On our way home from Alexandria, we took a slight detour and drove into St. Cloud to see the Munsinger and Clemens Gardens. It had been many years since we had been there.
The Munsinger Gardens are located along the Mississippi River. A brief timeline includes: In 1915 the city of St. Cloud acquired the site of a former sawmill where in 1926 Campfire Girls planted Scotch and Norway pines that still shade the grounds today. In 1930 the gardens were developed using labor from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), and thus was the beginning of Munsinger Gardens.
The tall pines planted by the Campfire Girls.
Today there are thousands of annuals and perennials and I believe every single one of them was in bloom the day we visited! It was an immense splash of color. Breathtaking.
A friendly little guy.
Sweet water droplets from the sprinkler system.
Fun plater ideas found all over the gardens.
An old cement horse trough.
The Clemens Gardens are up the hill from Munsinger Gardens where there are stunning, sun-loving plants.
Plenty of benches are scattered around the gardens.
An overview of the Clemens Garden.
From the brochure, Clemens Gardens was “developed as a gift of love from Bill Clemens to his wife, Virginia”. I had heard the love story before, so I looked on the internet to get more details.
Virginia Rose and William Clemens sculpture.
In 1988 Bill Clemens bought a vacant lot across from his home to protect their river view and prevent commercial building. They gave the property to the City of St. Cloud Parks department.
Virginia suffered from Multiple Sclerosis and had limited mobility. She loved roses.
In 1990 Bill funded the construction of the Virginia Clemens Rose Garden so she could look out and enjoy the thousands of roses from her window.
It is such a sweet story!
The rose garden.
And what a legacy for all of us to enjoy these spectacular gardens.
A white garden.
A yellow garden.
A big beautiful bouquet.
There were several fountains throughout both gardens.
Nymphaeaceae is the scientific name for the water lily family. Water lilies are lovely as they float leisurely on the water and look beautiful.
White flowering water lilies are common, so I was delightfully surprised to see many different colors of lilies at the Olbrich Botanical Garden in Madison Wisconsin, where we took a weekend road trip. They were impressive.
According to Wikipedia: “Water lilies are rooted in soil in bodies of water with leaves and flowers floating on or rising from the surface.” It was interesting to learn that the water lily family forms five genera (groups) with about 70 known species.
Several different types of water lilies can be found floating in the Sunken Garden in Olbrich Gardens. The sunken garden is a formal, traditional, English-style garden with an 80-foot reflecting pool, and small “water falls” over a cement drop at one end.
The pool is surrounded by mostly by spring bulbs, annuals and perennials with a view of Lake Monona in the distance.
A few more water lilies were growing in the pools surrounding the Royal Thai Pavilion in the Thai garden section of Olbrich Botanical Gardens.
My favorite color…a stunning blue and yellow flower.
The Royal Thai Pavilion in the Thai Garden.
Seeing all the different colors was a fun discovery…The water lilies added a lot of “splash of color” to the water pools.
They show off their beauty in a gentle and quiet way.
There was much to see in the lush gardens at Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison. The winding paths, little quiet spaces to sit, wonderful variety of flower gardens (17, plus an indoor conservatory), and large trees that provide a canopy of shade over some trails, a Prairie-Style viewing tower to climb for an overlook, and so oh, much more….
On a beautiful spring day in Minnesota I ventured out to the Brand Farms in Farmington, Minnesota for its tulip festival debut. Having planted over 160,000 Dutch tulip bulbs last fall, the Brands opened up their tulip field this spring for the public to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
According to their website “BrandFarms is a family dairy farm originally purchased in 1957 by German immigrants, Anton and Marie Brand, and has been passed down through four generations. Aaron Brand is the fourth generation who farms with his father, John. His grandfather, Richard, was born in 1932 and still has a daily presence on the farm.”
As I drove down the dusty dirt road I approached the farm an hour after it opened and was surprised – the parking lot was overflowing and cars were parked everywhere.
Word is out, and the tulips are up, and the festival is in full swing (it opened May 2 and runs through May 24).
I waited in line to board the tractor-pulled wagon that takes you out to the tulip field. It’s the only way you can get there (and there is a charge).
As we approached the field, there was a pop of exquisite colors and it reminded me of the aerial photos you see of the Netherland’s tulip fields (well… on a significantly smaller scale!)
On this day, many of the tulips were in full bloom. There were a few that have not opened yet, but I got an excellent first impression. A few interesting oddities were placed among the tulips for photo ops.
My favorite was a grand piano amongst the tulips. There were a couple of clawfoot bathtubs too. There was a variety of activities to keep the visiting kiddos engaged. One food truck was open this day, but I believe more food trucks are there on the weekends.
As I was taking photos of the many striking colors of tulips I was reminded of a time when a friend called me and told me she was standing in the flower shop wanting to buy me a bouquet of tulips.
She decided to call and ask me what color I wanted…and I said white. She was surprised, and said she was glad she called to ask because she would never have chosen white.
I have always liked white flowers. There were rows of spectacular white tulips at the tulip festival.
But while I stood looking at the tulips, I wondered…if I could pick a bouquet from this field which color would I choose? I decided I wanted one of every color…they were all so glorious.
It was a lovely morning at the first annual tulip festival at the Brand Farms. I’m glad annual is in the name. I’d bet they will add more tulips each year.
It continues to amaze me how there are so many variety of flowers…and then with each variety such an array of colors.
Spring flowers are a wonderful sight to see…. their vibrant, happy faces pop out through the winter’s leftover debris of dead grass, twigs and dirt, and really stand out. Tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, crocuses, scilla are all perky little reminders that spring is in the air.
My neighbor’s one daffodil. 04/04/26
Here’s a fun spring poem:
Daffydowndilly
"She wore her yellow sun-bonnet, She wore her greenest gown; She turned to the south wind And curtsied up and down. She turned to the sunlight And shook her yellow head, And whispered to her neighbour: "Winter is dead."
- A.A. Milne from her book When We Were Very Young (1924)*
My tulips 04/03/26
Often this time of year l buy some tulips to put in a vase to bring a little spring indoors. For several days the tulips stand perky and bright, and then the blooms open wider and their stems start to arch and bend and they take on a wild look.
04/06/26
I love it when that happens. It reminds me of the beautiful messiness of life.
Scilla siberica can be invasive. There is a lawn in Northfield covered in purple scilla… It does look beautiful this time of year. 04/06/26
Purple Scilla…04/06/26
Spring is officially here in Minnesota, yet it usually takes longer to arrive than what the calendar says. But I’m ready for the colors of spring…tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, crocuses, scilla, forsythia…all signs of hope and rebirth.
Yellow forsythia in bloom. 04/06/26
* If you are in the U.S., you can generally post poems from A.A. Milne’s early collections—specifically When We Were Very Young (1924) and Now We Are Six (1927)—without infringement.
It was a sandwich board that caught my attention while biking on the Root River State Trail.
I saw the words “lefse chips” and, being the Norwegian that I am, all things lefse makes me curious. So we veered off the trail and biked a block into the small town of Peterson, population 227.
We found the store (not too difficult) and walked through the middle of the magnetic screen door – a great invention.
This screen door is flexible. The two screens come together in the middle and latch with magnets. One can easily walk through the door. It was unique.
Tiger Trail Lefse Chip Co. is a small store that makes and sells lefse and lefse chips. I had never heard of lefse chips (much like Mexican tortilla chips) . They sell mainly online, and mostly to breweries and wineries. However, in this small storefront there were several samples of the lefse chips to taste. We liked them all. We bought a bag of the Hot Honey BBQ chips to bring home (and support this small business).
More cyclists stopped to explore the store too, and it felt festive on this chilly morning in this small town… that has big displays of gnomes, including statues, flags and wall murals.
This mural is painted on the side of the Post Office.
The light poles in the town of Peterson have banners with gnomes on them, in multiple colors.
After a good rest, we got back on our bikes to ride the “rail to trail” bike path that runs along the Root River. Yellow coneflowers, goldenrod and black-eyed susan’s were blooming along this beautiful portion of the trail.
Along the Root River.
Up close.
Scenic barn along the trail.
Even though it was a chilly morning, the sky was partly sunny and the trail was busy with hardy bicyclists. Earlier in the morning we left Northfield and drove a couple hours to get the trailhead. It was about 50* when we started to bike.
After our ride, we ate our picnic lunch outdoors, at the Rushford trailhead (it had warmed up by then).
An old jail house. Through the windows you can see the bars of the small, cell inside.
A portion of an old chapel.
The old train depot, in Rushford, is currently being renovated. Next door was an old school, a chapel and a jail house. Presumably those three buildings, along with the depot, will be part of the trailhead museum when all is finished. The town of Rushford, population 1,852, seems to be growing.
The Root River trailhead in Rushmore, Minnesota.
After lunch we continued to drive to Marquette, Iowa for an overnight stay. The drive took us through southeastern Minnesota bluff country and along the Mississippi River.
It was picturesque with green bluffs, the blue skies and puffy white clouds. A great day for a gorgeous drive. The place we stayed had some beautiful annual hanging baskets that are still vibrant.
We stopped to observe an interesting boat while driving back from the restaurant that evening.
The L. Wade Childress
It was intriguing to see this “pushboat” resting on land on the banks of the river, near Prairie du Chien. (This is when the internet is so useful. We found the faded name of the boat, on the outside of the bridge, so we looked up Wade Childress and found information.) We learned it had sunk near Fort Madison Iowa in 1985.
A beautiful old catholic church (1834) in the city: The Cathedral of Angra do Heroísmo.
I really liked this wooden sculpture of Jesus the carpenter we saw in a church. I’ve never seen Jesus portrayed as a carpenter in a sculpture form before.
A landscape view of San Miguel, the green isle.
An inviting path to the sea.
Yummy gelato…
Yummy fruits and vegetables!
A humongous pot of pretty petunias.
There were several types of roosters “strutting their stuff”, on all the islands.
These two parrots, in an enclosed area in a park, were fun to watch.
I like this photo of the exposed tree roots, growing down, down, down into the earth.
This tree was called the elephant foot…must be a nickname! 😉
And then there were so many flowers…these photos capture a few unusual ones…
I loved the way the twilight reflected in these windows.
The last island we visited on our two-week trip to “islands in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean” was Madeira, a separate archipelago consisting of four islands. Madeira island is southeast of the Azores and about 600 miles west of mainland Portugal.
The view over the infinity pool looking towards the Atlantic Ocean, on the roof top of our hotel in Funchal.
Funchal, the capital of Madeira, where we stayed in a lovely boutique hotel with a rooftop pool and fabulous view of the city and ocean, was winding down from a Flower Festival on the island…beautiful carpets made of flowers along the sidewalks, and stunning flower arrangements everywhere.
A carpet of flowers found on sidewalks and in hotel lobbies.
It was the last days of the festival.
One of many stunning flower arrangements.
We went on a grand driving tour to: Camara de Lobos, a fishing Village, Cabo Girão, a striking overlook of the sea (the cliff is 589 meters above sea level or 1,932 feet), and Serrado da Eira, a picturesque mountainous region of Madeira.
Interior views on Madeira Island.
Serrado da Eira Viewpoint.
Looking straight down from cliff overlook, 589 meters (1,932 feet) above sea level. photo gb
Another view looking down from the high cliff to the shoreline. photo gb
We went to a rum factory and a farmer’s market, walked down a historic street with unique painted doors, and went on a cetaceans-watching tour. We didn’t see any whales but we did see dolphins and a beautiful coastline. (I have no photos from our boat tour because I do not bring my camera/phone near any bodies of water after having lost electronics in lakes a couple of times!)
Camara de Lobos fishing village.
We ate at several fantastic restaurants on Madeira Island. A huge European breakfast buffet was offered at all our hotels, on all the islands, each morning. Lunch and dinners were a mixture of eating as a group in small, local restaurants, or visiting a quaint sidewalk café when dinner was “on our own.”
We ate lunch at Quinta do Furão, part of this lovely hotel complex.
In Madeira we ate together at several special restaurants but three stand out…lunch at Quinta do Furão on the outdoor patio with lovely views of the ocean,
The lunch view. photo gb
il Vildali, a Mediterranean Cuisine restaurant that was eloquently set for us at a huge table with luxury tablecloth and candelabras,
il Vivaldi Mediterranean Cuisine Restaurant.
and on our last night together we ate at Mozart Restaurant; with a fun wait staff and interesting bathrooms.
The Mozart restaurant was on the Rua de Santa Maria, one of the oldest streets in Madeira. It is a pedestrian-friendly cobblestone street, with some car traffic. It is lined with small restaurants, cafes and a small art gallery or two. It is also known for its painted doors.
Funny to say, but bathrooms can be very interesting. I have always liked to check out bathrooms in different places, but in the Mozart Restaurant we all checked out the bathrooms. The room was all mirrors, including floors and ceilings. It was unique!
The room of mirrors…the separate room with the toilet was the same; all mirrors.
It is here where we had to say good-bye to our new friends whom we shared so many wonderful adventures together over two weeks. We were so happy to have had our paths cross with these fine folks. It was sad to bid farewell.
These peace lilies were growing wild all over the islands.
I have never been to the National Cathedral, but have always wanted to see it. Since we were going to be in the Washington D.C. area during holy week, I checked out the cathedral’s schedule. There was a lot going on. I settled on buying tickets to see the Cathedral in Bloom.
Washington National Cathedral
The magnificent cathedral is lavishly decorated with flowers for Easter and they keep the bouquets fresh throughout the following week for people to enjoy, adding more beauty to the already impressive architecture.
Spectacular!
So once again, we took off with the grandchildren to go exploring.
Grandma & Grandpa with the kiddos.
Such beauty.
The Episcopal cathedral was chartered by congress in 1893 and established on Mount St. Alban (the highest point in the city). In 1907 the cornerstone was laid by President Theodore Roosevelt. The construction slowed during periods of economic hardship, so the building wasn’t completed until 1990.
The High Altar.
“Our” National Cathedral is for all people. “This Cathedral holds a unique place at the intersection of sacred and civic life. …we strive to serve God and our neighbors as agents of reconciliation; as a trusted voice of moral leadership; and as a sacred space where the country gathers during moments of national significance.”*
Looking up to the rose window on the outside.
Looking out the rose window from the inside.
“In a city of monuments and memorials, this Cathedral stands apart as a vibrant community of people called together to serve and renew the world around us. Our founders envisioned this Cathedral as a sacred space where the nation could gather in good times and in bad.”*
This amazing Easter Lily bouquet had a matching bouquet flanked on the other side of this entryway.
Stunning beauty.
We used a self-guided tour brochure to find our way around the massive building.
I enjoyed this space stained-glass window so I took a photo. I learned later that the small eye in the large red circle is a piece of moon rock brought back by the astronauts of Apollo 11 and given to the Cathedral by NASA
I enjoyed the gothic architecture, stained-glass windows and myriads of flowers.
The Pilgrim Observation Gallery on the 7th floor.
There was a striking observation gallery on the 7th floor, offering great views of the city.
The Children’s Chapel.
There were several smaller chapels throughout the cathedral.
Resurrection Chapel: the walls were floor to ceiling Mosaics depicting stories of Jesus.
I have noticed the choir section on television, when I’ve watched special events at the cathedral. Although there were no flowers on the choir seats, the dark, rich, carved wooden benches were stunning.
The Great Choir area.
This Cathedral took on much more meaning after seeing it and touring it. I want to think of it as our National Cathedral from now on.
On the High Altar.
A candelabra.
My enjoyment of flowers along with my enjoyment of exploring churches made this a special outing for me.
The Canterbury Pulpit is made from stone from Canterbury and was carved in England in 1929.
I had a hard time choosing which photos to include on this blog post.
Beauty invites you to enter under the arch.
Enjoy.
A baptismal fount.
Up close.
This lovely arrangement was tucked in the corner of a stairwell!
A very sweet piece on a window sill.
*Both quotes taken from the Washington National Cathedral brochure.
Many special memories were created on our recent trip to Santa Barbara. We went to meet our newest granddaughter, born in March. She is beautiful and so very precious. Being with her, and our other two grandchildren, ages 7 & 4, and with our son and daughter-in-love was the best. And we were able to attend grandparents’ day at the two older kid’s school which was a highlight.
We celebrated three generations of birthdays. All three birthdays fell within a week of each other, and within the time we were in California. Grandpa turned 72 on his birthday, and our son had a birthday, as did his daughter, our granddaughter. She turned 7.
We also enjoyed seeing our youngest son who joined us for a few days. We missed his two children and daughter-in-love who stayed back in North Carolina.
We stayed at a European-style villa, about a 9-minute walk to our son’s house. It was a lovely jaunt to begin each morning, and a nice stroll back at the end of the day.
Many flowers were in bloom! I didn’t identify them all with my app, but I did take a lot of pictures. So many interesting kinds and colors…
Succulents were a popular garden plant. I was delighted to see how beautiful they are, with such a variety of shapes and colors.
Of course, an ocean view never gets old. We ate lunch on the harbor a couple of times. It is enchanting…and so picturesque to see all the “boats” docked.
It was fun to see the pelicans fly by, and watch them dive bomb for their dinner. They circle high above the water, then dive straight down, head and beak first, when they spot a tasty morsel.
One afternoon Gary and I descended 200+ steps down Mesa Lane Steps to the beach and walked a mile or so to the next set of steps called One Thousand Steps. On our way up we counted about 150. Apparently the name dates back to a time when there were actually 1,000 small wooden steps.
One can only walk along this section of beach, bordered by sandstone cliffs that jut into the water, during low tide, otherwise water at high tide covers the beach.
Santa Barbara is on a 42-mile stretch of land that faces south on the Pacific Ocean. It is the longest stretch of south-facing coast between Alaska and South America. During a few months, you can see both the sunrise and the sunset in some places.
During our stay, April’s full moon waxed and waned to and from its fullness, shining in all its glory.
The Galleria’s spring flower show, Into The Deep, opened last week.
The clam shell was the center piece.
An annual flower exhibition is created every spring by Bachman’s, and it’s a delight to walk around indoors, and see all the beautiful and colorful representations of the theme, made with flowers.
This year’s theme, Into The Deep, included a great variety of sea floor images…
It’s easy to use your imagination while viewing these wonderful, artistic displays.
Hidden in the flowers are terrariums with tiny “mermaid gardens” inside a clear, acrylic globe. I liked this idea.
The challenge is to find all eight of them among the different scenes. I think mermaids are becoming as popular as fairies.
Clever Jelly Fish
There were also sea creatures: jelly fish, a school of yellow fish, lobster claws, sea horses, octopus limbs, o my…
On a weekday morning, we arrived about 10 am and it was comfortable viewing the displays. An hour later the crowds had begun to grow (no pun intended-ha!).
Then, it was fun to people watch, and see so many enjoying this amazing exposition. But, we could only image it would get busier and busier as the day went on. We left to make room for others.
For me, the flower show builds excitement as I anticipate seeing spring flowers out-of-doors soon.
