As I mentioned before, we recently (um, two weeks ago) went on our first trip to the botanic garden in the city near our farm.
Farmer Boy’s wonderful and amazing phonics tutor (who has become family to us and a dear friend to me) has a membership and invited us to tag along for a beautiful Friday morning spring outing. It was magical. Here are some highlights:
Tulips blooming everywhere.
Fresh air, sunshine and outdoor beauty make for three happy children.
Great big Koi next to a fantastic gazebo/deck area.
Cool sundial.
In the butterfly house - butterflies to come later in the season.
Learning about Redwood trees.
In the Shakespeare Garden.
And THEN, as if it could get any better, we came to the new ‘children’s garden.’ Holy cow it was SO incredible.
It's like heading into Oz...See the rainbow archway? In the afternoon the colored pieces reflect rainbows onto the sidewalk.
The children’s garden was so filled with creative hands-on activities, beautiful things to see, pathways and passages, treehouses and little nooks filled with tools and furniture used by unseen fairies. There were rakes and buckets, water to play in, rocks to handle. It was such a shame we had only a couple of hours to spare; we could easily have spent all day.
And did I mention the tulips?
I was especially excited to hear how affordable a membership to the gardens was. This would be an excellent gift for any family who loves the outdoors (*wink, wink, nudge, nudge*). There were lovely picnic areas almost everywhere we turned. I could imagine packing up a lunch and our current read-out-loud book and spending hours together eating, reading and exploring the gardens. It would be a great routine for homeschooling families during the most beautiful parts of the year and a wonderful way for anyone to enjoy watching the seasons change.
SO go and find a botanic garden in your area! Let me know if you like it as much as we did.
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OK, now I so want to go to your local botanical garden. Don’t get me wrong, ours is lovely and we do have a membership, but that children’s garden with the face in the tree and stepping stones through the pond looks amazing. Plus a Shakespeare garden sounds very cool.
We love Botanica! We have a membership too. FYI: regarding the tulips. Once they bloom they sell them for the next couple fridays at 15 cents a plant. I have a few dozen currently in my garage:)
What a beautiful place!! We have a lovely botanical garden an hour from here, and some in Niagara Falls too. But I envy you your childrens’ garden! How wonderful! As I was reading I thought this was a perfect place for home schoolers to visit often.
We love the Brooklyn Botanic Garden so much we got married there. Now we bring the kids and bore them with visiting the spot where we had the ceremony. Without the set up for a wedding it’s just a grassy area with some trees. They could care less.
Oh, I hadn’t seen the children’s garden! We haven’t been in ages, we’d gone a few years ago with some other homeschoolers on a field trip.