Finding ‘true gems’ among North Liberty’s parks

Lori Steffens; her daughters Lily, age 6; Lucy, age 3; and their friend Aiden Fitzpatrick, age 6; ventured out to complete our centennial celebration’s Outdoor North Liberty presented by Arlington Development scavenger hunt. They ended up having such a great time, that Lori wanted to share their experience and some of her wonderful photos. (You can see more of Lori’s work on her website.) She writes: 

As a mother, I’m always looking for things that will engage my children. One of the things I have always loved about North Liberty is the quality of the parks here. We have about three that we frequent quite often, but have never really ventured off the beaten path.  When I found out that North Liberty was having a park scavenger hunt, I thought it sounded like a great idea and immediately set to planning how many parks we would try to hit, and what days we could go.
Our adventure turned out to be much more than I could have ever planned for.
Now, I’ve lived in North Liberty for 23 years, and yet I never realized how many parks are here. I probably could have named only half them, and we found some true gems that we will certainly go back to.
During our adventure, Aiden, Lily and Lucy loved the opportunity to play and run on new equipment.  Once we started, I realized this could never be a timed and planned event, and I let the children lead me.  At a few of the parks, their focus was immediately on finding the clue. At others, the different kinds of play equipment or the new sights were all that they were interested in.
At most of the parks we visited, we spent at least an hour, most of it playing and only about five minutes looking for the clue.  Lucy, Aiden and Lily had a few parks that quickly became their favorites — we had to visit the “super-tall green slide” at Penn Meadows Park at least two more times after our initial visit, just to play!
They also really loved Cornerstone Nature Area, pointing out all the flowers and demanding that we walk the path, even after we had found the clue.
Liberty Centre Pond was a peaceful place to rest, and we returned to fish after learning that the pond was stocked with bluegills, catfish and bass (as are six other ponds around town!). Finding all of the clues took us two weeks filled with active, outdoor, after-school entertainment.
The entire experience was awesome, not only for the children, but for us parents as well. If you needed one more reason to love North Liberty (or perhaps 23!), you should pick a day, pack a lunch and go enjoy one of the great parks North Liberty has to offer.  Here’s to another great 100 years!