Family Outing: Desert Botanical Garden

As a family, we love to go on adventures and find new and interesting things to do.  We love the outdoors and nature and we are always on the lookout for a new place to explore. It's especially important I think, because we live in the city.  Summer is way too hot to be outdoors adventuring in the desert, so we like to travel during the most dreadfully toasty months.  When it finally starts to cool down a bit, we can finally start enjoying our local outdoor floral and fauna.  Waaay back in October (the pregnancy and newborn thing have put me behind), when it was still quite warm but manageable, we headed to the Butterfly Exhibit at the Desert Botanical Garden.  And it was fabulous.  The kids loved watching the butterflies and stood patiently to see if one landed on them.  Miss B was the only lucky one, but Q was so determined and stood as still as I've seen him in a long time.  I of course couldn't stop taking photos of the beautiful butterflies.

And as per usual, there were plenty of complaints about the heat or boredom (at least one of them is bound to be bored or hungry or tired), but my hubby and I are determined to take them on outings and give them experiences and opportunities for learning and growing.  Someday they will thank me.  I am certain.  And they usually like it in the end anyway.  :)

We also walked around the gardens and learned how native people lived and survived in the desert and we took a lot of breaks in the shade.

Can you spot the chipmunk climbing in the cactus?  We were mesmerized and couldn't believe he could climb through the spines and thorns with ease.  He (I don't know why I'm assuming it was a he), was quick as well!