Lessons learned this weekend.

There are basic rules in this life that one follows. Simple, little things like; if you don’t want to get wet, avoid the rain or use an umbrella, if you don’t want to get burned then don’t play with fire or touch the hot stove, or there’s the rule my daughter didn’t follow and suffered the natural consequences because of it. This rule would be, if you don’t wear long pants and/or socks whilst hiking in the woods, bad things are 100% more likely to happen to you then to others in your hiking party who are adequately dressed.

The weather on Saturday was beautiful, perfect hiking weather. We of course went out for a few hours on a trail, let the dog swim in the stream and stopped to have snacks before trudging back to the car. Elle insisted we go again the next day. Why not, it was an even more beautiful day the next day and we had nothing formal planned, so later the next day we all got our hiking clothes on again. Everyone except Elle that is. The weather was warm but bordering on hot and Elle didn’t want to be bothered with the inconvenience of sweating since she refused to wear pants and instead put on shorts. I told her she’d be happier in pants and informed her she might regret it later. No, she assured me she would be fine. I did draw the line however, when she came down wearing flip flops and made her go back upstairs to put on socks and sneakers. Once again under dressing, she came down sockless shoes. ‘I hate socks, they hurt my feet, I never wear socks, etc…’ We were all ready to go at that point so I didn’t fight it with her.

The hike started off innocently enough, until we had to trudge through some thorns. Everyone made it to the other side without incident except Elle who made it through with several scratches on her shin, probably realizing at that point that shorts weren’t the smartest thing to wear.

Fast forward about 20 minutes when everyone who had come hiking with us was engaged in friendly conversation, when all the sudden we see Elle up ahead screaming and flailing about, yelling that there was a tick on her. Sure enough, there was a little tick trying to attach itself to her shin. Vocalizing the fact that again, pants would have prevented this, didn’t need to be said… it was silently understood.

The last and final straw happened when we finally sat down to have a snack. Both the girls were sitting on Gramps’ lap. For the third time this trip Elle started crying and holding her ankle. I could tell she was genuinely in pain and therefore it might be pretty serious. Apparently Pinky had rubbed Stinging Nettle on Elle’s leg. It was an accident, obviously Pinky didn’t know what it was she was smearing all over her sister and unfortunately for Elle it was Stinging Nettle. Also, unfortunately for Elle she was not wearing socks, which would have prevented the whole thing. Before my eyes her ankle started to get red and splotchy then the white bumps started in. Yikes, I remember touching that stuff once… it was one time too many! Luckily we were sitting right next to the river, so Elle washed her foot off which helped for a few minutes but the walk back to the car was a hard one!
Here’s picture of her ankle. It might not LOOK like much but anyone who has experienced Stinging Nettle knows how awful it is to touch it… let alone have it rubbed into your foot.


So upon getting back into the car, I asked Elle if she had learned an important lesson today. She had. Her response was “Always wear pants and socks while walking around in the woods”.