We had a scary near-miss yesterday. Took the fam for a little hike up on the mountain near our house yesterday afternoon. Had a great time. Kids ran around being kids, hooting and hollering and looking for critters and playing in creeks. We got soaked with rain but no big deal - as we like to say, we're amphibious.

Anyway, we were just about back to the trailhead, maybe a couple hundred yards or so out, when we took the youngest out of the pack harness so she could stretch her legs and run with the other kids back to the van. My wife pulled her off my back, set her on the ground, and we turned to continue up the trail. I had taken 1, maaaaybe 2 steps when I heard the gut wrenching sound of a tree crashing down. I've been in the woods all my life and have heard and seen limbs and trees fall many times, but this about made me sh-- myself. Big tree. Loud. Close. When I heard it coming down it wasn't the long drawn out Ooookkkaaayyyy here I coooommmeee!!! gradual fall that I've heard before; I turned around and this thing was halfway to the ground, dropping straight towards my family. I lunged for the others and hollered WATCH OUT but by the time the words were out of my mouth, it was right above us. No time to do anything else. Shook the ground. It somehow landed directly between my wife and 2 year old. Somehow it caught the edge of my wife's back pack, busting every water bottle in it (I saw the water gushing out and honestly thought she's pee'd herself). For a second we all stood there silent, not breathing. Then I grabbed up Hope and held her close and comforted her, as the noise and impact scared her to tears.

Guys this wasn't a "Oh man, that one is gonna bruise!" tree...This would have killed someone, or at the very least caused serious serious injury. Who knows. It could not have gotten any closer to either one of them. Still getting goosebumps now typing this. I didn't measure or pace it out but my conservative guess is it was 35' tall. Maybe 40'+.

You just never know. We're thanking God that no one was harmed. Hope just turned 2 last week. We finalized her adoption this spring. She had a really rough start in life and the Good Lord has truly had His hand on her from the start. We're grateful. Humbled. Speechless. Blessed. Y'all hold your loved ones close.

We did snap a picture of her sitting on the tree.