A Day Out Hiking

The weather has been so pretty that we wanted to get out on Saturday.  We chose Lake of the Ozarks State Park to do a little 3 mile hike.  Gracie was definitely more excited than any of the other kids.

Here we are, ready to go.  We encountered "ticky woods" about this time last year so I sprayed us down with bug spray before we started.

And off we go...

Gracie was so well behaved on our hike.  Her gentle leader is the best thing ever (well, close second to her shock collar).

Our monkey had to climb up trees...beware Jaelyn, seed ticks aren't scared of heights either.

Allie and Caden spent half the hike looking for the perfect hiking stick.

We should not have stopped to take this picture because it gave everyone a chance to stop and look down.  Unfortunately, when we did, we discovered teeny, tiny seed ticks crawling all over our shoes, socks, and lower legs.  Stupid bug spray...didn't work at all.  At one point, Jaelyn had a colony, as she called it, hiking up her leg in a V formation.  Seriously, Dan said it was a perfect V.  Talk about freaking out...thankfully Dan was behind her to get them off.  We high tailed it the last mile with Caden crying and me threatening Jaelyn if she repeated the word "tick" again, which was only making him cry more.

As soon as we got back to the car, we tied our shoes and socks up in a trash bag and used hand sanitizer and bug spray on our legs to get the ticks off.  Several days later, Caden, Allie and I still have bites all over our legs and they itch soooo bad.  Have I mentioned I hate Missouri lately?  I don't hate our house or our school or our friends, but I hate the state of Missouri!

We had our picnic lunch after the cleansing and then drove through the park (but we didn't get out because everyone was barefoot!).  We saw several skinny dear and a couple cute chipmunks.

And that was about all the nature we could take.  We are talking about camping this weekend at Johnson's Shut-ins.  It'll be a great place to ride bikes and play in the shut-ins...but no hiking or traipsing through the woods!  AND I'm buying a new can of bug spray!