The Stream.

Today is the perfect day to pay homage to the wonderful little stream just a quarter mile up the road, the spot to which I started taking Alla when she was wee and where Fisher has realized he can drive to in the pink car. It's pretty wonderful, just a simple stream with a walkway over top, and in the spring and fall when the foliage isn't too thick the kids can throw a stick in one side and then watch it come out the other. I think it's how Alla learned to count, waiting for her stick to come out. One, two, three...seventeen!

We visit in summer, but only briefly to avoid the "skeeters." We visit in fall, Fisher shoveling in piles of fallen leaves. We visit in winter, when the ground and water are frozen, walk out onto the stream, and listen to them marvel.

We return in the spring, to see green buds appearing, animals returning, water once again flowing.

We love our little stream, and what I love is that when the kids are grown and remembering childhood, it will be a special place for them. Nothing I really tried to do, nothing I had to force, just this simple little spot near our house that we visited all the time, that easily forced itself into their hearts.