I love planning a surprise date night for Honey. ย It doesn’t happen often enough, but when it does I feel like we are both a bit giddy in the days leading up to it. ย For this one, I put “date night” on our family apple calendar, secured his mother to watch the littles, and bought the necessary tickets and made dinner reservations for an evening in town at Chihuly Nights at the Atlanta Botanical Garden.
We arrived in town at around 6:30 and started a meandering walk through the gardens. ย This was perfect time to arrive as we got to see twilight, the sun set and then take a second peek at some of our favorites lit up under the stars.
Honey first fell in love with Chihuly when we stayed at the Bellagio in Las Vegas for his dad’s 60th birthday celebration. ย It was magnificent art there in that stunning resort, but seeing his pieces installed throughout these lovely gardens was really breathtaking.
My favorites at twilight made me feel like I was in a fairy garden. ย Look how beautiful…
While many looked very natural in the garden, some were the opposite. ย Regardless, this Saffron Tower was just an incredible sight.
We took a leisurely walk through the garden as our dinner reservations at Linton’s weren’t until 8:30PM. ย There were plenty of little nooks to sit and soak it all in and we took advantage of many of them.
As the sun set, we both loved seeing the Atlanta skyline peeking out from garden. ย You could almost forget that you were in the middle of a huge, bustling city.
One of our favorites was an indoor exhibit literally filled with frogs. ย We questioned rather they were even real until we saw one tiny frog happily perched on a plant. ย The more we looked, the more we saw!
We ended our night with a lovely dinner on the patio at Linton’s. ย Located right in the garden, it is a stunning restaurant. ย We started with salads and a couple of appetizers and loved them. ย Our dinners were okay – not bad, but not something either of us were craving again. ย We would definitely go back, but would do a bunch of apps and forego dinner. ย Regardless, it was a lovely place to wind down at the end of a long week.
And, since I had visiting the Atlanta Botanical Gardens on my 40×41 bucket list, I am happy to mark this one complete as well!!
The Chihuly exhibit is coming to it’s close at the end of the month. ย BUT, the weather is absolutely perfect here in Atlanta to squeeze in a visit and I highly recommend doing so!! ย Chihuly Nights happen Tuesday through Sunday. ย If you go during the day with the littles, they also have a scarecrow exhibit going on.
Around Atlantaย | ย Atlanta Botanical Garden
DIXIE DELIGHTS DELIVERED
[madmimi id=246857]
What a fantastic idea for date night! xo
This is the perfect date night!! While I love Chihuly, the frogs would have given me a nervous breakdown…..I know it’s completely irrational, but they are my biggest fear. Stunning art though!
Not at all irrational – I feel that way about roaches. Like I can hardly breathe when I see one.
So funny! I had dinner with a girlfriend at Linton’s the same night. It was lovely– I hope you tried the butter. I will possibly be dreaming about that butter for the rest of my life…
The butter was DELISH! :-)
I LOVE Chihuly!! We’ve seen his work both at the Bellagio and at his gardens and museum in Seattle. His work is just stunning. What a wonderful date night!