Mother's Day at Bristling Acres

Happy Mother's Day to all Mommies!

Hope you had a fun, inspiring, relaxing, and ...fill-in-the-blank.. day!  Relaxing...now there's something I need practice at.  

We had a wonderful Mother's Day at Bristling Acres.  Well, not really at Bristling Acres.  We spent the majority of our day in Madison, WI (about a two-hour, one-way drive).  

Here's how our day went:

Mark getting the girls up so that they can make me a "secret" breakfast.  They were supposed to wake up early (as they usually do on the weekends) and then wake up Daddy but it didn't happen that way.  They did however make breakfast for me.  Ava made up the pancake batter and Annika helped cook them (with Daddy's supervision).  WOW! Annika made a lovely bowl of cut-up fruit.  She also picked me a tiny but ever so lovely bouquet of wildflowers.  So very, very sweet!  

After breakfast we blasted off to Madison.  

Two.  "Short".  Hours.  Later. 

...............we were there! 

Running errands- Boo!

(Although the errands did include a stop at a garden center to buy seeds and a stop at a sporting goods store to pick up soccer gear for Ava- Cheers!)

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Lunch at Husnus- Yay!  

(Husnus is a Turkish restaurant located on State Street) 

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Last stop: Olbrich Gardens!

We missed the Mother's Day Concert held at the gardens...oops.

We did enjoy a lovely stroll through the Bolz Conservatory and through Olbrich Gardens. 

We usually head to the conservatory in the middle of winter when we're desperate for warmth and the smell of plants growing.  We almost never make it there in the summer so this was a nice treat!

Annika and Ava using sticks dipped the water to create ancient symbols/drawings.  I never did figure out what the drawings were supposed to be.  

 My Reason for Celebration:

These two cuties:

 The last time we visited the gardens this Thai Pagoda (apparently covered with real gold leaf and very fragile) was still under construction.  That was a few years ago!

Oh my!  The flowers were lovely and very spring-y!  Soon I'll be posting photos just of the flowers we saw.

Checking out the carnivorous plants inside the conservatory.

Thanks to my little monkeys for making my day so special and thanks to them for giving us the reason to celebrate in the first place!  I feel so privileged to be their Mommy.  They truly do bring a lot of joy into my life!  Here's hoping for many more mother's days to come!