High flying Father's Day

Yesterday was Father's Day in the U.S., and we took advantage of the gorgeous weather by visiting Highland Forest, one of our favorite county parks. We packed a picnic lunch, and enjoyed the  gorgeous view from outside Skyline Lodge:

It was breezy up on the hill, which is one of the reasons we chose Highland Forest for our outing. Aidan bought a kite when we were in Lake George and he had not yet flown it. He and James put the kite together and soon had it ready to fly:

It took a few times for them to get the hang of getting it airborne:

But soon Aidan was an old pro at kite flying:

We then went on a hike. Highland Forest is a great place to hike, except when an unexpected and sudden thunderstorm arrives, but yesterday the good weather held. Aidan was looking for fossils in a soggy creek bed when James spotted these animal tracks:

I hope the raccoon and the coyote were not there at the same time! We probably covered about 3-4 miles during our hike and were grateful to get back to the car and water.

Dinner came from Jack Stack Barbecue out of Kansas City, MO. James had received one of their catalogs, so I decided to order a dinner from there for Father's Day. I ordered beef brisket, pork tenderloin and two sides, and it arrived packed in dry ice on Friday. All we had to do was heat up the food, which was perfect since we were tired from hiking and kite flying. Dinner was delicious! And there is still plenty of brisket and pork leftover, so we will have it for dinner another night. I think James would agree that it was an excellent Father's Day from start to finish.