Alternative Transportation

We spent the weekend playing in the woods and attending a fall festival in our neighborhood. After looking back at the pictures you may think we have made extreme changes to save the environment. We hiked, rode a pony and tried out a segway. Saturday, the whole family headed to the Twin Falls State Park trail. We didn't bring the backpack this time. Lucy did great. The trail followed along a fork of the Snoqualmie river. We were headed to an overlook of the falls but we didn't quite make it. Lucy and I stopped for a snack and let Rodney and Murphy roam up the hill and see the falls.

At one point Lucy and Rodney climbed this huge boulder. On the way down, Rodney was helping Lucy climb down backwards using her hands and feet. She was super focused, quiet and purposeful with her moves. There were a couple times when I wondered if she was actually scared. She took a long time to get down an 8 foot slope. At the bottom she quickly turned around and said, "Again!" It is so interesting to see how her personality is showing up. I think she was a bit scared but she so wanted to figure it all out, she was willing to push through it.

This same trait showed up again when Lucy got the chance to ride a pony. She was excited about doing it before we went. When Rodney started to lift her onto the pony she said in a quiet voice, "no". She got on and held on tight. The woman walked her down the lawn and turned around to come back but started jogging. While Lucy had gotten comfortable with the walking, the jogging elicted another, "No". When asked if she wanted to walk down and back one more time, she said, "all done". There was no crying, no freaking out. Just a calm, clear, "no".

They had little pumpkins for the kids to paint. She loved this although the water soluble tempra paint didn't hold up well on our front porch during the evening rain. We have a multi-colored spot on the step now.

Have you seen one of these? They are called Segway personal transporters. Rodney and I were able to try them out. It was a funny experience. It moves in the direction that you lean. But the word "lean" doesn't really describe it. When you stand on the segway and you barely shift your weight from the front to the back of your feet, the machine will roll backwards. Shift that weight to the front of your feet and it will roll forward. The only thing you do with your hands is turn the handle to turn the machine left or right. It makes no noise as it is electric. It was really fun to try but it took a lot of concentration for me to get it. Rodney seemed to master it quicker than I did. The city of Seattle has a few of these for the meter readers. It's pretty funny to see people rolling around on them. It just seems too futuristic but I can see the attraction.

Our community center opens up the gym a couple mornings a week for kids to play with a variety of riding and push toys, a small bounce house, lots of balls and a climber. Its a great space for rainy days. They just purchased some new crazy riding toys and Lucy tried this one out. It was really hard not to try it myself. Doesn't it look like fun?