This weekend I did manage to make it to Longwood Gardens. I didn’t make an official “spring fun list” this year as there was a lot of big travel (Barcelona, skiing, Hawaii…). But I wanted to go see Chanticleer, Stoneleigh, and Longwood. The first two are relatively easy, as they’re within 20 minutes of my house (and are smaller) but Longwood is more of a production. We’d thought about going last weekend, then it just didn’t work logistically.
But it did this weekend — my husband and I went Sunday afternoon in the space after I took the 13-year-old shopping for a dress for both the 7th grade dance and an upcoming bat mitzvah, and after he took the 10-year-old to ninja class. The tulips were toward the end of their run but there were still some really beautiful spots — I took a ton of “portrait mode” photos of one section with orange and purple flowers. There’s something about that combination that is so striking, and unexpected.
I was supposed to run the Broad Street 10-miler on Sunday but…while I did run 10 miles this weekend, I didn’t do the race. (I ran about 6.8 on Saturday morning and 3.2 on Sunday afternoon). There were reasons. The biggest one is that it was incredibly rainy — it stormed Saturday night, and then Sunday I can report that it was raining hard from 8-9:00 a.m., which is a big chunk of the time I would have been on the course. I really don’t like running in the rain. Then it also turned out that Sunday morning was the “hymn festival” at my church. The choir was singing a lot — 9 hymns plus an anthem, and most of those hymns had soprano descants on the last verse. When I realized that at our Thursday night rehearsal, and also realized we were down a handful of sopranos for various things, it seemed like it might matter more if I were there than Broad Street. So — especially since the choir loft was drier — that is where I went.
Anyway…I started a new puzzle this weekend. It’s one of Disney movie posters. My 10-year-old bought it for me when he was using some gift cards at a local toy store, which I thought was so sweet. The 5-year-old and I finished the 6th Dragon Masters book, and we’re now half way through the 9th Magic Treehouse book. I also finished reading The Light Eaters, which is about plant behavior and plant “intelligence” (there is some controversy about using that word with plants). Next up is Sy Montgomery’s What the Chicken Knows, and a book I’m reading for blurbing purposes.
I also updated and filled in the summer spreadsheet. If you have lots of kids in your family doing lots of different things, I highly recommend creating one of these! It’s got the names of my kids along the top, and the weeks of summer down the left hand side. I would see in an instant when certain things would fit (and wouldn’t)- very helpful!
That tulip color combo is gorgeous!
@Connie- isn’t it? So stunning.
Running in pouring rain sounds awful. I will run in light rain but a downpour sounds terrible. And then you tend to blister more since your feet get soaked (that is what happened to me last year when I ran my 10 mile race in light rain). The choir loft sounded like the better choice!!
That is sweet that your 10yo bought you a puzzle!!
@Lisa- yep, I don’t regret it. Blisters are terrible!
I love your flower and garden posts, tulips especially. Our local botanical gardens have been calling me this spring and I realized this past weekend would’ve been perfect. But then it became overcrowded with impromptu gatherings, play dates, and last minute invites. Three social events in one day is extremely rare for me. Whenever I feel a bit overwhelmed, I often think about Designing Your Life and recall relationships typically need the most attention in my life and that’s probably a good thing to focus on. As you always say, “people are a good use of time”.
You reminded me to reserve our next Dragon Masters book at the library. The first was one of the only chapter books to hold my children’s attention at night.
@Michelle – tulips truly are beautiful. A social weekend isn’t a bad thing, though! And yes, the Dragon masters are pretty exciting. We have enjoyed them for sure.
How do you keep track/plan your travel? Do you have like a big calendar on the wall? I am asking because I tend to overplan/stuff our calender with too much and then when the trips come up I can hardly enjoy them. But before, it’s like I don’t get how taking two trips in two weeks (for example) might be too much. Still trying to find out if better visualization of plans could help.
@Maggie – We tend to mostly travel during kid school breaks, and the rhythm of that is pretty much known – summer, Christmas, spring break, possibly a presidents day trip but possibly not. This year we had March 31 off so did a long weekend skiing trip, but given that was one week post Barcelona (for me and my husband) and two weeks before Hawaii, it did feel like a lot. But it was less of a lot for the kids given that they hadn’t gone to Spain. I think this might be one of those cases for printing up some sort of spreadsheet or calendar so you can mark travel days in a color so you could see them. When I make my summer spreadsheet I do have trips that involve all of us printed on there so I can see them but of course there’s some individual travel for various kids too. Hard to know!