Longwood Gardens

Earlier this week Liza and I went with my parents to Longwood Gardens, a place she's been before but never remembers from one visit to another. Score! They've got an orchid festival going on right now, which Liza was in favor of - bring on the pink and purple!

As usual, the Children's Garden was a big hit. We were about the only ones there, so she had plenty of room to run around like a maniac, paint (with water) all over the walls, and generally wreck havoc and have a good time.

Just like last time, I came away vowing that next time we WILL bring a dry change of clothes for her to use after visiting the Children's Garden ... 17 water features that children are encouraged to manhandle means a severely drippy child.

Longwood Gardens

With Jason out of town AGAIN, Liza and I flew out to visit my parents for the week. We'll be heading home tomorrow, but I thought I'd go ahead and post the link to our photos from our trip on Tuesday to Longwood Gardens. Liza wasn't so interested in the Chrysanthemum Festival, except the parts that had gravel. Loved the gravel.


http://www2.snapfish.com/share/p=41211162395033782/l=219999024/g=56849598/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB And in case that link doesn't work, here are a couple of my favorites:
Liza enjoys her grandparents' attention


One of the statues in the conservatory, designed to look like an origami crane.


One of the coming attractions in the Children's Garden, which is being renovated. Who could resist coming back in a few months to visit the spitting animal sculptures?

Halloween was a complete washout, with much screaming, crying, not sleeping until the wee hours of the morning, snot running down faces, etc. More on that when I get home to a computer that doesn't do funny things if I try to type in the non-HTML mode. If I see another carat, I'm going to scream.

Portrait

The Child didn't nap today, and I decided that watching Battlestar Galactica: Razor was more important that sitting in my office for an hour blogging, so all you're getting today is a day-before-Easter portrait of me, courtesy of The Child:
I'm going to have to start a whole Flickr set for her on my account, given the number of photos she took that turned out half decent. Of course, we also have some where people have no heads, or the shot is focused on the floor, or the windows behind the people look like they're 20 feet tall, but still, it's not bad for a 2-year-old.

And I'd like everyone to know that I had nothing to do with the bunny cake from my previous post, which my cousins bought for all the kids to share when we visited them on Saturday. And yes, MLF, the frosting IS as thick as it looks - more than 1" deep in the tallest parts of the eyeballs. Needless to say, the two-year-olds approved :)

Oh, fine, here's one more shot for K's mom .... shhh, don't tell anyone I'm publishing photos I took at Longwood, okay, Freia?

Not sure where she had more fun ...

... at Longwood Gardens, playing under the ginkgo trees, 

... or playing in the river that runs through the empty lots down the street from my parents' house.

 Both were free today, so I guess it doesn't really matter, now does it?

Hee

Looking outside my front window just now I noticed one of the reasons I don't mind paying my property taxes in this town - we have ridiculously good trash service. Not only can we leave pretty much anything ... appliances, yard waste, probably even dead bodies if they were properly labeled ... out for the trash, but they come around every week during the fall to get rid of the leaves. It's taking a crew of five city workers to vacuum up the huge pile of leaves I dumped on the sidewalk this weekend. I really need one of those vacuums - they just took care of a pile of leaves about 40 feet long and between knee- and waist-deep, in about a minute. Just think how much fun that would be to play with in my backyard! Of course, an occasional squirrel might get sacrificed to the Great Gods of Leaf Sucking, but that's a small price to pay for a spotless yard, right?

Oh, and here's my favorite of the shots from Longwood Gardens last week. This variety of chrysanthemum was so white it was almost blue ... except for these two, which apparently didn't get the memo instructing them how to dress this year.


I just love this shot, and I have just set it as the wallpaper on my computer. It's the first time in about a year that Liza hasn't held the place of honor on my desktop. Step aside, sweetie - mama's feeling artsy!

Oh, and in case you're wondering, that isn't a honeybee on the flower. According to the signs in the conservatory, it's some sort of non-stinging wasp that happens to pollinate flowers just as well as bees, only without the pesky risk of anaphilactic shock. Who'd a thunk it?