I’m in a fisheries meeting when my phone buzzes. The screen lights up and all fish facts leave my head. It’s a picture of me in a role I rarely see. I look like a mom instead of a reporter. A few days before the meeting, friend Windy Davis snapped a photo of my son and me on the Henry’s Fork of the Snake River. Buddy Greg Schoby had hooked a rainbow. The only one of the day. Early spring water on Henry’s is painfully cold so on my back my son went.
Davis calls the photo ‘Super Mom.’ I call it ‘Super Real.’ I keep the picture on my phone so I can look at my momly state any time the manly side of my outdoor job overwhelms me.
“When I see that photo I think of all the ways women are not only participating in outdoor activities, but also empowering and sharing those experiences with their children,” Davis says. “If more mothers are willing to take some risks themselves, learn new skills and share those skills with their kids, they can really set their kids up to be confident and ready for other challenges in life. Mom becomes the teacher and sometimes the hero.”
I want you to be the hero this summer. Use the insight within these pages to help you run wild with kids in tow. Learn how to manage a DIY family float with little ones on Page 16. Make trapper hats like mountain men on Page 27. And jump cliffs with our first Kids & Nature youth writing contest winner, Jadyn Smith does on Page 33.
I know taking the whole family on an adventure isn’t easy, but the outdoors are for all, including babies. The more kids we have outside, the better our chances of always having wild places to run free. Let your youngsters love your fishing hole and your hunting camp like you do.
Sure it means more stuff to pack and less fish to catch, but as your children grow, the outdoor habit grows with them. I’m already banking on our boys rowing me down the river when they grow up. I’ll make up for lost fish then. For now, my son on my back is a load I’ll happily carry if it means my boys develop a healthy respect for their mother and Mother Nature.