Gardens!

We are finally in a decent weather pattern here in Minnesota. For this, I am particularly grateful. This fine weather has allowed me to get outside and get my hands dirty. Oh how I love that! I am so glad to be back outside and tending to my perennial gardens and filling my flower pots for another season. Yes, I'm downright giddy. Really, need I remind you how much I despise winter?!

Recently, as I was browsing online for area arboretums and gardens, I found a very useful website. Ahem, if you are, of course, from Minnesota or plan to visit here. Check out this great site where you can click on the area of the state you are interested in and they give you links to that area's arboretums/public flower gardens. They provide you with the address, admission cost (if there is one), directions, peak season and website to connect you with each one. So helpful! I can't wait to visit some of these gardens that I didn't know existed. Did I mention that most of them are FREE?

As I was stumbling along, I found that one of the gardens I was looking for is actually a Children's Garden. I can't wait to visit this one and it's probably within an hour away, so a relatively short drive. I was delighted though as I perused their site and found a section just for kids and one for educators too.

The Kids section includes games/activities, experiments, lessons, a scavenger hunt and printables too! The Educator section even has lesson plans for you to use! All of these can even be used by those of you who may not live in our wonderful state or if you are unable to travel to this garden.

I'm already imagining how fun it will be to incorporate some of these activities from the website in our summer learning at our house. Not to mention, the beautiful gardens we may have the opportunity to visit this growing season.

Oh, the places we'll go this summer!

And yes, I'll probably post pictures here afterward. You know me too well.