Into the woods

We finally took the time this morning to put on our snowshoes and go into the woods. Our purpose was two-fold: enjoy the peacefulness and beauty of the woods, and blaze a trail with our snowshoes for our upcoming cross-country skiing. It's much easier to go cross-country skiing if a trail has been made in advance.

So off we went.

We always enjoy looking for signs of deer, and the deer are plentiful in our back woods, despite our neighbor, a hunter, who often complains to Ken that the deer have left the area since we moved to the property adjoining his.

I'm no fool. I let Ken lead the way. That makes the trek a bit easier for me, and I get to "groom" the rough pathway with my snowshoes.

Once we were quite deep into the woods, I turned around and took a photo of the nice trail we were leaving behind us. That's the shadow of the "triple oaks" cast across the trail. We always stop to admire the triple oaks, but I wasn't aware I'd gotten it into this photo. I told Ken if our property were a Southern plantation, "Triple Oaks" would be a great name for it. Alas, it's not a Southern plantation.

The only sound we could hear was that of a distant woodpecker, madly hammering away at a tree.

Here Ken shows me where deer have been digging under the snow, into a pile of brush that Ken cut last summer. They enjoy nibbling the bud ends of the branches.

Ken spends so much time in these woods in the summer, as he's cutting our firewood, that he knows each of the trees practically by name.

I was determined to find a heart for Cheryl, my niece, while trekking about. And find one I did! It's not a snow heart, which is what I expected to find, but it's a heart.

It was a good morning to explore in the woods. I often forget about the life that exists out there, so it's good to see signs of their existence and be reminded we're all on this earth together.