Every year, we drive a little ways to see the tulips blooming up at the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival in Mt. Vernon, WA. Last year there was snow on tulips in late April, this year we were greeted with blustery winds and a sky which rained before and after our visit, but not actually on us while we were there. The Tulip Festival is beautiful and gorgeous and such a bright display of color and light in an otherwise dreary Pacific Northwest rainy day. My oldest son even showed up in the Seattle Times (not my picture) wandering around the tulip fields!
My favorite thing about the festival is looking at the flowers. My boys? Obviously, the puddles and jumping over them. Followed closely by the tractor ride around the tulip fields. I don’t think we were able to keep my youngest out of any of the puddles there, and frankly, there were a lot of puddles. The look of sheer joy as he stomped his foot to see the splash come back up was worth the drenched clothes. Overall, it was a cold and wet visit, but it’s a family tradition which I wouldn’t give up for anything.
Welcome to Tulip Town, Mt. Vernon, WA. The tulip is world’s peace flower.
This is a storyboard, which tells a story. In this case, I wanted to showcase all the gorgeous blooms from the different tulip varieties.
My oldest kept doing this for all the pictures. I’m not sure if it was because it was super-windy and he liked the feeling of the wind between his arms, or he’s just being funny. Most likely the latter.
See, the arms are up again! He has a much more gleeful expression on his face in the red tulips, perhaps he liked them better than the pink ones. 
I tried to get both boys into the cute tulip action, but my youngest wasn’t having any inkling of cooperating with mommy.
I had much better luck sneaking up behind them. I love how you can see the dried mud on both of them from their numerous falls in mud puddles while walking around the tulips.
This is perhaps, one of my favorite pictures I’ve taken of my boys. I love that my oldest is still attached to the ground with some mud strings. I love that my youngest is so bundled against the cold he looks like a sumo wrestler about to chest bump his brother. And I love the puddles you can see them both trying to jump over.
Another storyboard. This one showing off my oldest son actually jumping over a puddle. I love the lean he has in the first picture!
Did I mention my son likes to jump?
The required “go stick your nose in the flower, son!” pose.
By this time, he was wet, cold, tired, and oh so done posing for me. I think his facial expression sums it up quite well.
Our 2010 trip to Tulip Town
