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Today we went with the more traditional outdoor breakfast at Magnolia Bluff County Park. The last time we were here was on Halloween.

Since they only plowed the lower parking lot, this is where we ate.

 Hiking on the trail was much nicer today comparted to yesterday. It was hilly, but the footing was pretty good. 

These rock outcroppings were really fun to observe without all the foliage and plants in the way.

Lots of old tall trees at this park. Probably would have been tough to log off back in the day.

We saw a white-breasted nuthatch. I think we've gotten much better at identifying birds over the past year.

It's fun, when you click on "This is my bird!" it will keep track of the birds you have seen and the place you saw them and the date. I added this one to the robin I saw yesterday, for a total of two birds seen in 2021!

Baseball started spring training started today, double-yay!

At home we did some coloring...

...telling of stories...

...and more reading. This is an inside joke, but the barred owl sounds like "who cooks for you" when it hoots. We thought this page was clever.

Our neighbor's name is "Frank." Whenever Frank wears red when he walks his dog, we know it is cold out. This is something we wanted to memorialize in the blog. It's getting much warmer out starting Tuesday. We might see red only one more time. Maybe I will get a better photo tomorrow.

I am getting excited about the warmer weather, I re-hooked up my lights on the deck. Pizza season will be here before you know it.

Here is the finished painting from a few days ago.

Goodbye February....and that awful polar vortex we had.

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Today we had a lunch in our car at Cherokee Marsh - South Unit. Not much for a view here.

But we did see our first robin of spring. This photo does not show it so well...but the robin is there in that mass of black near the middle. Darn shadows. You'll just have to believe us.

This walk was a little tough since the path is not plowed like they are at Cherokee Marsh - North Unit. You just need to go in other's footprints.

Once you get to the top, there is a view out toward the Yahara River and the start of Lake Mendota.

Your ironic photo of the day; a woman walking her dog past the "No Dogs" sign. It was her first time to the park, and probably did not know this. I know there is a dog park at Cherokee Marsh...maybe that is where she meant to go?

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We got a little bit of a break after breakfast today, so a quick trip to Pope Farms was in store. We made a small wrong turn, so we had to turn around. The fastest place to turn around was the Blackhawk Ski Club. We realized the fastest way to turn around was to go all the way into their parking lot...up and past the ski jumps.

This is one thing I'm pretty confident I'll never do....but it doesn't sound so bad. Looks like you start on the small jumps...

from their website - "Ski jumping is a year-round sport at Blackhawk and the facilities are some of the best in the nation. Blackhawk has 5-meter, 15-meter, 30-meter, and 60-meter ski jumps. All of Blackhawk’s ski jumps have plastic mats and steel track for training in the non-snow months."

 I'll probably still never do it.

Okay, so we made it to Pope Farms. We were the first ones there. It was very crusty snow and somewhat easier to trudge through. 

Up at the top of the hill we saw something. I thought it may have been the monolith!

But it was just a snow bunny. At least that is what we called it.

We did a little more walking to the back of the park before heading back to the car.

Mid-afternoon drive down Rocky Dell.

Evening phone call. The non-traditional way to take a photo of the people you are talking to.

He had my camera, and he took a burst of 134 photos of me. Fascinating!

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They told us that we should clear the storm sewer drains, so that's what we did. There are three of them that are kind of officially our duty.

 After that, we did some scootering down our sidewalk.

At lunch we were talking about carrots, and where carrots are actually grown. Naturally we asked Alexa where they grow carrots....the history of the voice transaction is below.

Later on, we learned that California grows about 85% of the carrots in the US...presumably they grow in the ground.

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 I had a nice break in the middle of my day, so it was perfect for going to the zoo. Most young children get to the zoo right when it opens, but the key is to go around noon when those people are leaving.

With the weather still cool and icy, we only saw about half the animals.

I took this selfie that shows he brought an alligator and hippo.

Here are the flamingoes again.

The seal.

He actually sang for me and two other people. When he was done, he bowed and gave us jazz hands. We clapped.

Kindermusik tonight.

Not sure if our good friend Sassy Ducky has made the blog, so I'm giving him a photo on the blog. Sassy Ducky helps with bath time.

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When we started our day, we didn't want to change the date because of the picture on the calendar, so he told us to take a picture of this and keep it on the blog.

We got outside today on the big wheel. He can reach the pedals, but having shoes and better sidewalk conditions will help.

On our drive today, we saw this huge wall of snow as we looked uphill. Just sky and snow.

Our ice lanterns are all melted now.

Barbie did some yoga tonight with Batman.

This is a story that has become a nightly ritual. We always read Richard Scarry's "Mr. Fixit"....so I figured I'd memorialize it here.

Tonight in the tub.