Last weekend we discovered what I consider the greatest park/outdoor space in the Cities. It's one of those "best places people aren't visiting," hidden gems, off the radar, kid-friendly spots totally worth checking out.
Maybe plenty of people know of this place, but I hadn't heard of it until a few months ago. It's the Tamarack Nature Center and it's in a Northern (i think) suburb, near White Bear Lake.
Max and I walked in first while Joe drove around for an extra 15 minutes with sleeping #2 & #3. As we approached the nature center there's this really cook frog sculpture covered in garbage that was pulled from the Mississippi (I just had to sing that little "M-I-SS-I-SS-I-PP-I" to spell that correctly) river. Max had fun seeing everything it was made out of.
First we headed inside to the nature center. I'd heard there was an outdoor play area but decided to go there once Joe, Otto & Wren joined up with us. Max enjoyed playing with all the real animal "parts" including these antlers, a deer hoof, lots of fur pelts among other things.
Once our whole family was together, we headed out to the nature area. It Was Awesome!
The 1st area was a big area with trees, logs, sticks, boulders and benches perfect for creative play. This was totally like the forrest right near our house, but with a bit more open space and just enough structure to spark their imagination. They played hard for a solid hour, totally engrossed in building, climbing and creating. When we walked into this area I immediately silently thanked the good people who decided to fence this area in. Little did I know the boys would have no interest in running away from this area for so long!!!
- A tree with a bunch of sticks around it like a teepee
- Max and I spent a solid half hour hauling sticks from the teepee to make a new kind of house with walls
- Otto took his time and made a really good campfire. He was quite precise and did a lot of detail work with little twigs.
- Big logs really good for running and jumping off of
- An outdoor, wooden xylophone
That was just the first of about five different outdoor play areas. They had a big rock wall with caves for climbing. There were a couple areas for sitting - some landscaped with cement and flowers, another in the woods with benches. Then there was a man-made river with rocks and sticks and water that pooled in sandy "beaches." Just enough water to sit in, cool off and play with. Although there appear to be a lot of people in the below photo, there really weren't. It was not crowded at all.
The last area we explored was a huge outdoor community garden they have. Rows and rows of squash, raised beds with herbs, bean huts and more.
- A view of the expansive garden area
- Max and the beanstalk
- The boys pumping water to tend to the crops
No comments:
Post a Comment