Early Spring

It's so sad we only saw a little snow this Winter.

We got a handful and that's it.  I am going to move on and embrace the warmer days to come.

We had 70+ degree weather yesterday and I wanted the two younger one's to run around outside.  I decided to bring them to Brookside Gardens.  It's just a fun place to do that sort of stuff and enjoy the gardens.  My mom used to take me there as a child all the time.

One of my kids favorite things to do there is the Labyrinth.

My kids call it a maze and Eddie is so into them right now. I didn't even bother trying to tell them it's supposed to be meditative and that there is no challenge to it. 

Nonetheless, it still had it's calming effects.

Though it felt like Spring, the flowers hadn't bloomed yet, the buds on the trees were emerging, the bulbs still under the dirt and the water fountains not turned on yet.  Couldn't find a single goose to chase or a turtle to marvel at.

Eddie, where are the flowers, turtles and geese?

"I don't know, can we go home now?"  Yikes, we just got here.  This is supposed to be fun!

We did go to the greenhouse and found some flowers and some little bridges they liked to run across a billion times.

These reminded me of rosary beads hanging off a plant or little skinny bunches of grapes. 

Almost towards the end of our visit.  We decided to take the path that led us towards a little lake and some benches to sit on.

This is Bernadette's new haircut!  I've never given bangs to my girls before, but she seems to do well with it.  It certainly served it's purpose as maintenance free.  Her hair is always in place now! 

Bernadette would not cooperate with me when I tried to get pictures of her.  She was purposely ignoring me!  So, I snapped when I could.

Once at the lake, Eddie started throwing wood chips into the lake.  Bernadette copied her big brother and started throwing wood chips, too.  They could do this for hours.

I was watching Eddie throw these wood chips into the water.  Each time he would try to throw them further and further away.  He tried so hard that the wood chip flew backwards and he was wondering where it went!  He was throwing the wood chips like a softball pitch.  He released too late.

Now, when I said it was time to go home - they didn't want to leave.  I had to leave some wood chips on the trail before they filled up the lake.

Awww...it looks so picture perfect.  As Bernadette is developing a mind of her own these days and hasn't learned the repercussions of not listening to me when I say, "It's time to leave, let's go!" for the third time!  I had Eddie grab her hand and start walking towards the car while I was patiently waiting for this picture.  Eddie had to use some force to get her to follow.  On the other side of her head could be a big pouty face.

Afterwards, we stopped by Micky D's to get some lunch and then went home.  Daddy came home early that day and he picked the other three kids up from school and we met at the park for some more outside fun.