arboretum in april

Our Friday morning plans fell through last-minute, so we decided to head to the arboretum instead.  We headed down with my friend Kaity Dixon, and her 2 kids - Maylee (almost 3) and David (1).  The weather was mild (a big part of my decision to do something outside!), cloudy enough to keep it from being hot but not raining.

We started in an unmarked grove, one that Kaity said she had driven past but never stopped at.  The kids had a great time running around chasing each other and finding "caves" in the loosely tangled vines.

We followed wherever the kids wanted to go, slowly winding our way through the forest.  We saw lots of beautiful flowers, vines, tall grasses, and sticks that transformed from walking sticks to swords to fishing poles.  We also found a tent caterpillar nest.  Jed and Maylee stumbled upon a long plank of wood and each carried an end of it, with David following curiously.  Jed "swam" in the grasses, and Maylee sat down, "pretending to be baby Jesus lying in the manger".

The kids had adventures galore, but the most exciting was when Jed and Maylee ran right into a collection of beehives, unassumingly placed in the middle of the forest.

By the time Kaity and I realized what the tall white stacks were, the kids (minus David) were standing in the middle of a swarm of bees.  Inside I screamed "get away from there!", but not wanting to alarm the children (or the bees), Kaity and I very calmly and sweetly called, "Okay, guys, how about we come back this way now?  Let's find something really fun to do - over there!  Step away from the bees, please, they would love some space."  We carefully took each child by the hand and gently guided them away from the hives, pausing once we were several feet away to observe the bees working and be excited about how cool they are - from a distance.  Jed enthusiastically told me that the bees were "cooking" honey in their hives, for him to eat.  How thoughtful they are!

Shortly afterward we decided that it was time for a snack, so we trekked back to the car and ate while we drove around looking for the lilac grove that we had heard was in bloom.  We had to ask a couple of people, but eventually found it across from the National Capitol Columns.  It was beautiful!  And smelled absolutely divine.  I've smelled lilacs before, but never been in a grove with so many of them, where the scent permeates every inch of air.

We went home around 1pm with 3 very tired children and 2 very tired mamas!