• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • The words
  • The writer
  • The work

Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

Archives for May 19, 2012

Saturday smiles: short and sweet edition

May 19, 2012

This week’s highlights:

Phil and I spent two nights in this rustic cabin in Cowan’s Gap State Park. It was a birthday/Mother’s Day/graduation/anniversary getaway trip. And it was perfect.

We hiked.

You might be able to smell the sweat. In this picture we had just climbed a trail marked “very steep.” Note to self: “very steep” in Illinois is not the same as “very steep” in Pennsylvania.

We encountered nature.

Cute, right? It might be poisonous, but the first one of these I saw, I thought it was a toy a kid had left on the trail. Then it moved.

Yep, I need to  be in nature  more often.

The snakes, however, I had no problem believing were real. I love seeing my husband watch creatures we don’t usually see. He thought the snakes were cool and wanted to observe. I wanted to tiptoe around and keep making progress on the trail.

None of this back-to-nature experience would have been possible without grandparents to watch the grandkids, so that is a MAJOR smile-maker this week.

And mountain views. Oh man, did we have mountain views.

I can live the rest of the week — maybe even the month — on this.

What are you smiling about this week?

 

Filed Under: Marriage, Saturday smiles, Travel Tagged With: camping, cowan's gap state park, hiking, mountain trails, nature, newts, rustic cabin, snakes, travel

Primary Sidebar

Photo by Rachel Lynn Photography

Welcome

Hi. I’m Lisa, and I’m glad you’re here. If we were meeting in real life, I’d offer you something to eat or drink while we sat on the porch letting the conversation wander as it does. That’s a little bit what this space is like. We talk about books and family and travel and food and running, whatever I might encounter in world. I’m looking for the beauty in the midst of it all, even the tough stuff. (You’ll find a lot of that here, too.) Thanks for stopping by. Stay as long as you like.

When I wrote something

May 2012
M T W T F S S
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  
« Apr   Jun »

Recent posts

  • Still Life
  • A final round-up for 2022: What our December was like
  • Endings and beginnings … plus soup: A November wrap-up
  • A magical month of ordinary days: October round-up
  • Stuck in a shallow creek
  • Short and sweet September: a monthly round-up
  • Wrapping the end of summer: Our monthly round-up

Join the conversation

  • A magical month of ordinary days: October round-up on Stuck in a shallow creek
  • Stuck in a shallow creek on This is 40
  • July was all about vacation (and getting back to ordinary days after)–a monthly roundup on One very long week

Footer

What I write about

Looking for something?

Disclosure

Lisa Bartelt is a participant in the Bluehost Affiliate Program.

Occasionally, I review books in exchange for a free copy. Opinions are my own and are not guaranteed positive simply due to the receipt of a free copy.

Copyright © 2025 · Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in