Living Our Dream

Kingwood Gardens

Berlin, OH - Events of Friday, July 27, 2018

As most of our regular readers know, we love gardens. Kingwood Center Gardens are a little over an hour away in Mansfield, Ohio. Kingwood doesn't have a huge garden, but the plantings are usually well done with pleasing color combinations and nicely contrasting textures so we have gone to Kingwood every year for the past several years. Even though this year's stay in Amish Country was much shorter than in the recent past, we made it a priority to squeeze in a visit to Kingwood on Friday.

Kingwood is a 47-acre estate built in 1926 for Charles King. King was President and Chairman of the Board of the Ohio Brass Company, which made electrical fittings for railroads and trolleys. King was married and divorced twice, and he never had children. Therefore, he left most of his estate to a trust that still operates Kingwood Center today as a public garden. Admission is $5 per person.

We started our garden tour by stopping to admire the view across the duck pond toward the buildings that were once the stable and carriage house. The former stable now houses, among other things, the rest rooms where we headed next.

Duck pond with former stable and carriage house

One of our favorite areas is the Terrace Garden. In Mr. King's time, there was a tennis court, a vegetable garden, an orchard, and a cutting garden in this area. The foundation that Mr. King established funded the transition to the purely decorative Terrace Garden in the 1990s.

View up to the Terrace Garden

Each level of the Terrace Garden has different color schemes, which is one reason we like this area. The next photo shows the blue and white colors of one of the levels called the Sunken Garden.

Sunken Garden

Another level had predominantly red colors...

Another level with predominantly red colors

...and yet another level had pink and chartreuse.

Yet another level with pink and chartreuse

Kingwood frequently has a traveling display of art in the garden. This year, there was an exhibit called "Invasion of the Big Bugs," which featured larger-than-life insects sculpted from sticks and twigs by artist David Rogers. Shown below is a damselfly that was in the Terrace Garden.

Damselfly sculpture in the Terrace Garden

On stone pillars at the end of the steps in the background of the damselfly photo above were container plantings of succulents that we found particularly interesting. We liked the variety of colors and textures of the succulents.

Container planting of succulents

Speaking of container plantings, Kingwood always has a nice variety of them. The next photo shows two of the many we saw.

Two of the many container plantings we saw

The upper terrace was once the swimming pool. It has been filled in and the gardens that once surrounded the pool now cover the entire area.

Margery and Paul with the swimming pool garden in the background

Formal Garden adjacent to the former swimming pool

In the area above the upper terrace was another "Big Bug" sculpture consisting of three giant ants. Since Paul is chairman of the Landscape Committee at the Co-op in Florida, he has taken on a project to experiment with different methods to control fire ants. Therefore, he felt compelled to try to fight off these ants as well.

Paul pretending to fight off one of the ants

From the upper terrace, we headed back down through the daylily garden. Last year, we went to Kingwood in August when the daylilies were done blooming. In fact, many of the other flowers were also past their prime so we made a mental note if we came back to do so no later than July. Fortunately for us, the timing of our trip north this year made it possible for us to do that. The dayllies were waning slightly since it was late in the month, but there were still plenty of them to admire.

A few of the many daylilies that were blooming

From the daylily garden, we crossed over to the other side of the terraces and walked down the path toward the parking lot through the perennial garden.

Path through the perennial garden

Before we got to the parking lot, we made a slight detour through the rose garden (the roses were done blooming for the most part) to the Gazebo Garden. We always like the Gazebo Garden because it is picturesque and usually has a nice display of annuals. The flowers this year weren't as spectacular as they were last year, but they were still very attractive.

Gazebo Garden

On our way out, we passed a gorgeous display of echinacea (coneflowers) with a few yellow rudbeckias (black-eyed susans, also sometimes called coneflowers) thrown in for contrast.

Coneflowers

We had a nice visit to Kingwood. July definitely seems to be a better time to go than August because not only are the daylilies and many of the other perennials still in bloom, but fewer of the annuals have started to decline because of the heat. The photo below shows just a few of the many beautiful flowers we saw.

A few of the many flowers we saw at Kingwood

When we go to Kingwood Gardens, we always stop at Athens Greek Restaurant. They have two locations, both of which are only a few minutes away. We have eaten at both locations, but we prefer the one located in Ontario, Ohio, to the one located in downtown Mansfield.

Athens Greek Restaurant

We both like gyros. Athens has both a traditional gyro, which Margery prefers, and an open plate version, which Paul likes. The open plate version has the meat, onions, tzatziki sauce, tomato and a quartered pita served on a plate. It is a lot less messy to eat.

Margery with her gyro

With our bellies full, we headed back to the loft for an evening of TV. Our time in Amish Country was winding down, but we had a few more things we wanted to do. Stay tuned.

Catching up on a Couple of Previous Trips to Pittsburgh and a Visit to Kingwood Gardens

Berlin, OH - Events of Thursday, August 3; Tuesday, August 15; and Friday, August 18, 2015

Over the past few weeks, we made a couple of trips to Pittsburgh to visit with Lora, J. Michael, and Lydia. There were some cute photos that didn't get downloaded from our phones in time to make it into the blog previously, so we thought we would include two of them here. The first one was from the trip we made in early August to Idlewild Park. On the day before we went to the park, Margery spent some time reading to Lydia. In the past, Lydia was much more interested in just turning the pages rather than listening. However, she now seems to take much more of an active interest in the story.

Grammy reading to Lydia

Last Tuesday, we drove to Pittsburgh for dental checkups. Beforehand, we dropped Freeway off at Lora and J. Michael's house, and afterward we stopped to pick him up and to visit. It was a beautiful afternoon, so we went outside to play with Lydia. Lydia's playhouse has a simulated grill on one side. In the photo below, she has grilled Poppy a hot dog (plastic), which he pretends to eat much to Lydia's delight.

Paul pretending to eat a plastic hot dog Lydia has grilled for him

That brings us to our visit to Kingwood Center Gardens. We first went to Kingwood two years ago. We liked it so much we went back last year and again last Friday.

Kingwood is a 47-acre estate located in Mansfield, Ohio, which is a little over an hour to the west of Berln. Kingwood was built in 1926 for Charles King, who was President and Chairman of the Board of the Ohio Brass Company that made electrical fittings for railroads and trolleys. King was married and divorced twice. He never had children so he left most of his estate to a trust that still operates Kingwood Center today as a public garden.

Admission is normally $5 per car, but when we were there last Friday, there was a special exhibit of whimsical frog sculptures going on during which admission was $5 per person. However, we got free admission through the annual membership that we got last spring in the Edison-Ford Estates in Florida. One of the reasons we got the Edison-Ford membership was the reciprocal agreement they have with many other gardens across the country.

We started our tour with a brief look around the conservatory. It has two rooms - one with desert plants and one with tropicals. However, we were more interested in the outdoor gardens so we didn't stay in the conservatory long.

Next to the conservatory are the rose garden, the peony garden, and the gazebo garden. There were only a few roses that were still blooming, but the rose garden had several beds of annuals to provide added color.

Annuals in the rose garden with some of the few remaining roses

The roses were fading, and the peonies were long gone; but the annuals in the gazebo garden were still going strong.

Gazebo garden

From the gazebo garden, we headed to the terrace gardens where there are 4 or 5 levels each with a slightly different color scheme.

First terrace

Walkway around the perimeter of the second terrace

Sunken garden terrace

Upper terrace used to be the swimming pool 

Colorful area adjacent to the upper terrace

From the top terrace we followed the path to the upper end of the daylily garden.

Walkway heading to the daylily garden

Daylilies bloom primarily in July, so there were only a couple of them still blooming since it was early August. In fact, there were so few of them we didn't even bother walking through the daylily garden at all, but headed directly to the mansion instead.

The mansion houses an extensive botanical library and also the offices of the foundation that operates Kingwood. However, the main floor is set up in much the same way as it was in Mr. King's time with much of his original furniture. Guided tours are available at specific times on weekends for $3, or you can do a free, self-guided tour any time during regular hours. We did a self-guided tour when we visited back in 2015 so we skipped seeing the inside this time. However, we did enjoy the container plantings by the front door as we passed by on our way to see the terraces that extend out from in front of the house.

Container plantings by the front door of the mansion

Looking down onto the terraces and lawn in front of the house

View of the terrace in front of the mansion

We enjoyed our visit to Kingwood, although we didn't think the color combinations of the plantings were as attractive or as striking as they were in previous years. There were two reasons for that. First and foremost, this year's visit was later than in previous years and many of the flowers had started to fade and others, like the daylilies, were done blooming altogether. The second reason the colors weren't as striking is Kingwood seemed to utilize many more plants with purple leaves in their garden design in several of the areas this year. While dark-colored leaves can provide a nice accent to brightly colored flowers, we didn't think they showed up well as a major component of the design.

Even though some of the flowers at Kingwood had started to fade, there were still plenty of beauty to see. The photos below show just a few of the many flowers we saw.

Some of the flowers at Kingwood

More flowers at Kingwood

From Kingwood, we drove to the Athens Greek Restaurant. Athens has three locations in and around Mansfield. We ate at the one in downtown Mansfield last year because we wanted to check out a couple of other things in the downtown area. However, we prefer the one that is only about two miles from Kingwood in Ontario, Ohio, where we ate the previous year so that's where we headed this time.

Athens Greek Restaurant

We both had lamb/beef gyro plates for $6.79, and we split an order of fries ($1.19 when added to one of the gyro plates). Paul liked the gyro plate, which is a deconstructed gyro with the meat, sliced tomato, sliced onion, tzatziki sauce, and a quartered pita served on a plate because it isn't as messy to eat. Although Margery decided she prefers a regular gyro served with all the ingredients wrapped up in the pita, we still both enjoyed our meals.

Margery with her gyro plate

With our bellies full, we headed back to Scenic Hills where we spent the rest of the afternoon and evening relaxing.

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Stan Hywet Gardens

Berlin, OH - Events of Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens (pronounced HEE-wet) is located in Akron, Ohio, about an hour from where we are staying in Berlin. It is the former estate of Frank Seiberling who, along with his brother, founded the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. back in 1898. The estate was built between 1912 and 1915. Seiberling and his wife, Gertrude, named the estate Stan Hywet, which is an Old English term meaning stone quarry. They gave it that name because there was an abandoned stone quarry on the property.

We first went to Stan Hywet two years ago. We decided to go back last Wednesday for several reasons. First, we like gardens. Second, we got free admission to the gardens through our membership to the Edison and Ford Estates in Florida. The third reason we went back to Stan Hywet was because there was a Mexican restaurant nearby we wanted to try.

Our GPS always wants to take us northeast to Akron and Canton by way of SR62 through the towns of Wilmot and Navarre. We prefer to take the slightly longer route following CR77 and SR241 that goes through Mount Hope and Mount Eaton because it is more scenic. This time we also decided to take a slight additional detour and go through the town of Dalton so we could stop at the P. Graham Dunn factory and gift shop located there. P. Graham Dunn manufactures inspirational plaques, pictures, and decorative items. There is a 165,000 square foot manufacturing facility and a 20,000 square foot gift shop. Dunn has stores in several other locations, plus they also sell through thousands of other outlets like Hallmark Stores, Cracker Barrel, and numerous independent gift shops and Christian book stores.

Entrance to P. Graham Dunn

The gift shop stocks over 30,000 items including not only finished products, but also unfinished wood blocks, panels and plaques for do-it-yourself crafters. The gift shop is on the second floor and when we got to the top of the stairs, our first impression was that the store goes on forever. You can see how far away the fellow in the red shirt looks in the next photo, and he is about half way from the back. There are two more large rooms behind him.

Gift shop

Margery checking out some of the items in the gift shop

The gift shop has windows on both sides so visitors can look down to the manufacturing floor below. In the next photo, the ladies are unloading and boxing wood plaques after the plaques have come out of one of several machines that apply finish. Some plaques are laser engraved, some are silk-screen printed, and some are carved by CNC routers.

Part of the manufacturing floor at P. Graham Dunn

We spent more time at P. Graham Dunn than we thought we would, but we eventually were on our way again to Stan Hywet. In addition to free admission to the gardens, our Edison Ford membership would have also gotten us a half-price guided tour of Stan Hywet Hall, which is the 65-room, 65,000 sq. ft mansion built by the Seiberlings. We figured the house hadn't changed much since we toured it two years ago so we skipped seeing the inside of the house this time. If you would like to read about our tour of the house from our previous visit and to see photos of the inside, click here.

Stan Hywet Hall

We started our garden tour to the left of the house where the English Garden is located.

English Garden

From there, we continued around to the back of the house. Below are just a few of the beautiful plantings and garden areas we saw.

Interesting combination of textures

Container planting with a complimentary color scheme

Japanese garden

Courtyard

Attractive container plants flank a bench in another courtyard

The 3-acre Great Garden is located on the northern side of the house. In addition to being an attractive addition to the landscape, it is also used as a cutting garden for flower arrangements inside the mansion.

View in the Great Garden

A lone sunflower overlooks a bed of purple cone flowers

Another view in the Great Garden

Adjacent to the Great Garden is the Playgarden. It has a number of things of interest to children like a giant bubble machine and a castle with a climbing wall and a slide. One of Paul's favorites in the Playgarden is an old truck surrounded by flowers.

Old truck in the Playgarden

Also adjacent to the Great Garden is the conservatory. It is a replica of the original Gothic-style conservatory that was built by the Seiberlings back in the day.

Conservatory

Waterfall inside the conservatory with a pink-flowering mimosa tree

Next to the conservatory is the butterfly habitat. Not only are there butterflies...

Monarch butterfly in the butterfly habitat

...but they also have caterpillars. They remove eggs and caterpillars periodically and take them to another location to allow them to feed because the caterpillars have voracious appetites and they can wreak havoc on the limited plantings in the butterfly habitat. After the caterpillars pupate (form cocoons), the cocoons are brought back to the habitat so the butterflies can eventually emerge. The butterflies mate, lay eggs, and the cycle continues over the summer. It takes about a month to go from egg to butterfly.

Monarch caterpillar

After our tour of the garden, we headed to the Mexican restaurant as planned for lupper. The restaurant, called El Meson, is located in a little strip mall in Cuyahoga Falls about 10 minutes from Stan Hywet.

El Meson

El Meson has lunches for around $5 to $7 and dinners for about $6 to $14. We were both pretty hungry so we both had dinners. Margery had a chicken chimichanga, and Paul had a shredded pork burrito.

Paul with his burrito

Although the restaurant got excellent online reviews, we thought the food was okay, but not great. The chips, while very crisp, were kind of thick. We like thin corn chips. Margery's chimi was nice and crisp, but the chicken didn't have a lot of flavor. They served the guacamole salad on top of Paul's burrito, so the lettuce wilted in no time. Not only that, but the burrito had all the beans on one end and all the rice on the other rather than an even distribution throughout.

After lupper we headed back to the RV with a stop at the Walmart in Massillon to pick up a few items. The Walmart we normally go to in Millersburg is a relatively small one. There are a number of things we like they don't carry plus they were out of several items we were looking for the last time we were there. Back at the 5th wheel we relaxed for the rest of the evening.

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Franklin Park Conservatory

Berlin, OH - Events of Wednesday, June 28, 2017

After visiting two garden centers in Berlin on Monday, we kept the garden theme going by taking a day trip to Columbus to visit the Franklin Park Conservatory. Columbus is about a two-hour drive from Berlin. We arrived around 11:40 a.m.

Entrance to Franklin Park Conservatory

Topiary flamingos covered with pink begonias at the entrance

Admission to the conservatory is $14 for adults ($11 for seniors over 60). However, we purchased an annual membership to the Edison and Ford Winter Estates in Sarasota, Florida, when we were there this past April and since Franklin Park Conservatory participates in a reciprocal agreement with Edison Ford through the American Horticultural Society, our admission to the conservatory was free.

The Franklin County Agricultural Society purchased 88 acres of land on the east side of Columbus for the Franklin County Fair in 1852. In 1874, additional land was acquired bringing the total to 93 acres, and it became the site of the Ohio State Fair. When the fair was moved to a new location north of Columbus in 1884, the land was turned into a park in 1886.

The Chicago World's Fair and Colombian Exposition in 1893 inspired Columbus to build a Victorian-style conservatory modeled after the exposition's Glass Palace in the park that was once the site of the Franklin County and the Ohio State Fairs. The Franklin Park Conservatory opened in 1895.

The Franklin Park Conservatory reminded us a lot of Phipps Conservatory in our old home town of Pittsburgh. They were both built around the same time and in the same Victorian style.

When researching Franklin Park Conservatory on TripAdvisor, several people that wrote reviews mentioned they thought signage was lacking. We also found that to be true. It started in the parking lot where they need some signs indicating where the entrance to the conservatory is located. Because there is a large clump of trees between the parking lot and the conservatory, you can't see the entrance. Not only don't you know where the best place to park is, you don't know which direction to walk after you do park. After mistakenly heading down a side road to what ended up being a separate parking lot for what appeared to be a conference center, we finally stumbled on the entrance to the conservatory. From there, we were then able to find a parking spot where our big truck would fit that was relatively close.

Once inside the conservatory, things were even more confusing because of the layout of the conservatory buildings. It was only after we were there a while that we figured out the conservatory is made up of three separate, older glass houses and one newer atrium/visitor center. The buildings are all connected by passageways, and the buildings and passageways form outdoor courtyards. There are also two terraces jutting off from the buildings. Initially, we couldn't figure out from the map they handed out at the visitor center which areas were inside and which were outside and what the best way was to get from one area to the other. Therefore, we picked the door to the right of the visitor center that looked like it headed into the conservatory. The first area turned out to be the Himalayan Mountain Area. This area, which is relatively small, contains a variety of conifers and deciduous trees adapted to harsh mountain conditions.

From the mountains, we entered the somewhat larger tropical rain forest.

Tropical rainforest

The third area was the Desert Room. There were a couple of special exhibits going on when we were at the conservatory featuring bonsai and topiary animals. We came to our first topiary, which was a gazelle, in the Desert Room.

Topiary gazelle

Other topiaries included elephants, a giraffe, and a lion outside in the courtyards.

Topiary elephants

Topiary giraffe

Topiary lion

One of the connecting passageways had an interesting display that consisted of plants in a rotating container with several kaleidoscopes aimed toward the plants. In the next photo, Paul is looking through one of the kaleidoscopes while rotating the plant container.

Paul rotating the plant container while looking through a kaleidoscope

Next is a short video showing what Paul sees.

Toward the rear of the conservatory, there are a pair of terraces. One of them had several attractive displays of container plants.

Canna and zinnias

Grouping of container plants

The Palm House is in rear of the conservatory. It was the first glass house built back in 1893. It is a tall structure containing a variety of palm trees.

Palm House

The Franklin Park Conservatory features numerous works by glass artist, Dale Chihuly. We first ran across his work when we visited Phipps Conservatory several years ago when we went to the winter flower show there while visiting Lora and J. Michael for Christmas. One of Chihuly's works is hanging in an alcove in the Palm House.

Artwork by glass artist Dale Chihuly

From the palm house, we headed out into the second courtyard where the bonsai display was located.

Margery with a bonsai ficus tree

As luck would have it, we saved the best for last. The third and final glass house on our tour contains the Pacific Island Water Garden. It is the home of the "Blooms and Butterflies" display that features beautiful and exotic plants and flowers from the tropics as well as dozens of butterflies flitting about. The Pacific Island Water Garden area has another rather large glass sculpture by Dale Chihuly.

View of the Pacific Island Water Garden area with a large orange and yellow glass sculpture by Dale Chihuly

Some of the exotic flowers in the Pacific Island Water Garden area

Some of the butterflies we saw

About 75% of the gardens at the conservatory are either inside or are in courtyards and terraces. However, there is a fairly extensive daylily garden outside on the south side of the conservatory complex. The daylilies were in full bloom. The photo below shows just a few of them.

A few of the many daylilies

There is also an outdoor garden area behind the conservatory. We headed there after seeing the daylilies.

View of the Palm House from the outdoor garden at the rear

Large stainless steel sculpture in the outdoor garden with the Palm House in the background

Another view of the sculpture with colorful flowers

The park where the conservatory is located also has a playground, several ponds, numerous walking trails, and several educational buildings. It was getting late so we didn't explore any further and headed back to the truck.

On the way back to the 5th wheel, we stopped at La Palma Mexican Restaurant in Millersburg for lupper. Mexican restaurants are kind of hard to find in Amish country, but last year we found La Palma in Millersburg and La Pueblito in Urichsville. They're both pretty good, but not as good as our favorite, Pancho's Villa in San Antonio, Florida.

We both had chicken chimichangas from the lunch menu ($7.35). When ordered from the lunch menu, meals come with either rice or beans, not both. That was fine with us because with chips and salsa beforehand, we still got enough to eat.

Paul with his chimichanga

With our bellies full, we headed back to the 5th wheel for an evening of TV.

Lora, J. Michael, and Lydia went camping with friends over the 4th of July so they didn't join us at Scenic Hills like they normally do. We just hung around the 5th wheel over the busy weekend and tried to stay out of everyone's way.

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Berlin, OH - Events of August 3, 2016

August 3rd was our 48th wedding anniversary. We took a day trip to Cleveland to visit the Cleveland Botanical Garden to celebrate. We took somewhat of a cross-country route much of the way rather than taking the interstate so we were able to enjoy more rural scenery.

Amish farmer raking hay north of Berlin on the way to Cleveland

The Cleveland Botanical Garden is a 10-acre garden that was founded in 1930. It is located a little less than 2 hours from Berlin on the eastern side of Cleveland next to Case Western University. Admission is $11 per person, and there is a $6 fee for parking.

We paid our admission and headed into the garden. Right outside the Visitor Center is a pond with a fountain and water lilies.

Waterlilies in the pond outside the Visitor Center

Cleveland Botanical Garden has numerous areas such as a Japanese garden, a woodland garden, a hosta garden, a rose garden and an idea garden with designs that could be adapted to your own back yard. Unfortunately, the only map available is the size of a half-sheet of paper, and numbers identifying the features on the map were so small we couldn't read them. As a result, we didn't always know the specific names of the areas we were seeing as we walked the garden paths. Therefore, rather than describe our tour of the garden area by area, we'll just show you the highlights of some of the things we saw.

Shady garden area with reflecting pool

Patio with container gardens

Another container garden collection

Hillside garden with waterfall

Colorful border of annuals

Waterfall beside a patio

Garden area set off by dramatic stone arches

Elegant pillars flanking the entrance to another garden area

Mixed annual-perennial border lining a brick walkway

View of container plants framed by an archway of evergreens

The Hershey Children's Garden has lots of things that appeal to kids of all ages. There is a splash fountain, kid-sized structures to explore, a maze, a pond with goldfish and a tree house. There are also lots of daily children's activities.

Gate into the Children's Garden

The Hershey Children's Garden was one of the first such gardens in the country when it opened in 1999. The garden was designed with direct input from children, and a tree house topped their wish list. It is the centerpiece of the children's garden.

Tree house in the Children's Garden

View of the Children's garden from the tree house

While in the Children's Garden, Paul got in touch with his inner child and pretended to ride a bronze frog like a bucking bronco.

Paul pretending to ride a bronze frog - Yee-ha!

In addition to the children's garden, there are also interactive activities for kids in the woodland garden. There were several groups of kids at the garden the day we were there from day care centers and/or day camps taking advantage of all the fun features for kids.

Cleveland Botanical Garden has the largest herb garden we have seen anywhere. There are different sections with medicinal herbs, culinary herbs, aromatic herbs, and herbs for dying fabrics with a total of over 3,500 plants.

Herb garden

On our way out of the garden, we stopped at the 18,000-square foot Eleanor Armstrong Smith Glasshouse that is attached to the Visitor Center. The glasshouse is divided into two sections - one featuring the spiny dessert of Madagascar and the other featuring a Costa Rican rain forest where you can walk through the jungle and watch hundreds of butterflies flitting about. There is a daily butterfly release at 2 p.m.

Butterflies in the rain forest side of the glasshouse

Butterflies weren't the only insects in the garden. There was a tree branch with a column of ants marching along carrying bits of leaves.

Ants carrying bits of leaves along a tree branch

We enjoyed our visit to Cleveland Botanical Garden. The photo below shows just a few of the many flowers we saw.

Some of the many flowers that were in bloom

Since it was our anniversary, since we had recently gotten a $10 discount coupon for Bahama Breeze that was going to expire soon, and since there was a Bahama Breeze on the eastern side of Cleveland not too far out of our way, we stopped there for lupper on our way back to Scenic Hills.

We had Firecracker Shrimp as an appetizer. Margery had almond encrusted talapia, and Paul had chicken with cilantro crema. We shared a Chocolate Island for dessert.

About to dig into our Chocolate Island dessert

With our bellies full, we headed back to Berlin for an evening of TV.