When I think back on the fondest memories I have of my childhood, the vast majority of them took place outdoors.  I could almost convince myself that I lived outdoors as a kid.  Like any active, sporty family, we had our favorite fresh-air pursuits.  While we did our share of hiking, I wouldn’t say that we spent an inordinate amount of time on the trails.  Summer and warm fall days found us, instead, on the water – sailing, canoeing and kayaking, mostly, with occasional motorboat jaunts, and my dad was never far from another spin on his windsurfer.  In the winter, we skied.  Downhill, mainly, but also cross-country just to mix it up.  Hiking was lower on the list, although I think we all enjoyed it.

Now that we’re grown-ups (well…) my brother Dan and I have both become avid hikers – even more than we were.  He’s trekking the Colorado wilderness with his wife, while I’m traversing heritage Virginia rail trails with my family, but we’re both out there, and I am sure that the legacy my parents gave us – the love of nature and the outdoors, the satisfaction of pushing boundaries, and the thrill of adventuring in the wide world – has a lot to do with that.

Just as my brother has his adventure buddy – my dear sister-in-law Danielle – I have mine in Steve.  Some of our earliest dates involved exploring the footpaths and waterfalls around the Cornell campus.  On our third date, we drove out to Buttermilk Falls State Park, where we hiked to the namesake falls and I claimed an enormous pink boulder for France.  It was a fun date, and also an important one, because I don’t know what I would have done if it had turned out that he didn’t like to go outside and play.  As our relationship developed, so did our hiking haunts.  I showed him around my beloved North Campus – taught him to play shoe golf (best game ever) at the Cornell plantations, introduced him to the best bridge-jumping spot (he didn’t jump) and slid with him down miniature waterfalls just upstream.  Of course, you know how the story ends.  We got married, took our hiking farther afield (to England and Scotland!) and eventually, found ourselves with two little trail tots.

I hiked during both pregnancies.  With Peanut, at least until ish got real at the end, I was on the trails most weekends (and inevitably fell asleep in the car on the way home).  I pushed even harder while pregnant with Nugget – sometimes unwittingly.  The picture above?  Snapped by a summit steward atop Cascade Mountain, our first Adirondack high peak, two days into my second pregnancy (and totally oblivious to the stowaway).

^Another family-of-four picture, this one snapped at Letchworth State Park – photo credit to my dear friend Zan.  Nine weeks pregnant and feeling sorry that Nugget had such a boring view while the rest of us enjoyed gorges and waterfalls.

When I think about the childhood I want to give my kids, I think about a childhood like mine – one lived outdoors as much as (maybe more than) in.  I think about fostering a deep respect for the planet, a commitment to protect and preserve our wild spaces and the creatures who share the earth with us.  I think about their sense of wonder, their marveling at the miracle of nature.

And the way I am fostering that appreciation is to give them the gift of a childhood on the trails and on the water.

In a very real sense, Peanut and Nugget are growing up in the woods.  They’ve been living on hiking trails since they were both tiny babies – starting in the Bjorn (Peanut) and the Ergo (Nugget) and eventually graduating to a Deuter KidComfort III and an Osprey Poco Plus, respectively.  Peanut spent her babyhood at Great Falls and Rock Creek Park; Nugget spent his at Knox Farm.  I want both of them to grow up with those same memories – of playing and exploring with their parents – that I did.

I’ll be the first to admit that my wanting to raise my kids outdoors is at least partially selfish.  I love the outdoors, and I dearly miss some of the active pursuits I used to enjoy before the kids came along.  I have been an avid kayaker since I was fifteen, and have had few opportunities to get out and paddle in recent years.  (The four hours I spent cruising around Lake George with my friend Seth last summer just served as a reminder of how much I miss paddling.)  And every winter I mourn all the skiing I’m not doing.  So, yeah, I hope they love this stuff because I love it and I miss it and I cherish the hope of one day paddling Blackwater or Smith Mountain Lake, sailing the Chesapeake, exploring the Blue Ridge, and sliding down the West Virginia ski slopes with them.  And more, and bigger – I want them to know my home mountain range as well as I do.  I want them by my side when I finally explore the national parks of the West.  I want to put my arm around Peanut as we watch the sun rise from a Hawaiian volcano, to high-five Nugget after a day of paddling kayaks and spotting marine life in the Pacific Northwest, to see the wonder on both of their faces during an African safari.  If I have it my way – and Steve has it his way – they’ll grow up as true adventure kids.

They’re little now, and we’re keeping our expectations down.  A short, flat trail sounds about right for our current stage of life.  Bonus points for spotting birdies.  (Relax, Nugget, Great Blue Herons don’t eat little boys.)  Next summer, we might be down to just Nugget in a backpack, while Peanut runs alongside us with her own little pack.  Before I know it, they’ll be paddling and sailing and skiing with us.

I’m doing my best to enjoy each moment as it comes.  To cherish the memories we make now, and not to get too hung up on the stuff that we used to do, that’s beyond our capabilities at the moment.  I’m taking grown-up adventures as they come, and not sweating it if the biggest adventure on a weekend hike is a diaper changed trailside.  Because I know that it’s just a few tomorrows until they can keep up with me and be true adventure buddies – if I haven’t ruined the whole experience by placing too many expectations on them too soon.  And I also know that the memories they are making on these trails – even now, at four and two – are setting them up for a lifetime of adventure in the great big world, and I hope that someday they look back on our family hikes as a cherished gift, and a gift that they’ll pass on to their own children.