Tulip Festival

Every year, Thanksgiving Point hosts their Tulip Festival. Gray and I always talked about going, but this was the first year we actually made it (we'd been to the gardens once before, but not during tulip time). Maga was the one who initiated it, we met her and Aunt Ana and cousin Aiden there. We took all the boys except Landon, who was working on a school assignment at a friend's house.

The flowers were fabulous ...

The kids enjoyed seeing the HUGE carp swimming in the lake ... Colton is smiling in the forefront of the picture above, but if you look in the upper left hand corner of the photo, you might be able to see Aiden sprawled on the wood deck looking down at the fish, with Callahan right there keeping an eye on him. Callahan was the official "Aiden chaser" and it was quite the job! "Quick Callahan, go grab him before he falls in the water. Get him before he runs down the hill. Oh dear, he's climbed onto someone's golf cart ... Callahan, go grab him before he hits the gas ..." *Ü*

It was a lot of walking, but the boys seemed to enjoy it. As we had purchased the entrance tickets, I noticed that you could rent wagons, strollers, wheelchairs ... a golf cart ... and a SEGWAY (if you've seen Arrested Development or Paul Blart Mall Cop, you know what I'm talking about). As we walked, I was wishing we had rented a segway ... not so much because the walking was too tiring -- but how often would the kids get the chance to ride on a segway? And it was only $20 for the rental (Grayson laughed SO hard when I pointed that out, as I had complained about the $10 entrance fee ... but come on, a segway!). Had Landon been with us, I think the segway would have happened, as it would have been too unique an experience to pass up. Of course, it wouldn't have helped on the stairs in the picture above ...

Callahan was always on the look out for drinking fountains ... and here at the falls, he wanted me to take a picture that LOOKED like he was taking a drink. I'm not sure that it really worked out ...

Oh ... such cute flower faces ...

(those are really big head holes!)

Of course we had to stop for snacks at the food vendors ... Grayson bought churros for everyone (except Colton, who wanted a ring pop). Everyone complained a bit as they weren't ready immediately ... but then commented that they were best when made fresh ... worth the wait.

In the children's garden, there were little iron animals all around, in the picture above, Colton is reacting to a snake, while Aiden attacks at coyote in the background. In the picture below, Colton gives a little love to a rhino on Noah's Ark ...

A final floral family photo

(sans Landon ... and a segway)

(in 2022, Gray and Jen would return to see the tulips. This post didn't come up in a simple search, so Jen reblogged it, creating photo collages and additional pictures, since it's already here, she stuck it in the WriteOn blog, even though it wasn't a letter ... it totally could have been!) Tiptoe Through the Tulips