Parks and Puppy Dogs

For the past week and a half, I have been vacationing with my sister and 23 month old niece in Ridgecrest, California. A few days ago, we took a trip to the Sequoia National Forest and saw some of the biggest trees I have ever seen in my life! Upon our arrival at the Trail of 100 Giants, we saw a sign that said "closed." Though we thought it was very interesting and a well-written sign, we decided that a 2.5 hour drive up a mountain entitled us to enter regardless. That being said, we parked in the "do not park at any time" spot and made our way to the trail.

We traveled on a paved path through numerous trees, stumps, streams, and other beautfiful things the park had to offer. About a half mile in we were all thinking to ourselves "this is great!" With the little one in the 'non-outdoors-friendly' stroller, we made our way around a tight curve to be standing face to face with the reason the park was closed in the first place...A GIANT GRIZZLY BEAR. Did you read my last post? Just kidding...there were no bears, but there were a large number of downed trees that all happened to fall right across the pathway. Thankfully, my sister had a male companion along for the trip, so I spent my time ahead of the group laughing as they carried the stroller up the Trail of 100 Giants...with about as many of them blocking the path. I think my niece and I really enjoyed ourselves.

After accidentally taking a huge, worthless loop that put us back to the middle of the trail, we made our way out and headed down the mountain. I had fallen asleep in the backseat and was awoken to the feeling of two cold little toddler fingers going up my nose. THAT was pleasant...

Meanwhile, we had arrived in Kernville, a really cute town that had a large river cutting right through the middle of it. Since they had a little park next to it, we decided to take the little one down to play on the playground. There are no words to accurately describe how much my niece loves parks, except for that if given the choice between a Sbisa cookie and a slide, she would choose the slide and she REALLY loves cookies..

While going down the slide and saying "yeehaw" at least 100 times, a small girl walked up with a puppy on a leash. My niece immediately froze and squeeled "ELLIE" at the little puppy (Ellie is the dog that lives next door). I told my niece that it was "puppy," not Ellie, and allowed her to "pet" it, to which she grabbed it's ears and poked it's eyes with her (previously mentioned) toddler fingers. The poor puppy was then yanked away by the three year old who insisted on taking it down the slide. The little puppy knew better and desperately tried to escape. Unfortunately for it, the little girl had no intentions of not going down and was already barreling around the first curve when the slack in the leash caught up with the little puppy's neck. As it was fiercely yanked down the slide, my niece squeeled "WEEEE" and took it upon herself to greet the puppy at the bottom. About this time, the young girl's mother came to the puppy's rescue and he will surely live to slide again. Oh, the joys of life with a precious toddler. Did I mention the fit she threw when it was time to leave? She must get that from her mom...