Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park

 If you ever get a chance to go to the Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park in Grand Rapids, Michigan, be sure to go.  The gardens are beautiful, the sculptures are impressive.   Look what they did with their pumpkins!

 Hidden among the sweet potato vines. . .

 . . . and pumpkins as mulch!

A few of the sculptures:

 

Beautiful bears enjoying the fall flower beds 

of coleus, flax, zinnias, sweet potato vine, and mums. 

This guy is HuGe--he'd make Goliath at The Farm look small!

Mad Mom--even tho she's unhappy, she makes you smile :)

And a few things reminiscent of The Farm!

A Farm Gal Goes to Denver

What does a Farm gal do when she visits Denver?  She goes to the Botanic Gardens, of course!  I was surprised to find beautiful lilacs there.  I guess I thought it would be all cacti all the time.  Wrong--loved this beautiful border of lilac shrubs where you can go from one plant to the next, sampling the colors and smells of each named variety. 

The Japanese Garden was beautiful too.  Pond + rocks + shrubs + trees = fabulous garden, even without any blooms!

I love going to other gardens to get inspiration, don't you?  This little sweet combo makes me wonder if hens & chicks would mix with tulips in our midwest gardens. . .

Did I say beautiful?  I think I did.  Lots of sandy, hyper-tufa type containers in this garden, as you can see here in the foreground. 

These submerged pots were cool too.  On a gentle slope, I wonder if they will fill them with plants or enjoy them just like they are.

One of the many grass gardens. 

The DBG is exhibiting Roots--a series of bronze sculptures from Allan Houser now through November.

Hope you've enjoyed this little peak into Denver Botanic Gardens.  And we hear that the Missouri Botanical Garden is featuring an exhibit on trees this summer--complete with  treehouses!  There's another road trip to take :)