Frolicking Through the Flowers

In the short span of time since Gracie joined our family, we've visited quite a number of flower festivals. One of the smallest (and most spectacular) is the iris festival about 30 minutes south of where we live. In early June, we spent a gorgeous Sunday morning meandering through the display gardens, trying to capture the beauty of the day.





Grace briefly went through an adorable phase this spring wherein she carefully placed fallen flower petals back on the flowers. The petals didn't necessarily need to match the flowers; she just couldn't bear the thought of them being on the ground.



Painted Adirondack chairs were placed throughout the garden for people to stop and, well, smell the flowers. Gracie chose this pretty blue one to rest upon:





Chad and I were both quite fond of this coppery iris, so I thought this shot would be especially nice with the flowering dogwood and white bench in the background. It turned out pretty well, dontcha think?



Although we were there to celebrate the regal iris, there were lots of other late-spring blooming perennials and flowering trees to admire such as this show-stopping clematis vine:



... an exquisite poppy:



... and these cascading wisteria tendrils:



(Actually, I'm not sure if the yellow ones were wisteria. They were quite striking, whatever they were.)

In the middle of the garden, Gracie found a cute little tree with long, willowy branches that were just within her reach. She danced around it as if it were a May Pole.



It was just this spring that Grace started to actually smell flowers (rather than eat or lick them), and you can bet that her little sniffer got quite the workout at the iris garden that day!







Although GG has a healthy fear of spiders and other creepy crawlies, she is not the least bit afraid to explore the great outdoors. I love that Gracie is in awe of God's creations, and we will continue to expose her to the natural beauty that surrounds us.