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October 8, 2014

Fall Trip to Pittsburgh

Filed under: Creatures,Fall,Parks,Slideshows,Travel — Judy @ 10:13 pm

We had a lovely trip to Pittsburgh last week and it was great to see Kelsey after her summer in Europe. Her boyfriend from Germany was also visiting. In addition to the usual haunts, we took a sidetrip to The National Aviary there. It was a free day and the line to get in was long in the cold breeze, but so many birds!!! Cute little ones, and big ones like the eagles. All colors and sizes. I took lots of pictures and included them in the slideshow.

On one of the days we had an interesting lunch (and tea, of course) at Dobra Tea Room in Squirrel Hill. The tea, of which there were so many choices that it was hard to choose, were served in their traditional vessels from around the world. Hot tea, cold tea, loose leaf tea, and light vegetarian fare all served in a Bohemian-style tearoom.

And naturally, we spent a lot of time playing with the puppies. Walks around the neighborhood and down into Frick Park are always a must when we go to Pittsburgh. Sky is the blue merle and Huxley is the red merle that you will see in the slideshow. Both of them are mini-Australian Shepherds and both are deaf. Such good dogs, sweet and fun to play with. Cooper is the big Golden Retriever. Also a sweetie, he is my sister’s baby. They all love going to Frick Park to play at the Hot Dog Dam.

Slideshow for trip to Pittsburgh Oct 2014

April 2, 2014

Phipps Spring 2014

Filed under: Shows and Tours,Slideshows,Spring — Judy @ 10:14 am

I do love going to the Phipps Conservatory when we go to Pittsburgh! Here is the Spring Show from March 2014 featuring primroses, pansies, and so many beautiful orchids. Enjoy!

Phipps Spring 2014

April 6, 2013

Garden Artisans Expo

Filed under: Shows and Tours,Slideshows — Judy @ 11:41 pm

With the usual venue for GardenScape under renovation, some of the landscape designers in Rochester took a different approach and developed their own show called Garden Artisans of Rochester Expo running from March 14-17 this year. All in all, it was a much smaller show and lower key than GardenScape. There were 8 non-juried garden displays with much of the plant material supplied by Oriental Garden Supply. These displays were mostly not as extensive as the ones you might have seen at GardenScape in past years, but the few bigger ones did not lack in creativity or excellence of display. We visited on Friday and there weren’t many people there. Hopefully, more came on the weekend, but I didn’t think the show was very well advertised or promoted. Quite a few seminars and talks were scheduled, but we missed catching any of them. The number of vendors was low, and for the most part uninteresting.

The light at the venue made it difficult to capture many of the beautiful garden vignettes, but hopefully you can enjoy the gist of it in this slideshow.

Garden Artisans slideshow

 

The Expo participants worked hard to try to make this a good show, but the people (person?) behind the scenes didn’t carry through on what needed to be done. Too bad, because we Rochesterians crave us some flowers and gardens in March!

January 2, 2013

Winter Show 2012 at the Phipps

Filed under: Shows and Tours,Slideshows,Winter — Judy @ 2:10 pm

We visited the Winter Show at the Phipps at night this year. What an incredibly beautiful display! All the twinkling lights, the gorgeous poinsettias and other flowers, and everything tucked in and around their usual wonderful plantings.

The entrance area in the Palm Court had an elaborate Victorian-style hearth that was homey and welcoming. Big balls of mistletoe and holly hung from the ceiling there. In the Serpentine Room, a seasonal display of doors with wreaths elaborately decorated in various styles by the staff horticulturists was delightful and the gaudy, glitzy, glittery poinsettias of past years were replaced by a wonderful introduction to the so many beautiful poinsettia varieties we would find throughout the Conservatory.

New this year was the Winter Light Garden located outside in their Perennial Gardens area. Regretfully, we had checked our coats before touring the Phipps and the night was very cold so we didn’t venture very far into that garden. We could see the glowing orbs, the “dripping” icicles on the fabulously lighted trees, and a brilliant fountain of twinkling lights from where we stood for a few minutes. Of note, in keeping with the Phipps’ commitment to environmental sustainability, all of the lights throughout the displays were LED-energy efficient lights.

The 1893 World’s Fair-themed Garden Railroad was decorated for Christmas and operating to the delight of the many children visiting. The Sunken Garden was filled with poinsettias and the overwhelming scent of paperwhite narcissi. The elegant Parterre de Broderie, which apparently is a popular place for intimate weddings, would have made a gorgeous setting with its soft rose-colored poinsettias and twinkling lights for a winter event. The Victoria Room featured a traditional fir tree beautifully decorated with thousands of lights and ribbons and ornaments that reflected in the surrounding water. And finally, the seasonal display in the East Room was a cheerful woodland where bears dressed in shaggy bark cavorted among the white poinsettias and red cardinals appear to flit around a yellow moon with Santa’s silhouette.

We enjoyed this year’s show immensely and hope you will also enjoy this slideshow of photos Kelsey and I took while there. Note that it is a large file so please be patient as it may be slow to load up.

Phipps Winter 2012 Slideshow

 

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