because he looked so cute in the camo shorts outfit. Trisha wanted to try and get pictures of the boys together but Asa wasn't really cooperating, he was more interested in playing.



Asa in the climbing area.

Asa in the toddler area. The final image has a little boy that was there in it, Asa had fun playing with him.