Weekend Outings
Monday, April 30th, 2012From Monday Mom – Neetika:
Now that spring has sprung and Haley is an active toddler, we’re looking to introduce her to new activities and experiences. I find myself listening closely to the local radio station and scouring the Internet to find things to do as a family. I have lived in this area for a really long time, but there are so many attractions I’ve largely ignored until now. Through Haley, I’m beginning to appreciate all of the fun stuff that’s available to our community!
A few weeks ago, we went to an historic mansion just a few miles away. When I heard it opened up for the season, the only thing I could remember about the place was seeing its photo in a calendar. My husband and I looked it up online and found that in addition to the house tour, the grounds of the mansion include a pond and gardens. They also have activities for kids. When we drove up to the place (which had one of those old-fashioned driveways that fits a horse and buggy and that’s about it!), we were stunned by how many cars we saw. It turned out to be people attending a morning yoga class on the meadow- there had to be at least 150 people there! Who knew?
Once we made it up to the home we saw that there weren’t nearly as many people there. Most of the guests were young families as well. Haley was being her fidgety self, so we opted to explore the house on our own rather than subject the other visitors to her fussiness on a tour. The house was grand and interesting. We knew of the family name because they contributed part of their fortune to the university where my husband went to graduate school. It was nice to learn some more about them. Haley didn’t really appreciate the history lesson, but that’s okay.
We then went out to the gardens. On the pond, we saw some ducks. This is very exciting because “duck” or “du!” is one of three words Haley can say, so she pretty much freaked out and wanted to grab them. We also brought a soccer ball that she loved kicking around. We ended the day with a packed picnic lunch. It was a really lovely day.
My husband and I were recently talking about the number of weekends we have with Haley before she’s all grown up. There are disturbingly few. And over 50 of them are already gone! Hopefully, we will continue to try to make the most of all of them.