A Taste of Spring

Wednesday, as I mentioned, we went off to Hillwood as a treat for my mother-in-law. She surprised me and didn't cancel, though she did present us with a newspaper outlining the Pope's path and continued to worry about it the whole way there. Upon arrival she uttered, "Well, that was a lot of worrying for nothing." I managed not to say I told you so. Barely.

Anyway, it was a gorgeous spring day and I had a wonderful time. I think most of the others who went had a wonderful time. With the notable exception of my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law. Now, I don't know that they didn't have a wonderful time - but they certainly weren't effusive by any stretch of the imagination, leaving me to suppose that they had a passable time, if not actually a fun one. On that front, the day simply reminded me that I need to not try so hard to do things with them, because realistically? We're never going to have a relationship, because quite simply we have nothing in common and any attempts that I make to try and reach out are inevitably rebuffed, ignored, or unwelcome.

Regardless, I had a wonderful time and the Sleepy Baby seemed to enjoy rolling around in his stroller through the gardens and being worn through the house. The whole day was replete with brightly colored things at which to stare - and he consequently spent most of the day utterly fascinated. When he wasn't busy charming the older ladies who had to stop and coo at him.

I had been looking forward to the greenhouse - it was billed as having 2,500 orchids. And there certainly were leaves and pots for 2,500 orchids. But very few were actually in bloom, so it was a tad disappointing. However, there were still some very pretty ones:






My favorite, by far, was the Japanese style garden - and I need to go back with Tim as he would love it as well (our favorite garden at Powerscourt in Ireland was the Japanese one, even though very little was in bloom when we were there.) Here are some of my favorite views of the Hillwood Japanese garden:







The rest was lovely as well - but I think perhaps the nicest part was just wandering around through the blooms on a lovely day with the best companion there is.