I had to get a new job finally, and so I wasn't doing much on my computer besides that. Then once I got a new job, I was coming home tired. Getting used to working outside my house again took me a while.
I am going to make up posts in chronological order. This one is from back in January. It was actually like 50 degrees that day. The Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden is north of the city. It was free in January, since not much was blooming. So we had a really nice walk.
The garden was originally the grounds to a families mansion, it went through many iterations and fell into a little disrepair. It has been kept up and expanded for many years now, and has become one of the best botanical gardens in the U.S.
Before going into the conservatory we walked around some of the other gardens. They have a cute, small medicinal herb garden. The properties of many plants are what developed into modern medicine. 
The conservatory had lots of ferns and leafy plants. They also had a nice orchid collection that was blooming.
Cute little mini cottage, you could peak in the windows.
They had a little Japanese garden as well. It was okay, but of course Tanner has seen the real thing. It made us miss home a little. They have a building that looks a lot like the Shoreline Community College campus, that serves as a cafe and tea house, that looks over the Japanese garden. It was closed in the winter, but made me home sick.
They had a really nice collection of carnivorous plants. These pitcher plants are local to Virginia and are endangered in the wild. Tanner was really into the carnivorous plants of course.
They have a HUGE kids area. It was amazing, giant tree house, little play houses, a garden, instruments, logs to play on, wind chimes. There were a lot of families and children there when we were. There was a little girl with bangs whose voice sounded a lot like Olivia, even though she was Latina. It made me SO homesick! There are so many things that are more fun if we can bring Olivia and Owen.
I really like this area, they are still developing it. It will be a collection of dwarf conifers around the bottom of the lake.
There is a meadow of grasses and wild flowers that aren't blooming yet.
LUNCH! After the Botanical Garden we stopped for lunch at a place by our house, we even had a Groupon, so yay for cheap dates. It is called Cultured Swine. They focus on fusion sandwiches and tamales. It is a mix of Caribbean, Mexican and American flavors and dishes.
Sorry for the upset lady in the picture. It has a cute local beer menu and we didn't know they have a Happy Hour. It is only a few blocks from our house.
As you can see it is tiny
They have a collection of hot sauces
This was a Caribbean flavored one, they make it themselves, we loved it
Sideways photo? I got baked Mac and Cheese and Potato Salad.
Tanner got a pulled pork sandwich. It was really delicious. They have a smoker out back, and smoke their own pork. We even walked around the alley so we could peek at the smoker.
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