The wait is over, folks. You did it.
And now, without further ado, the rest of the ABG:
The Conservatory
After our snack, we made our way over to the conservatory, which is the primary location of the current art installation, Rich Soil, by Kristine Mays. The sculptures are life-size, 3D dancing wire figures. And they were pretty cool, very whimsical. I really enjoyed seeing her work!
And, to Logan’s delight, off on the side of the atrium of the Conservatory they have an amphibian display. There are about a dozen tanks, showcasing different kinds of frogs. Logan is currently obsessed with frogs and he was therefore obsessed with this exhibit. The bright poison varieties were especially swoon-worthy to our little guy.
Speaking of swooning, the next part of the conservatory quite literally had me in raptures. The jungle room aka the Tropical Rotunda. I’m pretty sure that’s what the Celestial Kingdom is like: all that lush greenery without the bugs. It. Was. Magical!! I mean, look:
To create the tropical atmosphere, the room was kept on the warm side. And every so often, misters sprayed out fine drops of water throughout the whole room.
We stayed in that room, wandering for quite a long time. It’s a relatively small room, but we kept wandering in circles, enjoying ourselves. And there was so much to see that it didn’t even really feel like we were wandering in circles.
Also, we learned about halfway through the room that masks were no longer required in there. HOORAY!!! It made it much more comfortable to wander through.
After the tropical rotunda, was the desert house
It was a warm, dry, room with tons of varieties of succulents from Africa. The variety and diversity was amazing!
Next up was the Bromeliad room (below). It contained lots of air plants and Spanish moss. (Spanish moss is not actually a moss! Who knew?)
After the Bromeliad room, we entered the Tropical High Elevation room… aka Heaven: The Sequel (and in this case, the sequel was as good as the first one)
There was a little pond with some tiny fish in it. 
Isaac loved the little fish. 
Well that’s one way of doing masks. 
This arch is what dreams are made of. Currently my lock screen background. 
Logan and Isaac were REALLY not feeling pictures at the moment. Rude. 
Fortunately, Clara and Jonas were cool with it. 
They are excellent 
photography subjects 
I love that they’re friends. 
It was noticeably cooler than the jungle room but still got misted at regular intervals. This room had a lot of really unique plants including many varieties of carnivorous plants.
By this time, everyone was getting hungry again, so, we had what basically amounted to a light lunch. And we ate in atrium of the Fuqua Orchid Center, which is just about the coolest lunch spot that I can imagine. It was lovely.
After our light lunch, we went into the Orchid display house, which houses a ridiculous variety of orchids against the backdrop of other beautiful plants and a pergola and more of Kristine Mays’ work.
All of the pictures below are from the orchid display house:
As much as we all loved the Conservatory and the Fuqua Orchid Center, we did eventually have to leave. 🙁 (They take up less than an acre of space, and we spent a couple of hours there The ABG is 30 acres total.)
Our next stop was the Edible garden, it featured a small orchard and vineyard, as well as lots of different kinds of herbs and vegetable plants. Naturally, it was All very beautifully arranged.
Next up was the Perennial garden. Which was mostly dirt, because it was too early for most of the plants. Understandably, we didn’t stay too long in this area.
While we were in the Perennial garden, we heard the sounds of children laughing and frolicking. Our children were intrigued by this and so we decided to go over to the Children’s garden…. or I guess you could say we went to the Kindergarten 🤓🤓 Just a little German joke for ya’ there. (Christina or Phil, tell me if my joke is totally off… Haha!)
And let me tell you, that Kindergarten was AMAZING!! There were just a lot of things for little people to do and climb on.
But let’s be honest, the slide was the star of the show for these kinders. It goes surprisingly fast! Here’s a great video of Logan and the twins going down the slide together:
No one was injured. No one cried. Everything was and is fine.
About 20 feet from the bench where Jonathan and I were sitting was a small pond. And of course, dear reader, you know that it didn’t take too long for Clara to head over there.
At first she had her hands in the water.
And then I looked back a few minutes later, and her shoes were off…
Then her feet were in the water. And she was wading…
And before I knew it, she was practically sitting in the water.
Her siblings all joined her at various stages in the above progression.
Apparently, the little fish in the water come along and “kiss” your hands, arms, legs, etc. If you sit still long enough. And that was the children’s objective.
We spent quite a while at the Kindergarten. And we were getting close to dinner time. And so, we opted to head out.
We made a quick stop at the Gift Shop to pick up some postcards, stickers, etc. And then we headed on home, by way of Fox Brothers BBQ, for some of the most amazing BBQ in the entire world. This place was recommended to us by a family that we met at church. It really was incredible. That brisket 🤤🤤 And they also had the best brussels sprouts I’ve ever had 🤤🤤
Basically, it was the perfect end to a perfect day.
