Sort of as e-mailed to the Doubtful Guests (the planters) earlier today:


We found Furry Woodland Creature and Christmas Tree Graveyards this
afternoon, our first time seeking them. We ran into some other boxers
(Soulduo and a friend) on the trail of same and temporarily joining
forces with them. Unfortunately, I'd grabbed the wrong copy of the clues
before I left home - ie. not the set on which I'd written the Doubtful
Guests' phone #. Didn't realize that until we were onsite, so we didn't
get to meet up with the DGs this round :-< (I met them at Cox Farms last
year, when they came looking for the box I'd planted there). Even
though I grew up in Reston and went to elementary school right near
those two boxes, I don't remember ever having been in that stretch of
(very wild) woods. A wonderful surprise! And that second Xmas Tree
stamp is just incredible (though bigger than my stamp pad).

On the way home (driving, people - it's miles! ;-> ), we managed to find
Audubon #2 of series 1 just fine, exactly where we had been looking on
Monday. Really exactly - I'd run my pokey stick over it. Like Scarab
said when he e-mailed me in the interim, we'd just missed it by a few
leaves the first time...

Weather was great; all but Audobon #2 were nice & dry. It wasn't too
bad. We put another towel inside Audobon #2 and rushed out of there,
hiding it well, just about 5pm when the gates were supposed to close (as
the last out, we closed them).

My girls and I had fun with their "treasure hunt", althrough they got
pretty cranky the last hour or so of the very long afternoon. My
littler one thinks every park marker and sign and post is a clue and
wants me to read them all to her! My older one has an idea for her own
stamp; wish I had one ;-> Hope to tackle the Doubtful Guests' second
Audubon (Audobon?) series, also in Reston, sometime soon.

Enjoy this nice weather; we're supposed to have a bit more of it before
TG...

--Arielle in NoVA