Bort, Bones and Acorns

There's things I like about walking in the woods, specific things that are hard to ever describe in any human words - it's something that only connects with your own soul or another soul standing there with you... a soul who might be looking too. Not everyone looks, at least not in the same way.
Not everyone sees everything there, which is why I have always loved to walk with another person, another set of eyes with me so that the discoveries double, the moments are shared, the rest of the world & my own problems disappear. I forget, just about everything.
Bort has been my closest nature friend for what seems like a lifetime but is a blink of a dinosaur eye in history, today we walked aimlessly but began collecting things. First I thought I would collect some small trees for a Barnyard project...
but then Bort saw the bones.
He found a skull, some teeth, some claws, the jaw bones... we tried guessing the skull was of something like a raccoon, we tried guessing who mighta' ate it since there was also a cracked snail shell there, and animal tracks & trails. Bort mentioned an owl eating while dropping things high up in the trees, i wondered about what was the biggest animal an owl could eat.
Then I found the spine bones up a few feet...

I sometimes think if i had snacks (aka enough food) I could spend forever in the woods. Then again... I suppose I do.

In the same area we found the BIGGEST most magnificent acorns I have ever seen - so healthy, so plump and perfect. Hardly a rotten one. A neighbor later drove up as we came down the hill with our bag full of acorns, and said that lots of acorns meant a harsh winter. I can only hope this year i have worked as hard as a squirrel to be prepared.

(BTW- we plan to dry and cook these acorns! read more about it HERE.)

OUR COLLECTION(S) ::::::

I would like to use the tiny bones to make decorations for my baskets or jewelry. And to be in awe of how pretty they are.

The acorns, will be for food (upcoming post soon!).

Xoxoxo

A Walk In The Woods: Obscure Beauty

I hadn't been for my usual walk in the woods lately, maybe it had even been a whole entire 2 weeks! The things that nature does while you are sleeping are unreal - in that small amount of time the flora finally grew so tall in many spots it was well above my head, some areas had gotten so thick that the beaten path was completely obscured in confusion. Tall wild flowers fell in ways in didn't recognize because there have been bunches of deer pushing through and re-routing our forest 'highway' - so many deer that the once smooth ground was chunky with tracks. Many of which were fresh and one step ahead of me the entire time (possibly because my hot pink outfit was a warning sign!). :)
It's the little things that count for me. Like a hickory leaf eaten' down into this lacy pattern...
and the crazy shapes a fungus can take, this one below is kinda growing inside out - looking like a cup!
It's spiky spider season here now too- tons of these making almost invisible webs all along the path - I ducked under a few, and went face first into much more. I accidentally brushed my hand against that pointy lump of a body and it hurt - those spikes are not just for show.
Forest Food! This is one honker of an acorn - I had to carry it all the way back home with me, I couldn't put it down cause it was too mesmerizing.
I don't know if I am ready for this one, although on fire with color and mystery that leaf is a sign of fall coming, and fall means it's gonna get very very freaking cold very soon... (it may take a lifetime for a girl from New Orleans to get used to the seasons.)
At the end of my walk is always this spectacular view of wildflowers, trees and mountains. Pretty neato! Nature never stops rockin', it has consumed my every move like a really good song.
XoXooXOooox