Mother's Day Weekend

I had a great Mother's Day weekend. There were no big dinners, no fancy gifts, just the gift of time, for myself and with my loved ones.

On Saturday, while Jill was off teaching rock climbing to a Mountaineers class, we hosted the grand kids to a full day of activity.

We dressed for cold and possible rain and started off at the Washington Park Arboretum/University Of Washington Botanical Garden, destination the board walk trails in the wetlands of Foster Island. 

Unfortunately the Lake Washington water levels were so high that the bog trails were muck, so we retraced our steps and opted for the beauty of Azalea Way instead.  There were diversions along the way.

Isaac had not approved of my first suggestion of activities earlier in the week, stating sarcastically that he would rather go to a flower show. Well, we changed the plans, but when we actually did end up at a flower show, he was quite taken by the solid masses of azalea blooms. He borrowed my camera to take some close ups. 

He thought the bi-colored blooms were fascinating.

Irene found some that were fragrant.

From here we drove into the University District to check out the Farmers Market. We were hungry, so we tasted all the free samples. Done with that we found a Subway shop, and parking - a task in itself- and had lunch on The Ave, University Avenue, followed by a stop at the Starbucks, which was full of students busy on their laptops. 

After a search for parking on campus, we walked to the Burke Museum of Natural and Cultural History on the U of W campus. 

As I said to Isaac, we always think of dinosaurs living in some distant tropical location. 

But this triceratops was from Montana.

And this giant ground sloth was from Sea-Tac Airport, about a mile from my house. 

There are representations from many native cultures, but we like the Pacific Coast artistry the best. 

I had never seen a heron mask before. 

Quite clever!

The campus is quite beautiful, especially in the spring.

We were tired by the time we stopped off to pick up our-take-and-bake pizza on the way home. We watched a Sounders game on TV. Well, Tom and I did,  while the kids played on their phones. Jill, who had a successful day too, picked them up about 7:00. None of us got rained on! It was  Grand Mother's Day. 

Sunday morning Tom and I braved the threatening skies to go for a 3.75 mile walk through several parks in our neighborhood. 

It only sprinkled on us a little bit. I found this forest gnome hunkered down on a bench.

In the afternoon we toured some open gardens in the Ravena neighborhood of Seattle. I'll post more photos later in the week. 

About 5:00 we picked up Jake at his apartment in Ballard. That's his place behind us, the ground floor/sub floor of a big old bungalow. 

We went out for gourmet burgers and beer and good conversation. Then he took us to a locally famous ice cream shop called Molly Moon's, which we were not aware of. But from the long line of customers that arrived shortly after we were served, it's obvious that plenty of the locals know of it. 

And my Molly's sundae was delicious!  I'll have to behave myself for a long time now after all that good eating. 

As I finish typing this post it's just after midnight Sunday night/Monday morning. We'll pack up a few things in the morning and be off for an overnight at the Whidbey Island cabin while all of our kids go back to work. 

My next post might have island pics.