Our First Family Fun Friday Of Summer 2015

As I've mentioned in years past, I like to plan fun outings for the girls and myself on Fridays during the summertime. I usually don't have any piano lessons scheduled on Fridays, and most of the girl's extracurricular activities are on the other days of the week as well. Sometimes, life gets in the way and our schedules get complicated. Sometimes, we need to plan our outings for other days of the week. This year, however, we were able to start the summer off with a Friday-morning trip to the Tucson Botanical Gardens.

We haven't been to the Botanical Gardens for a few years now. In fact, the last time we went, Lorelai wasn't even there...it was for a field trip with Celeste's preschool group. So, I figured it was time to give it another try. I also wanted to go there before the end of May, so that we could see the Gardens' cool Butterfly Magic pavilion before it closed for the summer.

 

Overall, the girls had a nice time, but the trip did have its ups and downs. Some parts of the gardens were closed off or incomplete, due to construction for a new visitor's center on the opposite end of the parking lot. There was some construction noise and dust that filtered throughout the gardens during our trip, and that got a little distracting.

But things started off well enough. I am not much of a botanist, but I did my best to call the girls' attention to the different varieties of plants (as well as their names) wherever we went. They really liked the grounds, and all the decorations.

Probably our favorite part of the trip was our detour into the Butterfly Magic pavilion. It was the last weekend the pavilion was open, before it closed until October. I suspect that the summer heat makes it difficult to maintain the proper temperature & humidity inside the pavilion. If we'd come at a cooler time of year, we may have seen more butterflies inside.

However, we still saw plenty! Every few seconds, another one would fly overhead, or just past our ear. They were all very beautiful and cool to look at. It took a while before I could get good pictures of any of them.

 

 

The girls had a lot of fun butterfly watching, and they were also able to spot a few of the dart frogs that also call the pavilion home (they were not poisonous, but were colored just like the dangerous tropical varieties). Even though the humidity, combined with the excessive heat, made the pavilion a sweaty affair, it was still a great experience.

There were a few other bright spots the girls enjoyed: the miniature village, complete with miniature running train...

...the fun photo ops...

...and the children's garden, complete with sandbox and water wall (where the kids washed their faces to cool off, ick).

But because it was the end of May, in Tucson, it was inevitable that the weather would start working against us. After being outside for an hour or two, we were all starting to feel pretty hot...and many of us were getting cranky too!

Aurora, in particular, is particularly sensitive to the oppressive summer heat; about an hour into our trip, she started to complain about her exhaustion. As time wore on, her complaining grew steadily louder and whinier, and she was weeping for the whole world to hear before too long. As you can see, her "enthusiasm" (or lack of same) was starting to rub off on her big sisters.

But at least the girls all got to see this velociraptor, standing amidst a forest of petrified wood!

Wait, what? Oh, Botanical Gardens...you so random!

Anyway, it was a nice trip when all was said and done. We made it home before the heat became unbearable...and then we chased it away with our first summer trip to the clubhouse pool.

As you can see, everyone was very refreshed after that!

Since that Friday, one more Friday has come and gone. It was a "fun" Friday, but mostly consisted of a bunch of "checklist" events...a summer movie matinee, clothes shopping, a trip to CostCo, a dinner with Grandma Barrett at the country club. A nice day, but not necessarily photograph-worthy. But we are hoping for more fun outings in the next few Fridays...including our annual Phoenix trip in just under two weeks! Not long after that, we head to Colorado for our family reunion. Summer just keeps on keeping on.