Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens - Fort Bragg, CA

The four of us ready to explore the botanical gardens

Beautiful Rhododendrons and spring flowers in bloom

Gorgeous views of the Mendocino Botanical Gardens

The beautiful gardens and wildlife

The girls enjoyed the day with nana and papa

Elise playing hide-and-seek in the gardens

Momma by the pink Rhododendrons

Beautiful May flowers in bloom

Alina did some exploring of her own

Daddy with his sweet girls

 

 

On our first day in Fort Bragg, we took advantage of the beautiful weather and headed straight for the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens. The best part about the Mendocino Botanical Gardens is that they are situated right on the Northern California coast with stunning ocean views. May is also the perfect time to see all the gorgeous multi-colored Rhododendrons in bloom. The ocean overlook trails had the most incredible views and were only a short hike from the gardens. We also had the good fortune of arriving on a weekend where the botanical garden was hosting a Mad Hatter's tea party. It was all things Alice in Wonderland with free treats and games for the kids. This is, without a doubt, one of the most beautiful botanical gardens we have seen and a must for anyone visiting Fort Bragg. We all had the most enjoyable and relaxing day. I definitely plan to take the girls back here when they get older.

 

 

The Mad Hatter / Alice in Wonderland Tea Party

The giant chess board

The girls had fun exploring at the party

Cruising the path on a mission to find the ocean

A stop by the Gnome Depot and Adventure Trail

The lovely vegetable and herb garden

The girls discovered this very cool dragon sculpture

On the trail toward the sea

Beautiful view from the cliff side overlook

Sit...pause awhile embraced by gardens, surf & open sea

Beautiful ocean views at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens

 

Glass Beach & Museum plus the Skunk Train - Fort Bragg, California

The scenic views on the hike down to Glass Beach

Gorgeous Glass Beach in Fort Bragg, CA

The girls loved discovering all the colorful pieces of glass

Elise sought after the emerald green glass

We easily could have spent all day at this unique beach

A trip to The Glass Museum

Glass, pottery shards, electrical insulators and much more

Glass Museum detailing the origins of the sea glass

Daddy and the girls ready for our first train ride!

Stunning views from the open air train car

Enjoying the Skunk Train in Fort Bragg

Beautiful day for a train ride

Elise at the train station after a fun Skunk adventure

BerryFest Roseville - Celebrating Mother's Day 2013

 

Celebrating Mother's Day weekend at BerryFest in Roseville

Plenty of strawberries, locally grown vegetables and fun

The girls with their new parasols; it was one HOT day!

Daddy and baby girl make one sweet duo

Papa braved the big slide for a bit of fun

 

The girls at the petting zoo

 

John, Christy and cute Baby Audrey joined us for the day
 

Family time is the best possible Mother's Day gift
Happy Mother's Day 2013!

First Big Vacation of the New Year

Gorgeous views of MacKerricher State Park - Fort Bragg

All of us on the trail toward Point Cabrillo Light House

Beautiful plants & flowers at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens

We just spent an extended weekend visiting the gorgeous Mendocino Coast and Fort Bragg, CA. It was a much needed escape, as we have spent the past four months relatively housebound fighting off virus after virus. I swore that I was going to have to call the CDC in to come decontaminate our house; it was that bad. Since both the girls are in preschool, they pretty much brought home new super viruses the entire cold and full season. Mom caught them, dad caught them, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins; nobody was immune and this was a tough flu season. I'm feeling on top of the world that we survived and that we were all collectively healthy enough to take a weekend getaway. The girls did pretty well on the long drive, though poor little Alina got car sick during the windy roads on the drive up. Nana and papa joined us on the trip and it was fun to get to share the weekend with them. As nice as it is getting a short vacation, wrangling two kids under three can be exhausting, especially when they are bouncing off the floor, beds and walls in the hotel room and fighting going to sleep (ahhh, insanity haha), that's when nana and papa came to the rescue and we all enjoyed wine on the balcony. Here are just a few photos from the trip. More to come soon.

Glass Beach in Fort Bragg

Irises and Gunnera Manicata (aka. Dinosaur Plant)

Taking a dip after a fun day of exploring