{"id":135,"date":"2008-09-01T13:57:15","date_gmt":"2008-09-01T17:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/2008\/09\/01\/longwood-gardens\/"},"modified":"2008-09-01T20:40:03","modified_gmt":"2008-09-02T00:40:03","slug":"longwood-gardens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/?p=135","title":{"rendered":"Longwood Gardens"},"content":{"rendered":"

Okay, I’m slowly telling the story of my Summer Vacation.\u00c2\u00a0 The day after my birthday and graduation, I had breakfast with my classmates and fellow graduates, and then drove back to Virginia.\u00c2\u00a0 Along the way, I stopped at Longwood Gardens and spent a few hours there.<\/p>\n

Years before, when Josh was a toddler, we visited Longwood Gardens with my parents-in-law and met some family friends who lived in Pennsylvania.\u00c2\u00a0 (We lived in New Jersey at the time.)\u00c2\u00a0 I believe that was when I met Lorinda, who often leaves comments on this blog.<\/p>\n

It was funny, because I barely remembered that trip — until I went inside the large greenhouse and peeked at the Children’s Garden.\u00c2\u00a0 Then I remembered that on that long-ago visit, it rained, so we spent most of our time inside the greenhouse.\u00c2\u00a0 I also got a weird sense of deja vu when I watched the small dancing fountains going to a recording of Stars & Stripes Forever, because my father-in-law had videotaped the entire performance, and it was identical, after all those years!<\/p>\n

Anyway, my trip this June was a totally different experience.\u00c2\u00a0 That trip was a large gathering, planned by my mother-in-law, and with a toddler in tow.\u00c2\u00a0 This trip was a solitary ramble in a beautiful place on a gorgeous day.\u00c2\u00a0 I was thinking about graduation and new beginnings and all the hope my future holds.\u00c2\u00a0 I did a lot of praying and thinking about the future, and a lot of simply enjoying the beauty.<\/p>\n

The water gardens were beautiful to listen to as well as to see.\u00c2\u00a0 There was a bit of forest I was able to hike through.\u00c2\u00a0 I sat on a bench and simply enjoyed the woods.\u00c2\u00a0 It was very nice to have nobody tired of me taking pictures or bored with simply looking.<\/p>\n

It was funny — the day was Father’s Day, and there simply weren’t too many families that celebrated Father’s Day by going to gardens!\u00c2\u00a0 Those that were there were on a very different, child-centered agenda, from what I was doing.\u00c2\u00a0 It felt wonderful to ramble through a safe, slightly wild, gorgeous place and reflect on how blessed I am.<\/p>\n

I’ll post the full album on Facebook, but include some of the best pictures here:<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1741.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1745.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1749.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1750.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1752.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1761.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1775.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1796.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1798.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1801.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1805.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1822.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1829.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1835.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1843.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1864.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1867.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1879.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1880.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1893.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1915.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1922.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1931.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1940.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1941.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1943.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1944.JPG\"<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1957.JPG\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Okay, I’m slowly telling the story of my Summer Vacation.\u00c2\u00a0 The day after my birthday and graduation, I had breakfast with my classmates and fellow graduates, and then drove back to Virginia.\u00c2\u00a0 Along the way, I stopped at Longwood Gardens and spent a few hours there. Years before, when Josh was a toddler, we visited […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,19,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-flowers","category-nature","category-photos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderjourneys\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}