Talesin West by Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright began building this desert masterpiece in 1937 as his personal winter home, studio, and architectural campus. Located on the beautiful Sonoran desert in the foothills of the McDowell Mountains in northeast Scottsdale, the site offers a broad range of guided public tours.  Visitors experience firsthand Wright’s brilliant ability to integrate indoor and outdoor spaces.

Shelbi was VERY excited to go see this house. We decided to go and take a 90 minute tour and it was awesome. Here are a few pictures. We werent able to take any pictures of the inside unfortunately.

These were all over the property.

This was one of the rooms that they held meetings in.

The ceiling was canvas. That drawing is one that Frank Lloyd Wright submitted to Phoenix to use as a capitol building. It was never used as a whole. Although parts of it are.

The Front of the house and the area we werent allowed to go in.

The pool! It was only about 2 feet deep if that. And I wanted to go swim so bad!

One of the many artistic things they had on the property.

One of the towers that held water.

Another pool. And they wouldnt let me get in it!

Bell tower!

This beauty blew fire and was hooked to a gass line. But they only turn him on at night.

Statue garden.

And they little beauty was the most well behaved thing ever! We miss her VERY much!

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The Botanical Gardens

Okay this is going to be a tad long. And I apologize in advanced. I have way more pictures but I chose some of my favorites. Shelbi, Ann, Miss E, and I went to the Botanical Gardens. It was cool and had cool plants.

This cactus kinda reminded me of a beehive.

This sign cracked me up! I about died. It said What is a Catcus? A Cactus is a plant that is a member of the cactus family.  I about died!

I thought this one looked kinda like an armless, faceless, legless person.

This was SOOOOO tall for a desert plant.

This wonderful scary looking plant is called a teddy bear cactus. Is that funny or what!?

So we decided to take a break and get a drink and some brownie. And these birds were giving me a heart attack. They kept crawling around our feet and I thought one was going to peck my toe off.

View of the valley

Little Miss E was quite hot so we found a water thing to cool her off in.

This is for Ed. It is the only Utah plant that the whole place had and it of course had to be the littlest dang thing I have ever seen. Its called a Utah Agave.

I really want to have a furry tree! 

We were going into the butterfly hut and the sign cracked me up.

Butterfly house was very cool! There were all sorts of butterflys everywhere!

This poor thing had part of its wings broken off and it didnt move fore the longest time.

Miss E liked the butterflys.

Miss E as a butterfly. It took like 5 people to get her to look at us.

This cactus looks like a cabbage.

The prettiest flowers come from the scariest looking things.

These were at the exit and they were made out of glass. They were neat!

Sorry folks that this was soo long. 

Cibo

On Monday before Stefen went to school and before we went to the Botanical Gardens Shelbi decided to take us to the supposedly REALLY good pizza place. So we made the trek to downtown and discovered the menu was mostly in Italian and there was NO pizza. But there were really amazing sandwichs and salads.

Typical Stefen

Miss E and Shelbi

My sandwich with brushoto and tomatoe.

Stefens with steak I think.

Shelbis with eggplant

Anns salad

Not wanting sunscreen!

Friends say Happy Birthday!

On Sunday while Ann, Shelbi, and Miss E were here we had a birthday party with our friends. 

Miss E being bat girl!

Miss E getting her head massaged!

Uncle Button found a nice pillow for his head.

Strawberry cake with chocolate frosting! YUMM

Miss E being silly

Jaden massaging his head!

Stefen and Adam chilling

Jaden being a fashion diva!

It was a fun filled night with lots of laughs and silliness!