Small Pink Objects Really Are Easy To Spot In The Woods....

Mistwalker · Mar 19, 2012

I have a lot of work going on and even more that I will be starting soon. I have several projects going, and will be spending a few weekends remodeling parts of a restaurant for a friend of mine. I know this means less time just playing, so yesterday, Sunday, I decided to spend the day with the little one not trying to teach her anything, but just letting her be a kid playing in the woods. We hit a section of the Cumberland Trail and just went for a walk for a few miles. The gear for the day was a small kit I put together a while back in a Maxped organizer, and a small fixed blade I picked up some time back geared more to urban carry.

The last time I hiked this section a couple of months ago I had decided that next time I'd bring Alayna, I thought she would like it and she could help me ad perspective to some of the distances on the trail. Small pink objects really are easy to spot in the woods...even at a distance.

She found a nice hunk of some really resin rich fatwood, spotted and interesting burl, explored the root balls of some blown-over trees, checked out some moss and lichen on some of the stones, and learned that pine boughs are ticklish...

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Mistwalker · Mar 19, 2012

About a mile and a half, maybe two miles in the trail crosses a small stream. Here she got to exercise her strict leave-no-pool-unrippled policy.

While I just sat and watched her play around I played around with the TOPS knife some. It's a small stout knife with a fully flat ground 1/4-inch thick blade. It has contours that make it easy to keep a grip on, and even though it has a thick blade it has a good edge geometry and came very sharp It had no trouble in the whittling dept., even whittling very hard seasoned wood.

Soon the shadows were getting longer and it was time to head home. We spotted more signs of spring on the way out. I couldn't believe she actually wanted to take a break before I did. I gave her a hard time about it, but all that playing must have been tiring.

Well...no real lessons learned, and no real skills practiced, just more familiarization with a wilderness environment, and me getting to enjoy one of fatherhood's greatest pleasures...that of just watching your kid be a kid. I had a great time, I hope you guys enjoyed the photos.

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kamagong · Mar 19, 2012

Looks wonderful. I have a little girl of two myself. At what age did you start taking her out?

tknife · Mar 19, 2012

Great pics, she looks like she had a blast. (And of course it's fun taking a new knife out to play with too

) That TOPS looks like a little tank of a knife, is it thicker than 1/4"?

OldPhysics · Mar 19, 2012

Sure did enjoy the photos!

I'm waayyy late for my first grand-kid. But there's still hope!

TwinStick · Mar 19, 2012

Great pics & great posts, as usual. I gotta ask Mist, exactly what is that large tube on the left side of your kit in the first pic ? Looks like a medical type of giant blood sample vacuume tube or something. And what is in it ? Quick clot pkg ?

6shooter · Mar 20, 2012

mistwalker said:
I couldn't believe she actually wanted to take a break before I did. I gave her a hard time about it, but all that playing must have been tiring.

I bet with all that running ahead and exploring she covered twice the miles you did, give the kid a break!!

Love the pics as usual, your girl always looks like she's having a blast out in the woods with you

Mistwalker · Mar 20, 2012

kamagong said:
Looks wonderful. I have a little girl of two myself. At what age did you start taking her out?

Thanks. I started taking her to the woods before she could walk and started taking her on hikes as soon as she could walk they were just shot ones to start with. She's always had an extreme amount of energy. The thing with me is the first longer hikes were in the autumn and winter for less worries about spiders and snakes.

tknife said:
Great pics, she looks like she had a blast. (And of course it's fun taking a new knife out to play with too ) That TOPS looks like a little tank of a knife, is it thicker than 1/4"?

She always has a blast when she has water to play in

Yeah, it's a little tank with a really sharp edge. Really liking the grind on it. I believe TOPS has made some smaller knives with 3/8 thick blades but this one is only 1/4" thick, it's just small so looks even thicker in the photos.

OldPhysics said:
Sure did enjoy the photos!

I'm waayyy late for my first grand-kid. But there's still hope!

Thanks OP, glad you enjoyed them. I go back and forth between hoping my oldest doesn't have kids too soon in life to hoping she has them while I am still young enough to have some fun with them in the woods.

TwinStick said:
Great pics & great posts, as usual. I gotta ask Mist, exactly what is that large tube on the left side of your kit in the first pic ? Looks like a medical type of giant blood sample vacuume tube or something. And what is in it ? Quick clot pkg ?

Thanks TS, that's an epi pen I keep in a first aid kit in the truck for my partner because he is extremely allergic to bees and I am ever getting him off into a bunch of bees it seems. I took it n this hike because the bees were out in force. I'm not sure yet if Alayna is allergic to them or not...I'm not, my wife isn't, and my oldest daughter isn't, but my mother was extremely allergic to them. I got to see her going into anaphylactic shock once when I was young and she almost died. It was a worrisome site to witness.

6shooter said:
I bet with all that running ahead and exploring she covered twice the miles you did, give the kid a break!!

Love the pics as usual, your girl always looks like she's having a blast out in the woods with you

Yeah, lol, I'm sure she did actually, she usually does

Thanks man, glad you enjoyed the post.

Brad "the butcher" · Mar 20, 2012

Nice pics mist

Our old man would always buy us outdoor hats in bright colours and coats in yellow, red or light blue when we were younger for camping and fishing as we were allowed to explore within the landmarks he warned us to keep inside of.

I had a yellow trucker hat with a fancy stitched walleye on the front, dad said he could spot me a mile away. Still have that fugly hat somewhere, I horrified my brothers with it a few years ago as my fishing hat on our yearly camping/fishing tournament.

I would never give a young child camo outdoor gear, how the hell do you spot them!!!

Mistwalker · Mar 20, 2012

Brad "the butcher";10648678 said:
Nice pics mist

Our old man would always buy us outdoor hats in bright colours and coats in yellow, red or light blue when we were younger for camping and fishing as we were allowed to explore within the landmarks he warned us to keep inside of.

I had a yellow trucker hat with a fancy stitched walleye on the front, dad said he could spot me a mile away. Still have that fugly hat somewhere, I horrified my brothers with it a few years ago as my fishing hat on our yearly camping/fishing tournament.

I would never give a young child camo outdoor gear, how the hell do you spot them!!!

Thanks man. Lol, Alayna has some camo that she likes to wear sometimes because she knows that I wear it a lot in the course of doing wildlife photography and her older sister wears it sometimes. I don't mind when she wears camo on days when we're hanging close and having lessons, she wore camo on our St. Patrick's day hike as the green seemed fitting. But she loves bright colors like pinks and purples and those are both easy ones to spot in the woods when she's out zooming from here to there.

beanbag · Mar 20, 2012

Everyone says it time and again because it's true-

Nothing beats a day in the woods with the young-ins.

Way to get them out there, Mist.:thumbup:

TheGame · Mar 20, 2012

Great pics. Reminds me of when I go out with my nephew. He is always running around out there. Always a good time having kids with you in the woods. :thumbup:

Mistwalker · Mar 20, 2012

beanbag said:
Everyone says it time and again because it's true-

Nothing beats a day in the woods with the young-ins.

Way to get them out there, Mist.:thumbup:

Thanks man, you got that right, best value for entertainment going in my opinion

TheGame said:
Great pics. Reminds me of when I go out with my nephew. He is always running around out there. Always a good time having kids with you in the woods. :thumbup:

Yeah, they have so much energy and so many discoveries yet to make. It's like I get to live my childhood again and re-experience all of the discoveries a few moments at a time vicariously through them.

dialton · Mar 21, 2012

and by the title only, I was thinking that we were about to see some pink lanyards on yer knives!!!!

hung-solo · Mar 21, 2012

cool stuff as usual Mist

grunt soldier · Mar 21, 2012

as always mist great post. I love taking my little one to the woods and watching her run wild. she is only 5 so doesn't last quite so long but she is a trooper.

I'm sure yours will remember this for years to come.

Mistwalker · Mar 21, 2012

dialton said:
and by the title only, I was thinking that we were about to see some pink lanyards on yer knives!!!!

Ya know...I'm not exactly a youngun anymore, and gettin' old enough that this would probably be a wise idea, but I seriously doubt it will ever happen

hung-solo said:
cool stuff as usual Mist

Thanks man, glad you enjoyed it.

grunt soldier said:
as always mist great post. I love taking my little one to the woods and watching her run wild. she is only 5 so doesn't last quite so long but she is a trooper.

I'm sure yours will remember this for years to come.

Thanks man. Yeah Alayna usually has more energy than she knows what to do with but it was afternoon before we got started good. It's mostly down hill all the way to that little creek, especially the last couple hundred meters, so on the way back here little legs were getting tired. I figure it's good exercise though and she always has a blast. She always sleeps good after one of our hikes.

Havokk · Mar 22, 2012

Being in the woods with kids is cool. Their excitement and enthusiasm makes the place better. There's also nothing better than just spending time with your kids (or in my case, my sister's kids

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"No pool left unrippled" policy, eh? I like it, I'm going to adopt it myself.

mkhop · Mar 23, 2012

Great outing and photos and just when you think the day couldn't get brighter she smiles .

Mistwalker · Mar 23, 2012

Havokk said:
Being in the woods with kids is cool. Their excitement and enthusiasm makes the place better. There's also nothing better than just spending time with your kids (or in my case, my sister's kids .

"No pool left unrippled" policy, eh? I like it, I'm going to adopt it myself.

Yeah, their enthusiasm is infectious, it's almost like you get to relive bits of your childhood along with them. Yep, she comes by that honestly, I have a hard time leaving them unrippled myself

mkhop said:
Great outing and photos and just when you think the day couldn't get brighter she smiles .

Thanks man, glad you enjoyed them. Yeah, she always manages to brighten even my worst days.