Today's adventures

 Today we went to the REC center where my dad took us on a tour.  He was quite popular and was greeted by many of the people working out or wandering around.  Upstairs they have lots of exercise equipment and a room for classes including kickboxing.  My son had to try out the punching bags.  I don't think he realized how firm these bags are.  A couple of punches and kicks and he was done!

 We peeked in on the construction of the new pool area.  They are adding a giant slide that will go out of the building and wind around back into the pool.  There is a big ladder inside for you to climb up.

 This is the lazy river area where you will float down a switchback from one end to the other.  My dad wasn't sure how you got back to the start.  It won't be so fun to have to get out and have to walk back to the beginning to start the trip over again, but maybe that's how you get your exercise.  Or, maybe you have to swim upstream.

 There was a section for swim lessons for kids and lap lanes and even water aerobics.  My mom goes to those while my dad does his exercises and can watch from the many windows in the upstairs exercise area.  He says the little old ladies keep an eye on him and give him a hard time for not walking fast enough.  They've tried to encourage him to join in on the aerobics, but he has no desire to get in the pool with them.

 It's a really big pool and this is separate from the newer pool they are adding.  I like the ramp into the pool that a wheelchair can go down.  That would be great for aqua therapy.

 They even had this really big area for the parents of the swimming kids to sit and watch or sit and text as most of the parents were doing.  You can see at least three of the 5 parents on their phones here.

 Then we were off to the local plant nursery after our tour.  Had to get a flower fix.  Not that I am not getting enough from the flowers at my dad's house, but we saw these pink and green petunias at a local restaurant and figured the only place that would have them was the nursery.

 If you are looking for an orchid and the ones at the grocery store just don't cut it, this nursery has them in every shape and color.  Of course, you will pay a pretty penny for them.  WalMart sells them for $10 and these were in the $30-$100 range, but if you could afford them, they were oh, so pretty.

 My mom has grown orchids for about as long as I can remember and has had almost every kind I've ever seen, including all of these.  I used to know the names of them.  I love the more exotic ones like these that you can't find at WalMart, but of course, can't take them back to California and on a teacher salary can't afford $100 for an orchid anyways.  But, I do love to look at them and admire God's handiwork and man's ability to manipulate DNA to make so many more varieties.

 These remind me of old men with big beards.

 One thing I love about orchids is they bloom for so long.  I've had some that were in bloom for 6 months.  You surely do get your money's worth out of them.  Not like cut flowers where they last a week if you are lucky.

 Whoever puts the displays of flowers together sure does have an eye for color.  They had baskets and pots of mixtures of flowers everywhere and each one was beautiful.  Lots of different arrangements of blooms.  Some flowers I had never seen before and it sure made me want to go home and plant up a couple for my yard.  but of course in California where we are in a drought, I'm not sure I'd be able to keep something like this alive.  It's raining here almost every day and even though the temperatures get pretty hot during the day, the cool off nicely at night.

 We even checked out the vegetable plants.  One thing about California that has Colorado beat is the long growing season.  We do not get snow, so can grow vegetables almost year round and can certainly start our vegetables earlier.  Although I tried to grow tomatoes this year and planted seeds, the ground squirrels or rats came along and ate the tops off the plans after they were about  3 inches tall so I won't be getting anything from the garden this season.  Oh, well, there's always the farmer's markets to get fresh, homegrown tomatoes.

They even had this beautiful butterfly tree.  Now I want to decorate my house with butterflies.  Maybe not the real ones, but just look how beautiful the colors are.  Too bad I don't have this much room in my house.  Time to get rid of some of the junk I've been keeping and surround myself with beautiful things!