The final days of summer are upon us, so we’re trying our best to cram in as much as we possibly can before the start of school. I have to say that I have a heavy heart that the school year is starting. As busy as my days are, I love having my kids at home during the summer and taking chunks of time out of my day to explore with them, watch them grow and learn, and have little family outdoor adventures.
This summer we spent time in the Bahamas (one of our all-time favorite places), went snorkeling in the Florida Keys, swam in the pool (almost every evening), went on scavenger hunts at the beach (some great finds; some not worth mentioning!), and just enjoyed being together as a family. My husband has his “alone time” salmon fishing in Alaska and, to re-charge my soul (which I highly recommend for all moms) I went on a solo vacation to Puerto Rico. (that’s a blog post in and of itself!)
One of our final summer adventures was a trip down to the Redlands to visit the Fruit and Spice Park. If you’re not familiar with Florida, the Redlands is an agricultural community in South Florida located about 20 miles southwest of Miami. Many tropical fruit crops are grown in the Redland that cannot be grown commercially elsewhere in the US except South Florida, such as mango, avocado, guava, passion fruit, lychee nut, jack fruit, to name a few. All of these can be seen and sampled for free at the Fruit and Spice Park, a local attraction.
While touring the park, we were allowed to taste some of the ripe fruit that had fallen to the ground. AMAZING! Of course, thoughts of JOON ran through my mind. Some of the fruits were so fragrant and the colors so vibrant that I couldn’t help but take a few notes on incorporating some of these fragrances into our products and learning about the potential health benefits of the fruits. Inspiration comes from many places and there’s lots of it right in my proverbial back yard.
I have to say that my son didn’t necessarily enjoy the tour around the park as much as my husband and I did. He seemed a bit bored sitting on the tram listening to the guide. He’s only 5, so I can’t blame him. ”Mom, this is for grown ups,” I heard repeatedly. Well, maybe so, but no reason why he can’t be exposed to such things, right?
The following weekend, I had an itch to visit Fairchild Tropical Gardens in Coral Gables. I used to live in Miami and would often visit Fairchild. Forty acres of beautiful gardens to meander through for hours. And, when you’re tired of walking around, just have a seat on a bench by a lake and take in all of the natural beauty. What could be more beautiful than being so closely connected to nature? I was very aware of Andros’s experience at the Fruit and Spice Park, so I was initially a bit reluctant taking him to Fairchild, but, still, we loaded the entire family (baby included on this trip) into the car and headed down south. This time, we skipped the guided tram tour and just walked. To my surprise, my son LOVED it. He picked up a map and decided to guide us through the gardens. First on his list, the arboretum (which he called the ‘abortoreum’). It poured on us while we were there, but we didn’t mind. Just more puddles for Andros to splash through! We all had a blast.
As we were leaving, I wondered why it had taken me so long to come up with the idea of visiting the Fruit and Spice Park and Fairchild. Such rare and beautiful oases nestled so close to the urbanity of our daily lives. I suppose that oftentimes, we (as in all of you and myself included) either tend to think of activities (rather than experiences) that are very close to home, as in within 10 – 20 minute driving distance because we simply have too much on our to do list to waste any more time in the car than necessary. And, I believe that we also tend to think of experiences as vacations – trips to far away places, getting on planes, going on long car trips, overnighting in hotels. I am guilty of that. With just a little forethought and planning, we could have visited both of these places many times during the summer and taken away something unique and different from each experience. Rather, it was much easier for me to go for a bike ride or across the street to the beach or pull out my membership card to the Discovery Center (which, over the past 2 years, have visited probably 100 times!). We definitely had amazing times together at all of the places that we visited this summer, but next time I’ll remember that it’s not that hard to put in just a little more effort to have enriching experiences, both for me and my children. Vacation will always be vacation – I’ll never forsake our trips to the Bahamas or anywhere else for that matter (Italy is next on the list!). But now, I am going to do a better job of discovering all that is around me – for the sake of learning, exploring, experiencing and connecting. It’s important for me to continue to grow and even more important for my children to continue to expand their world and their place in it.
