Imagine it's just before Christmas Eve again, for that is when my boys and I took our dogs to McKinney Falls State Park for a little nature excursion before the holidays. Having recently enjoyed autumn colors at Lost Maples, Westcave Preserve, and Hamilton Pool, we found that McKinney Fall seemed appropriately devoid of leaves and color -- we had found winter in Texas at last.
But it didn't really bother us, and it certainly didn't upset the dogs one bit. Instead of delighting in vibrant colors and active wildlife, as there wasn't much around, we enjoyed themes in nature and the unusual that caught our eye, noticing things that might have escaped observation at another time of year.
For one, we discovered that nature provided hints of Christmas all around us. From ornaments...
to red and green colors.
Sometimes we found unexpected shapes that brought our thoughts to ordinary objects or otherwise sparked our imagination, such as hearts...
Bigfoot tracks...
and even a longhorn. Hook 'em Horns!
We enjoyed "Wildlife Words of the Day" including "snag," "hollow," and even "scat" (I declined to post of picture of scat, however).
And we enjoyed a variety of textures, from the soft to the rough to the bristly.
The cactus kept our attention, through color, shape, and spines. Sometimes it was pests, like cochineals...
but sometimes it was beauty in age and decline. Have you ever wondered about the interior structure of a cactus, its vascular system that supports its water conservation? When dry, it leaves behind a beautifully intricate skeleton.
We found animal tracks...
a lone butterfly...
a flower staring back at us (you can really have a conversation with this flower if you choose to)...
nifty things plants and fungus do...
and vicious man-eating fire ants.
The winter season can keep some people indoors, but there is still so much to see, even when the leaves are on the ground instead of in the trees. Sometimes it's noticing the little things that really open up the wonders of nature. And when you do it with your kids, you feel like you're helping the whole world open up in their eyes.
I'll give an actual tour of McKinney Falls State Park in the next post, to complete our nature walks. I'm almost caught up!
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