Grandma Russell loved to take long walks through the woods and meadows. Every day she would set off to see what she could find. Sometimes Mom, Keith and Gale would accompany her for part of the way. They explored the meadow across the creek, where tall grass grew, and skunk cabbage and wild flowers. Grandma pointed out Indian Paint Brush, with it bright red blossoms, and little purple and yellow flowers that looked like miniature snap dragons. By the creek, jolly yellow columbines grew in bright clumps, and when they looked real carefully they could find little purple star flowers hiding in the grass.
Often they walked with Grandma to the spring. There were big meadows all along the bluff, above the creek, where Keith and Gale could run and try to catch little white butterflies that fluttered over the tall grass. At the spring the creek turned west because it ran into an outcropping of granite. Here there were huge, smooth, white boulders to sit on. They were always warm, but in the middle of the day they were almost too hot to touch. The children discovered that rain collected in cracks and little pockets in the rocks, and they loved splashing and playing there. Sometimes they could convinced Mom to let them dangle their feet in the deep swimming hole, as long as she was sitting between the them, holding each around their waste.
Right in the middle of the meadow between the spring and the road stood a big old tree. Under it the grass didn’t grow tall, like everywhere else. Keith and Gale found cow pies there, and Grandma told them that cows lived here and all along the meadows by the creek. Maybe some day they would see them.
There were beautiful white flowers that grew in this big meadow by the spring. They were so pretty that the children wanted to pick them and take them home, but grandma stopped them. She held their hands and took them over to examine one of the flowers. The petals were thin and white, they almost looked like tissue paper. But the stem of the flower was thick and prickly all over with thorns. Grandma told the children not to pick these flowers. They were pretty to look at, but poisonous.
As they were looking at the flowers, grandma saw an interesting rock. She showed it to the children. It was red and white and blue, all mixed up together in the same rock. Grandma told them that it looked like an Indian had painted it, but it was really just different kinds of rocks mixed up together. She let Keith and Gale examine it, then she let Keith carry it home to add to her collection. Grandma found a new rock every time she went for a walk. She carried them home and put them under a big cedar tree in front of the trailer. There were rocks shaped like shoes and boots, rocks striped with white lines that looked like they had been painted, rocks full of holes that grandma said were made in volcanoes, and all kinds of other rocks that were just as interesting.
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