Sweet Yet Sour

Two weeks ago, finding myself with only one child (Anna goes to a class on Monday mornings), I took Henry and Cash on a hike.  It was a nice day for a hike; there was a nice layer of cloud cover and the day was warm, but not hot.  The boys and I headed to a trail not too far from the house that overlooks the mountains and our neighborhood.

Henry has not hiked much, so I began the hike with him in his stroller and Cash steadily alongside me.

Henry soon tired of staying in the stroller and opted instead for pushing the stroller himself.

And then soon after that Henry decided he was tired of pushing the stroller and that the hike would be much better if he wasn’t wearing any shoes:

It’s a nice soft gravel/dirt path, so I decided it was okay to let him go without shoes.  And frankly, if you’ve ever tried to argue with a two-year-old about anything, you know where the phrase “pick your battles” comes from.

Soon after this Henry discovered that there was actually dirt all around him. My beloved little boy loves dirt!  So after walking along pretty well Henry just decided that hiking was not really his thing:

Henry did this for a while; sitting or crouching on the trail with his hands in the dirt, just digging and playing quite happily.  After about 15 minutes I got tired of not actually making any progress and Cash got antsy.  I could not convince Henry to come with me, so I had to pick him up and strap him in the stroller.  He was pretty mad about this and there was grumbling and fighting me about being taken away from his dirt. But Henry loves dirt so much that he grabbed a handful and held it for the rest of the hike:

Covered in dirt all the way up to his elbows, with dirty socks and a dirt under his fingernails, Henry proved that I may have wanted to take a hike, but all he wanted to do was play in the dirt!