The observation deck at Henry j Cowell State Park

The kids and I hiked here on the last morning of our camping trip today. It was a long slog of complaints and fears and quibbles, and I'd even started trying to reach Chris, who was at the campsite packing our car, to see if he could somehow pick us up via the closest road, when things turned around. We each picked a certain number of complaints we'd allow ourselves and a certain number of positive expressions we'd aim for. Halina kept her numbers private but entered them on my phone. Luke chose 7 and 6 respectively. I chose 1 and 4. As you can see, we felt encouraged and empowered after that to enjoy ourselves and to hike back (which we did).