We were eating breakfast on a Tuesday this past week, and for some reason the girls were quizzing me on the types of foods I didn’t like as a kid. It probably had something to do with Maddy picking at the delicious scrambled eggs I’d made for us. I was honest and told them that as a kid I hadn’t liked most preparations of eggs, zucchini, squash, eggplant, and mushrooms.

They remembered a story my mom told them about a time we were tricked into eating something we didn’t like. It was at a wedding for one of my mom’s friends. I think my siblings and I had played our violins for the wedding, so we also got to attend the reception. It was in a restaurant at the top of one of the skyscrapers in downtown Tampa. It was super-fancy, and I think it was a brunch.

So we sit down at our table, and the first course is brought out. Our eyes get big because it looks like a big plate of whipped cream. “Oh this is going to be good,” we think. Someone confirmed to us that it was whipped cream, or maybe my sister and I convinced my brother that it was. I can’t remember if we all took a bite, or just a couple of us, but somebody stabbed a fork in and got a big mouthful.

It was not whipped cream. It was eggs benedict. Which nowadays I would be super happy to have and would savor each morsel. As a kid, it was just gross. I’m sure our manners diminished slightly as we tried to remove the taste from our mouths. I don’t remember what we ended up eating, but it was not the rest of our eggs benedict. We were tricked for sure.

As I’m writing this, it feels like the weather is trying to trick us into believing it’s winter again. It’s wet and chilly, but the rain is great for our gardens. And we had a wonderful Spring Fling event this past Saturday – thank you to all of you who came out and joined us in celebrating spring with garden seminars, our kids’ planting activity, The Melt Machine Food truck, and fun giveaways.

Spring Fling was a fantastic day, and we’ll continue our events with our free seminar on Butterfly Gardening on March 25 at 10 a.m. Chilly weather or not, spring is here, and we’re excited to embrace the season’s gardening possibilities with you.