Nature Walk along mountain brook parkway

We are taking a break from school this week, but we were not able to do a nature walk last week, so we got up early on Tuesday morning and headed to a new trail close to us. It runs along the Mountain Brook parkway and we had been to a picnic along it a few years ago. The creek that runs along it, and which you can cross over at one point was a big draw!



We spent about an hour there, and our "normal observations" of birds, trees, and flowers was "added to" this week. The creek brought with it some new things, and our wildflower intro at home brought new observations.
Let's see, we saw a few robins at work, tossing old leaves and searching for worms. Also, we heard the bluejay long before we saw him. We had to sit for a few minutes before one of the boys saw him high up among the pine a beech trees. Noah had me take a picture of his favorite tree,


...and we took pictures of a flowering bush that had amazing flowers on it. I can not figure out what it is- maybe someone could help me?? Each branch had 5 leaves at the end of it, and the limbs/stalks are a pink color. It is very pretty, but I don't have any idea what it is. We are definitely learning to use all our field guides, though!




Down at the creeks edge, we found some shells, and wondered what they were. Joshua grabbed a handful to add to our ridiculously large assortment of shells. We have an enormous collection that grows every year :)
We also encountered a lot of wildflowers and the boys were amazed at how tall they were. everyone was trying to find one his height or taller.




Now we just have to figure out what those wildflowers are!