Congratulations And About A Hike

The winner of the giveaway, randomly chosen by Ewelina is the 21st commenter, which is Charrette!!  I'm even going to really send her a package in June, despite the fact that she lied in the comments here.  Or maybe she was just making a joke.  Yes, that must be it. (She said "Congrats!  You started just before I did!  But you are way better at it than I am. . . ."  As a matter of fact, this is sort of funny because I've been contemplating adopting a more Charrette-style blogging schedule.  This means that I would blog whenever I felt like it, and more likely when I actually had something to say (although what I'll say will never be as thought provoking or well written as what she writes!).

So congratulations, Charrette!  Email me your mailing address!  

And I'll end with a couple of pictures from our trip up the Holy Cross Mountain to visit a monastery.  Greg had taken a group of missionaries there a few weeks before and had made friends with a monk-in-training and talked to him about the Book of Mormon.  He was interested in reading it, but neither Greg nor the missionaries had one on them at the time (oh, for shame!  Who doesn't take one along when they're hiking?), so we all went up there to deliver it.  

Well, that was the main reason we were going, but for David, the main attraction was to be seeing the petrified cadaver of the Polish-Lithuanian aristocrat  Jeremi Wiśniowiecki who died in 1651 and whose son became king.  Unfortunately the sanctuary was closed when we got there so we missed out on that (I was heartbroken, let me tell you.)  But David actually cried.  He is a serious lover of all things ancient Egyptian, and especially mummies.  This was his first chance to see one (sort of) in real life.  

The hike up the mountain was gorgeous.  It's surrounded by a completely preserved forest which was ringing with birdsong and smelled moist and earthy.  The leaves were just starting to appear on the trees and there were fallen trees in various degrees of decomposition everywhere and they just made the whole forest floor look like out of a fantasy novel.  I totally expected some mythological creature to peek its head around one of the trees at any minute (it never did, though.  I guess they're shy).  

This was also great exercise for all of us.  We were actually on our way home from Greg's parent's house after Easter, where we had spent a few days in the forest on long walks.  We are just getting interested in Nordic walking, and on the way up the mountain I used the sticks the whole time.  Now there's a good workout!  And Aaron LOVES walking  uphill, (bonus!).  I felt so good after this that I've been walking every day since (although not Nordically, as I do it in our neighborhood).  

So, yeah.  The pictures.  Here they are.  You can't see the kids faces in either of them, but that's not very important to me (even if it drives my mom crazy) and they were taken on his cell phone so, you know.  And I realized belatedly that I should post some pictures of the monastery itself.  Maybe later. . .