My oldest grandson is growing up so fast. Seems like yesterday I was carrying him on my hip and making midnight snacks for a scary movie. I knew as he grew older he'd begin outgrowing me. After all, what self respecting teen wants to hang out with their grandmother? 

So what do you do when your babies are bored hanging out with you?

Well, you hang out with them, of course. Luckily my grandson does things I am still capable of keeping up with even when it means a little hike.

When his mother started telling me he had plans to work at the creek instead of coming over for the weekend, my interest was at its peak. What work was he doing at the creek? 

I decided to go check it out.

The journey begins here- the mouth of the thicket. 

The woods are pretty dense behind the farm. It's for sure there are a fair share of critters hold up there. We saw coon tracks all over the place. They were sizable. 

A small journey through the creek bed was beautiful in the fall. Leave were not yet starting to change but a fresh rain brought the small creek to a swell in the days before. Still running but much recessed you could see where the creek had recently been out of its banks. 

What a beautiful walk. Just a few hundred yards from the house but it seemed like a different world. It wasn't hard to imagine how fast that small brook would rise as acres of water shed from these hills. 

But what was bringing a teenage boy out to these woods every chance he could steal away? What was more important that watching movies and eating a ton of food with grandma on the weekend? 

Then I saw it.

I can't remember what year it was built and I had forgotten all about it being back here. But there it was right where his daddy put it, so far up in the air I'd never be in it. I think he did that on purpose. 

Gare and his buddy J had found a place to escape the hustle and bustle of the everyday mundane. A place to have their own adventures. I'd pay to be a bug in the bark during some of the conversations that go on up there. 

So what was this work that was going on in the woods? The tree house hadn't had any recent additions. 

Seems it's a hard, steep hill to climb to get out of the creek and over to the tree house. And after a good hard rain the incline was challenging. There was also the matter of crossing the creek without getting soaked.  

A bridge and some steps were in order according to Gare. 

He cut the steps with a sickle. Yeah, a sickle. 

And the bridge laid across the creek was once a tree where only the stump remains. 

The tree came down with a shovel, a pick ax, and a sickle. 

A new bridge was under construction as I watched. 

J says, "Hey, what's with your grandma. She thinks she's a photographer or something." 

"Well," Gare says, "that's because she is."

"Right on," says J. 

It was fun to watch them work and play.

What a mess but nothing that won't wash away with the next rain.  

It was a good day. 

I pointed out all the places I thought critters might be making a home for the coming winter. The roots of every tree on the bank had hollows in them rooted out by warm blooded things and not the wash of a hard rain. 

And those steps though! I need some just like this coming up the hill to my house. 

Maybe a good reason to come to grandma's soon. Put me in some steps so I don't break a hip going down the hill to the car in bad weather.

Think that will work? 

We'll see.