When I was a youngster I loved to hike. I lived in a house surrounded by trees so I spent as much time outside as I did in. As I got older and had some health issues (more on that subject at a later time), hiking was no longer an activity that I could enjoy.
Thankfully this summer has been quite the turn-around for me. I'm feeling better than I have in a long while, and we are starting to make a Sunday hike part of our weekly routine. My kiddos have been all up for it until lately when a dead baby animal sighting and a drastic increase of mosquitoes have threatened to derail this exercise.
I knew that if I gave my kiddos some sort of activity to do while we hike we would be fine, but what can you "do" with a 4yo and 3yo while you hike? My solution was to make a science notebook where they could mark off each time they saw something on the trail.
I made a list of the most common things we see and showed them how to make a tick mark each time they saw the item listed. Knowing my children as I do, I knew that this would last no more than five minutes, but I hoped that it would at least kinda redeem hiking in their little minds.
As predicted, they lost interest in making little marks, but instead drew a line or scribble each time they saw something of note. Ants, butterflies, squirrels, wild turkeys and bird sightings were all meticulously recorded on this page.
So not only did we get through our Sunday/Father's Day adventure, but now I have an activity to try for our upcoming 10+ hour road trip!
