Windy Picnic

Today Captain Adorable, my Mom, and I went to the National Arboretum. We met KindandCalm, her son Cheerful, and her baby girl. We just so happened to get there right at feeding time for the koi in the pool outside the visitor's center, so the boys (born only 2 days apart) were allowed to dig in to the feed bucket and throw the fish food into the pool. They loved this activity, to the point that we thought perhaps Cheerful would fall in the water because he got so close to the edge of the pool with each toss. The beautiful koi were hungry and it was fun to watch them compete for food. There was also a lucky duck in attendance.

We played around in the herb garden for a while, both boys running around, up and down stairs, with glee. It is a little worrisome to have them in such a beautiful garden because you worry about them picking flowers, but I think they were too busy running around to bother. Captain Adorable did find some clumps of grass clippings that he threw into the grass. I guess the lawn part was freshly mown. His little hands were quite green!

Then we walked to and through the famous azalea gardens (over 40,000 azaleas!) which had some early bloomers out but nothing like it will be in a week or two. It was still beautiful and smelled wonderful too. Captain Adorable was a bit slow and found some mud to play in, so then his hands were green and muddy (blah), but I managed to round him up and pull him along with a gentle grip on his arm (over quiet protests of "my arm!").

Finally, we toddled across the grass on a primitve path to the stately columns installation and had our picnic lunch sitting on the fountain. It was rather windy but we managed without getting too cold. By that time everyone was ready to head home, so we said goodbye. Captain Adorable had a nice nap in the car, and I carried him to the couch once we got home.

I took a bunch of pics. Let me see if I can post one or two...