What happens when you get locked into the state park?

Well, fortunately we didn't find out. :) But we cut it really close! A couple of weeks ago, we took the kids to Umstead State Park in Raleigh. Jeremy met us there after work, since he was working in the area. It's a lovely place. We went in on the south side. Jeremy and I went there a fair amount when we lived in the Cary area years ago. We also lived over by the north entrance for a year and enjoyed that just as much.

But, back to the story. So we had a picnic dinner. Then we went for a hike down the wooded trail to the Company Mill site. There are tons of rocks/boulder along the creek and remnants of an old dam long-since fallen into the water. There is even a small "waterfall" of sorts created by these rocks. We found ourselves having fun as the sun was setting and realized that we were going to cut it close getting back to our cars before the park closed. And they lock the gates so we would have been stuck. We hauled it out of there. I am proud to say that Olivia did an amazing job basically power walking up hill for over a mile with us. At one point, I carried both boys and JR put Olivia on his shoulders. The good news is that we made it out (with 5 minutes to spare) and had a great time! We did talk about what we would do for the night on our way back up the trail. :)

One of the reasons for going on this hike besides pleasure was Olivia's bible lessons for the last couple of weeks. The name of Jesus that we are talking about right now is Rock. Our memory verses: Deuteronomy 32:4 - He is the Rock; his deeds are perfect. Everything he does is just and fair. He is a faithful God who does no wrong; how just and upright he is!  Matthew 7:24 -“Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock." Jesus is the firm foundation that we can build our lives on. He is the best foundation for our lives. Our science the first week also had to do with the earth being made up of metal and rocks. So Jeremy talked to her about the "softness" of some rocks versus the "hardness" of others. We took paper and crayons and did some rock rubbings. We found some quartz rock on our hike. They put a few pieces of that in a paper tube and shined a light through it. Olivia has had a thing for collecting rocks for a couple years so this was a very enjoyable lesson for her. We talked about how the water and other elements wear away at the rocks but that God is rock that can't be changed or broken.

Here is a picture of her house built on the rock...